Re: Nerd Boy, episode 304

OK.. Here we go, a behind the scenes. First, I have some kind of idea.
In this case it was the "klaxon" thing. So I write a script.

   -N: "Klaxon" would be a good name for a villian.
    F: Yeah, too bad it means something.
   -
   -F: How about "Kleenex"?
   -
   -N: No.

Yes, I misspelled "villain" in the script. The "-" indicates a new panel,
so there are two empty panels in this one. After reading this a few times
I scrapped it and wrote the following.

   -N: "Klaxon" would be a good name for a supervillain.

   -N: Too bad it already means something.
    F: Yeah.. Wait, why are we talking about this?

   -N: Because you said something about villains?
    F: I was talking about Bob Dylan.

   -N: Why?

There's more flow in this one but it still kinda sucks. So then I changed
the last line to: "What kind of crappy supervillain is that?" And then
when I started drawing it (last panel first), I changed it to "Nah, that's
a crappy name for a supervillain."

Most of the time, since I've written the script in JavE and at the top of
the document, I don't have room to start drawing there. So I start drawing
the last panel first.

After a while, I got used to drawing the strips in that order. Now, even
if there's no script in the way, I start with the last panel. That way I
can arrange everything -- characters and background and stuff -- around
the punchline and then use that arrangement in the preceding panels.

Here's an intermediate scribble.

<strip in progress>

      -N: "Klaxon" would be a good name for a supervillain.

      -N: Too bad it already means something.

      -F: Yeah.. Wait, why are we talking about this?
       N: Because you said something about villains?

      -F: I was talking about Bob Dylan.
       N: Nah, that's a crappy name for a supervillain.






                             ,,,
                  OO         ..'
                  ||        .||.
          _______ bb _______ ||


                        I was talking          What? That's a -crappy-
                       about Bob Dylan!        name for a supervillain.
                                    `,,,               ,
                                     '..             OO
                                     -||-           ((
jg___________________________________ |\ __________ b b _____

</strip in progress>

Note that I moved the panel breakpoints so as to rearrange Fan Boy and
Nerd Boy to change the flow a bit. IMO, the pacing just seems better
in this version. I liked the contrast in pacing between the two first
and two last panels, so I decided to accentuate that by leaving out the
floor in the first two panels.

Well, that's it. Nerd Boy behind the scenes.

--
 OO  Joaquim G�ndara
.||. http://www.Nerd-Boy.net
 bb  jg

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