This Comics Basics Track provides a basic foundation for visual elements and strategies that are specific to drawing sequential narratives. The world of historical comics and comics today is incredibly diverse and vast, and we want to expose you to the enormous potential of this exciting format for storytelling.
This track will get you to exercise the hard skills you’ll need as well as an overview of every facet of the comics process: writing, scripts, thumbnails, panels, spreads, pages, text, speech bubbles, and more.
See our Comics Curriculum, part of our Curriculums for Self-Taught Artists for a broad overview of comics. Check out our Comics section for tutorials and other resources.
Comics Basics Premium Track
Need more guidance, or someone to kick your butt? Purchase our Comics Basics Premium Track where you’ll get comprehensive support from the Teaching Artist Cat Huang and Prof Lieu through weekly voice sessions and critiques in our Discord.
Pacing
Do the track at your own pace! Taking the time to process the content is important, so we don’t advise putting pressure on yourself to finish the track quickly. Remember to have fun and enjoy the process! Hear Prof Lieu’s explanation of the track in this video.
Share Your Progress
Post your ongoing progress in the #artprof-tracks channel in our Discord, you’ll get support and feedback from the community! Tag us @art.prof on Instagram with #artproftrack so we can share your work.
Ongoing Assignment
Ideally, this ongoing assignment is to be done simultaneously with the weekly assignments. However, if your schedule doesn’t fit well with this, and you want to do the ongoing assignment at a separate time than the weekly assignments, our suggestion is to do the ongoing assignment for 3 weeks straight. The continuity is important so any time that you can draw daily for 3 weeks is great.
reading comics
Read comics every day! Half the battle in making comics is reading them.
Lesson 1
instructional comic
Draw a comic that provides instructions for how to prepare your favorite snack, without using any keyboard symbols.
Lesson 2
animal sounds comic
Create a comic that shows an action that prompts an animal to make a sound.
Lesson 3
birthday party comic
Draw a 4 panel comic based on a birthday party you had at any point in your life.
Lesson 4
100 year old self
What do you imagine/hope/wish you will be like when you are 100 years old? Draw a comic based on your future self.
Lesson 5
argument comic
Create a comic that is an argument between 2 people.
Lesson 6
“all in a dream” comic
If you realized you were dreaming, what would you do in that dream? Create a comic based on that scenario.
Finished?
- Submit your track images + info via this upload form.
- You can choose to receive a hard copy certificate from us via snail mail. (this includes international people)
- We’ll feature your track work in an Art Prof Share segment in one of our live streams on YouTube.
- We’ll post your name, a link of your choice, your slideshow, and video feature on the corresponding track page in our student gallery area.
