I am always happy to see and hear that comicsdevices.com is being used in schools and comics-making! Nice to know my random research obsession and the time I took to design the website are achieving their purpose 🌟

i'm legit almost angry at all the institutions that made people think their dream comic was unproduceable. Everything is produceable baby. The only limiter is how crazy you are

I don't know if these exact things have been covered yet, but @reimenayee.com has been doing a ton of research and cataloging of visual comic tropes over on comicsdevices.com

Comics Devices Library - The Creator's Guide to Comics Devices

An online library and meronomy of visual-narrative devices that are used in the medium of comics and other sequential art.

comicsdevices.com

Whoever is a comics creator in Australia and following me: applications for MAKE Comics Festival's Market Day is closing THIS FRIDAY NIGHT!! My friends and I will love to have you there!! makecomics.com.au/apply

It seems people are often afraid of liking their own art work due to the worry of being perceived as egotistical or conceited, but you can still love your work and have a huge driving force behind that acting as a love for learning and improving. You can be proud and seek joy while you grow.

Reimena's work is so delightful! If you have critter friends and want them to look extremely cute on paper, go thither.

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · 3w ago

🦜 My pet portrait commissions are open for the summer until August 30th! reimenayee.com/commissions Check out my portfolio of 1000+ pet portraits: reimenayee.com/pet-portraits/ #art

🦜 My pet portrait commissions are open for the summer until August 30th! reimenayee.com/commissions Check out my portfolio of 1000+ pet portraits: reimenayee.com/pet-portraits/ #art

“Lettering is supposed to be invisible” is a little simplistic. If the letterer is doing their job w/ skill, and in harmony w/ the art, it elevates the comic even though you might not register HOW. Bad lettering is more noticeable because it drags the art & writing down with it.

The fun part with making historical fiction is that I get to learn about and include a facet of history that is underfeatured. In this case: the Georgian Era proto-gay/queer/drag subculture of the Molly Houses. 🎀 The World in Deeper Inspection webcomic update: alcottgrimsley.com/comic/c2007-...

The fun part with making historical fiction is that I get to learn about and include a facet of history that is underfeatured. In this case: the Georgian Era proto-gay/queer/drag subculture of the Molly Houses. 🎀 The World in Deeper Inspection webcomic update: alcottgrimsley.com/comic/c2007-...

You know what’s so funny, when I acquired this I knew I was on the ace spectrum (demisexual) which is a major reason I loved it. But only last year did I realize I’m fully ace. I may no longer be the editor but I can’t wait for this book to get to the hands that need it most (me included).

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · 2mo ago

Hyped to announce BEE'S GUIDE TO APPLIED ROMANTICS: a teen romcom graphic novel with an #asexual heroine!! 💜🖤 I'm excited to be making this with my friend Erica Eng. Bee loves all things romance but has never been asked out. When one of her BFFs asks her for help to win a crush... (1/4)

you should want to honor and compensate the people who empower and enable your work, especially when we’re talking about queer works. at some point we have to break the cycle of our elders, activists, and archivists dying in poverty and obscurity.

if we want to be treated with any kind of respect or rigor as an art form we need to extend the same consideration to others! ESPECIALLY right now when ai is flattening our collective work, the devil is always in the details & proper attribution matters more than ever

toril@toril.bsky.social · last mo.

comics people cry that comics aren't taken seriously as a medium and then refuse to act like serious artists

In my experience (as an editor of several nonfiction graphic novels/memoirs), these issues have largely been navigated by instinct! Ben will tell you, like @natepowell.bsky.social and other cartoonists, that he developed a stronger sense of historiographical responsibility *while* making the book

Lisa Gullickson@sidewalksiren.bsky.social · last mo.

Here is an example of the citations at the end of More Weight: A Salem Story by Ben Wickey. There are 55 pages of citations and typed, so maybe some would consider that unwieldy and aesthetically incongruent, but what is the greater issue?

Chris is so good at articulating my own thoughts about this situation.

Chris Schweizer@schweizercomics.bsky.social · last mo.

I'm sorry for everyone involved in this because I don't think Walden was trying to co-opt someone else's work but was using it as a springboard to tackle a historical subject, and I don't think that Cleves is overreacting to what she quite fairly feels is adaptation rather than an independent work.

