The DFC authors and illustrators give their tips on creating your own comic strip!
The Etherington Brothers
The first thing to think about is the character's personality, if they are friendly or villainous, energetic or lazy etc. This will help you with the next stage of your design - picking a shape and size for your creation!
In our comics all the character's personalities are described in Robin's scripts, which really helps me identify the elements of their design which I will exaggerate.
In my head I try to think of something very original for each character I draw. It's good to have lots of pictures of animals and plants and other weird things to inspire you, but the best tool is your imagination! A good excercise is to try to combine two unlikely objects to help you come up with an original shape for your character's body,head,hands,etc. For example, what would a monster look like that was a mixture of a Rhino and a Chocolate Cake?
Dave Shelton
When I create characters I usually start with the drawing and then when I'm happy with their appearance I look at them and ask myself what kind of people (or dogs) they seem to be. Then if I decide they look like they're quite interesting I draw them some more and think more about their characters. If I look at them and I don't care about what kind of people (or dogs) they are then I start again. I try to base the designs of characters around quite simple shapes and make my main characters very different in size, shape and colour so that it's always easy to tell them apart. Matt Groening, who created the Simpsons, says that you should always be able to identify a character just from their silhouette and that's a very useful rule. I find you can achieve this pretty efficiently by giving them the right hat.
Nick Abadzis
Imagine what you or your best friend would look like as a cartoon character and draw that. You could also use your your brother, sister, mum or dad, or someone else you know.
If you don't want to use yourself or someone you know as a starting point, you can use your favourite animal - a cat or dog, say, or an elephant or a snake.
All you really ned is a starting point, and it can be anything you like. The only limit is your imagination! If you've picked your friend, say, imagine what they would look like as an alien, or a monster. You can give them big ears or a sinister smile; you can add all sorts of fun and silly things, like anntennae or suckers or big warts or giant feet. Don't go too mad, though - if you want to draw a comic strip featuring your character, you'll have to draw them doing all sorts of different things - walking, running, talking, eating. The trick is to keep them simple and yet individual.
The face is always a good place to begin, as that's what people notice first about a person. When I first designed Cadet Zugg from Cora's Breakfast, I wanted a friendly, funny-looking alien. Because the strip is all about Breakfast, I thought of what people like to eat when they wake up in the morning. Personally, I'm fond of eggs, so an egg-cup came to mind. If you look at him, Zugg looks a little like a green egg with arms and legs in an oversized egg-cup - at least while he's got his blue spacesuit on. It's worth looking around you at ordinary household objects for inspiration.
There's no easy way to explain how to do this but you must try to imagine your character's mood. Are they sad, angry, happy, bored, frantic, or lazy? Think of the expressions you yourself pull when you're in any of those moods, and try to draw those. Where are they going, what are they doing and who will they meet? Think of all the situations you are in every day - when you go to school, go shopping with your parents, play games with your friends. Think about how your character might be in any of those situations and what makes them happy or sad.
John Aggs
Make the look of your character the same as the way they act. If they're a crazy character, then they should look pretty crazy too!
Base your characters on people you know. It can be a bit mean but it works! Turn your teachers into aliens! Try and make your characters have a strong outline. Superman, Batman or Bart Simpson- you can easily tell who they are from a mile away, just from their silhouette.Use bold colours so people remember your character. Just like a sweet wrapper or a brand logo. That's why superheroes wear such bright clothes!