Tools for making comics

2020 article on easy, digital comics-making apps – NYTimes

ComicLife software, easy to drop images and add text, promotes itself as having: “Zero Learning Curve — so easy, you and your dog will be making comics in minutes.” Most popular one out there. Most flexible too.
Printable Comics Templates – big start big end panels
Lego Comics builder – looks like fun!
Kerpoof V. simple, painfully cutesy – lots of template drawing tools. Suggests possibility of integrating user photos, images from google maps, etc., to recreate scenes without drawing skills.
The Automatic Comics Mixer – comics-generating web app from Samplerman!
ComicSketch Simple, gets you started drawing panels right away.
BitStrips for Schools : Lots of good characters, kidsy, cute decent model.
Comic Creator : Allows users to: choose backgrounds, characters, and props, as well as to compose related dialogue (shown at left). This versatile tool can be used by students from kindergarten through high school, for purposes ranging from learning to write dialogue to an in-depth study of a formerly neglected genre. The tool is easy to use, made even easier with the Comic Strip Planning Sheet” My assessment – sucktastic. But, the ease of use and ability to drop characters, etc., suggests there are better out there.
Make Belief Comics : Pretty cool, easy to use, user friendly – good characters to choose from – promising. About founder Bill Zimmerman: A journalist and prize–winning newspaper editor, Zimmerman for 13 years created an interactive, syndicated Student Briefing Page for Newsday newspaper to teach young people about current events. It pioneered the use of interactive techniques found in his books to encourage young readers to express their opinions about the world they live in and brought in hundreds of thousands of letters. The page was nominated twice for a Pulitzer Prize. At Newsday, Bill also created a series of comic books to teach history and current events to young readers.
Balloon Talk, samples of dialogue/thought/etc balloons – from Blambot fonts
Resource-filled article on comics making tools for teachers – plus video with 26 tips for using comics
Article with Five Comics generator tools for educators – from Marygrove college in Detroit!
Comics generators and literacy – interview w Bill Zimmerman on Connect the Pop
Comics generation tools – on connect the pop
More comics generation tools: bitstrips – from connect the pop
Article on Bitstrips – from the Guardian
Lesson on using an ipad to make comics with students – from Nathan Stevens
Article on Matt Finch/Fun Palace comics generator site – BoingBoing
Fun Palace online make your own comics generator

Drawing
Learn to Draw – Famous Artist Cartoon Course – public domain

Comics makers’ sites on process
Creator Resource – Comic Book Freelancing Tools & Resources – very useful for aspiring cartoonists!
Dean Haspiel shows his process – from breakdowns to scripts to finishes
Jessica Abel – on using indesign for scripting comics re: Bechdel – from her blog
Raina Telgemeier on how a graphic Novel is born and raised – from Inside a Dog
Fred Van Lente on writing a comics script
A database of Sample Comic Book Scripts
Comicsexperience – database of sample comic book scripts
Matt Fraction on breaking down a Batman Year One page to practice script writing
Scott McCloud’s site – he’s Scott McCloud, ’nuff said!
R. Sikoryak’s site – the creator of Masterpiece Comics (mashups of cartoons and lit) and the comics Carousel slideshow
Comics artists offer their 10 Rules for Drawing Comics – ongoing blog
James Sturm comic The Sponsor – on pursuing your work
Alison Bechel Coda to Fun Home – from Vulture
Myfanwy Tristram’s 9 Steps to making a comics page – blogpost
Neill Cameron’s Comics Making Resources – templates, etc

MiniComics Making Guides
Minicomic @ BigTimeAttic
Article on making mini comics @ comics reporter
Minicomic making by the Cartoonists League
Minicomic video – on YouTube
Making a simple Mini-Comic – by Abel and Madden
Jessica Abel’s mini-comics making guide – extensive!
DocPop’s mini-comics guide – with template
Marek Bennet mini-comics video tutorial & comics version
Quirk Books Mini-Comics Guide 1, Mini-Comics Guide 2, & Mini-comics Overview
The “foldy” mini-comic guide by Abel & Madden
Comics manifesto by Josh Shalek – defunct site
Guide and printout for making accordion style mini-comics – by Grant Thomas
Alec Longstreth’s minicomic on making/publishing minicomics – talk at the Center for Cartoon Studies
Lydia Wysocki’s mini comic guide to making mini comics – the pdf of her comic
Comic on How to Make your Own Biographical Comic Strip – Matt Boyce on DW&WP
Frank Young & David Lasky – talk how to collaborate on a graphic novel – regarding their book the Carter Family
Neill Cameron’s InstaComics – mixed media, easy comics making exercise
Make a Halloween Mini-comic – on Crafty
Instructions on making an Infinite Flipper booklet – YouTube

Unusual format Mini-Comics examples:

Eero Kozmo Knot

Tess Eneli Reid The Birth of Linda


Relativité by Audrey Hess Editions rutabaga

Beth Hetland site (pictures via Barbara Postema)

Pranas Naujokaitis’s Laffy Meal

Jason Shiga’s Mathematical Comics Innovations & a tutorial (the Last Supper interactive comic pictured above)

Caitlin Cass Women’s Work mini-comic

Editions Rutabaga – novel mini-comics

Cool mini-comics video by Les Editions Polystyrene

Jeanne-Pierre Vortex unfolding comic! (video)

Ken Wong Flexagon

Harvey Kurtzman Hexaflexagon Flexagon site

Andy Poyiadgi Origami Comic

Guy Pradel’s Cocotte folding Comics – with PDF templates

 

Andy Hirsch Flashlight Comic

Jim Woodring Moebius Strip Comic

Moebius strip comic – via Matemolivares blog

Jake Tokheim’s awesome Ring Comic (from my making comics class!)

Shinrashinge Rotating Cups Comic (i know not a mini-comic, but fascinating)

Jon Chad The Ruby w/construction paper foldy comic glued into the middle of the mini. As it unfolds it includes larger and large images. (via Jarod Rosello)

Jessica Abston and Alex Kim Medusa  – accordion comic (via Jarod Rosello)

John Martz mini-comic yearbook. Jarod Rosello says: “Formally experimental in a different way, but, if I recall correctly, it’s a completely redrawn high school yearbook from 1968, printed and bound as a mini. So cool and so weird.”