I had always wondered how to produce multi-page (8+pages) citations together with the full-colour 300+ page graphic novel. The best I could come up with is a cheap tiny booklet that’s stapled to the front or back, like those supplementaries in a school textbook

comics are already a multi-discipline quagmire of conflicting word and art definitions. there not being any kind of established standard bumping up against a precise world of acknowledged permissions is going to cause issues without a little more grace

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · last mo.

And! Academics and cartoonists gotta form a better understanding of each other’s publishing/creative culture. The risk of miscommunication is going to happen more as more historical genre comics get made. The thread below describes what I mean.

Also, to stick up for my fellow cartoonists, there is a lot of transformative work involved in taking material from a primary or secondary source and turning it into a page of comics/sequential art that is almost impossible to reflect in a citation

B. Erin Cole@berincole.bsky.social · last mo.

as a cartoonist and historian, I've seen many history comics that are VERY casual about citations. Citations are so important: they thank others for their work, tell the reader who you see yourself in relationship to and how you developed your thought, and provide roadmaps for future researchers.

Forever grateful to my mentor/consultant Richard Stoneman for being so generous and kind with his life’s work and time for Alexander Comic 😭 (I am slowly building up the strength to continue the work soon)

Historical fiction comics discourse: this exact scenario is why I have this anxious academic (dressed as vigilant) tendency to need the receipts for where all my sources and creative decisions came from 💀😭

TBH, this isn't uncommon w/ historical GNs, though this case is especially extreme... Most comic editors aren't familiar w/ best practices for nonfic; creators approach as artists, not journalists/historians. (And yeah, a comic adaptation IS "transformative", but it's still built on others' work.

The World In Deeper Inspection is updating again! I'd call it a glorious mess, a comic version of primordial soup. It's a creation that has itself spun off the lovely book The Carpet Merchant of Konstantiniyya. Could happen again, who knows? Great time to read the archive, then hop into new pages.

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · last mo.

My first webcomic, The World in Deeper Inspection, is out of hiatus. alcottgrimsley.com/comic/chapte...

Srsly tho my actual advice to young cartoonists is that it's not always wise to do your first comic as an epic especially if you haven't had any practice making/finishing writing or drawing comics before, but if you want to gamble on it, then you'd need to accept or be aware of some things

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · last mo.

It's a miracle TWIDI grew up with me and I feel no cringe towards it. And that 15 Year Old Me was smart for future-proofing TWIDI by making the structure non-linear episodic instead of a long linear narrative Anyway, don't begin your first (web)comic with the grand epic you came up with as a teen...

Webcomic

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · last mo.

My first webcomic, The World in Deeper Inspection, is out of hiatus. alcottgrimsley.com/comic/chapte...

but also like i genuinely think it's fine to start a big epic project you won't finish. finishing something < learning abt yourself, what you actually want to do, improving your skills, figuring out your work pace, making friends with peers. i think those are the goals of an early creative career

tsuch a great insight on making long comics as a young cartoonist. i don't regret making balderdash! (my own little epic) as my first big project & i genuinely think it's fine to pursue long projects you never finish. but this 👇 is very likely to happen & it did to me! it's okay to pivot

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · last mo.

Like the likely risk you'll outgrow your epic as you mature, whether that's due to the art style or the storytelling sensibility (the common cause of death of a first webcomic). There's ways to build in a strategy that accomodates growing up and changing tastes, but Idk how to articulate that

Good thread. People don't start creative projects anymore cause they think they have some big sweeping thing simmering in them. Then they start and realize making big things is a lot of work. Then it never gets done. Also because this thing is their first thing, they they're kinda mid at making it.

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · last mo.

Srsly tho my actual advice to young cartoonists is that it's not always wise to do your first comic as an epic especially if you haven't had any practice making/finishing writing or drawing comics before, but if you want to gamble on it, then you'd need to accept or be aware of some things

Srsly tho my actual advice to young cartoonists is that it's not always wise to do your first comic as an epic especially if you haven't had any practice making/finishing writing or drawing comics before, but if you want to gamble on it, then you'd need to accept or be aware of some things

Reimena Yee 🦇@reimenayee.com · last mo.

It's a miracle TWIDI grew up with me and I feel no cringe towards it. And that 15 Year Old Me was smart for future-proofing TWIDI by making the structure non-linear episodic instead of a long linear narrative Anyway, don't begin your first (web)comic with the grand epic you came up with as a teen...

Cartoonists advise to not begin your first (web)comic with the grand epic you came up with as a teen, but like 18 Year Old Me you can also disregard that and somehow have it be the thing that built you up to a publishing career and the one project that keeps your sanity intact