Well it sure is, when you consider everything, it really is hard to write something with everything you want and in a solid block. Sometimes, I feel the need to just block off the rules and formalities, in order to write, and sometimes I feel like if I don't follow them something will result in a flaw, and cause problems later on (which is why I want this next story to be entirely written out before I begin)

Being constantly influenced by many things also adds to the difficulty, especially when you want to take the elements of things that you like, mesh them together in a new way, and present them to the world. Just the sound of that sounds hard, but it sounds so fun, and so fulfilling.

Recently, I just binged about 300 episodes of anime in the past 1-2 weeks, to get a grasp on what I was writing, and to chew out the flaws and good points other creations have made (notably popular ones, and things I've been generally avoiding). If you want to see what I've been watching, you can check it out here: 

my list of anime

Another thing that is creating this writing block, is no less the result of wanting to capture an audience to an enticing story. So many manga, and stories, can have bad starts, and appear as generic, no matter how much effort is put in to make it dynamic. Ignoring the rules feels too dangerous here, but following the flow of the medium, and the rest of the tropes and ideals seems to also lead to a swift death.

Either way, I want to experiment with how I can get people to read a text, without being to overbearingly scary. So I want to appeal in this order:

1. An interesting, unique cover page. 

For example, Let's take other manga as an example. Of the cover pages here, which one are you most likely to read?

Without personal Bias, the fourth one seems the most interesting, but the overall level of these title pages seem to draw almost no attention to what the manga is about, except the fourth one, and possibly the fifth one (ignoring the titles).

In their own right, they are trying to appeal to certain audiences, such as the first one, would tend to appeal to people going after shoujo romances. But they are also general enough to leave a wider audience wondering what it is about. More specific targeting cover pages, would use elements such as sexual appeal, an item of interest ( sports, weapons, magic, school clothes) , or anything of the like. But what I would like to make is something that is either shows an original style or representation, that would pique a potential reader's curiosity. Colors, design and overall conveyance are all important. I think the consistent style of Assassination classroom's cover pages brings a curious reader to try it, while bright colors or unusual colors that draw attention that highlight the context of the story, (or does not) does well to bring attention. It is not to say to judge a book by its cover, but people easily judge a book by its cover, nearly all the time.

For my OH MAN covers, I had experimented with this in itself. With an appealing title logo, and ensuring the content of the title pages itself are interesting. Subtitles were also used to help the impression and increase the curiosity levels.The first one, calls out the curiosity factor for this odd looking character in the world. The second cover page, brings in the new characters, which has an appealing factor, working in tandem with this odd character. For cover page 3, I used complementary colors, and an element of the story to bring out interest. For cover page 4, bright warm colors were used to highlight the new world, to create an eye popping sensation. For cover 5, I experimented with a newer style and a more scenic composition and a variety of colors and a misty feel to highlight the fore coming and current elements in the story. I actually considered these elements a little, but composition was more important before most of these creations. Check them out here ( and see how bad they are.. ). Which one do you think is the most interesting?

  

Aside from cover pages, next would be..

2. Plot summary and Synopsis

Generic plot lines, generic names, and synopsis covering only the beginning scope of the story, are what I dislike the most. Things that do well to leave the reader in thought of the characters and potential elements, instead of summarizing the beginning of the story do much better to present the work. Many works have misleading synopsis of what the actual content of the anime, or manga actually holds, because it doesn't look to the meat of the story, but rather the tip of the iceberg. If you were to go to a fancy restaurant, and order a steak, you would rather want a superb delicacy over a pretty piece of rock. It is much more important to tell you about the taste and texture of the meat, rather than the decorations that present itself for your first impression.

3. Introduction and Beginning events

In line with the synopsis, must work well with the actual beginning of the story and its function. If people can't get curious or interested at the first chapter, it has already failed. People read the synopsis in order to prepare their expectations of the work, and if you make it too specific, what you are limited to do in presentation starts to diminish. Highlight what people seek, and lead them on. Presenting all your cards will limit the ability to do things past the first step.

For the actual story itself, the power of presentation of information has to lull the reader in to ask questions and have them answered, in time and in cycle. Just like a manga, cliffhangers are presented to lead people on to ask a question, and have it become answered in possibly the next chapter. However, it is not just limited to chapter by chapter, but, page by page, event by event, panel by panel, or even text by text. Of course, the smaller the element, it needs less impact, and needs moderation in how important the dialogue is. Set up people to understand what will happen, and try to read the expectations by what has been set up. With this, you can control the reader and the story both, to have a very good time, or a bad time. Its all up to how well it is written and executed.

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Those would be my main 3 focuses in creating my new work. But before all that has to even take place, I need to write and ensure that a fantastic, interesting, surprising story can even be made, before introducing all of the extra elements. For my next post, I want to try making a super short story ( or at least an intro to one), and see if you guys are interested in it, or think it sucks.

 

Anyways, thanks for reading!

ceroblitz

 

 

 

 

I just have the need to get my thoughts out on all this story crafting nonsense, and what I'm considering for the next thing I'm working on. We certainly have many of our own tastes and dislikes, and general quality of a subject will improve the creation in question. But even quality, isn't directly related to it's ultimate reception. People come across crappy creations all the time. But does that mean they aren't good?

Lets say you have an idea you want to get across to people. Before you worry about format and what you plan to include, is it the best conveyance of the idea? Let's take a look at some examples of manga, namely, scenes that are high in execution.

Manga is about conveying a progression of a story from a particular perspective across the time it takes to read though and enjoy the moment. If the time and pace of the manga or story isn't believable, people can never get immersed or want to engage with the world. There needs to be a balance of presentation and understanding, alongside time for the reader to understand what is going on.

So lets take a look at this page, from the manga Helck (which you should read, it's really good, but I can't say it is perfect. But super enjoyable! Also, spoiler warning):

Chapter 36 - Helck

Revelation scenes like this, are built up with worldbuilding throughout the story. The less expected the element of revelation, the more exciting and interesting it is. The pace of this page, is overall slow, and the spacing between each bubble and panel is big enough for people to understand there is some huge relevance behind the sword. Keeping it brief and expressive, slow and steady is important in scenes like these, and a good grasp must be held, and gets the reader to understand: "Hey, this thing has some big relevance for upcoming events!"

Of course, manga isn't built just on scenes like these, and need to have a balance of scenes that get a lot of information out through text and scenes that give a lot of time to connect with pictures and pacing.

A lot of text can easily alienate the viewer from reading a scene, but if it is well spaced, and well worded, people won't be even able to tell.

Lets take a look at this text panel from Hunter x Hunter, which has overall great paneling, and a moderately fast pace. (Though the art is inconsistent, it's easy to understand, which is important)

At a glance, the text is easy to receive, but it's density can easily drive away people from taking all the details in. This brings up the question of how many of these words actually matter to the plot, if the reader should even have to read it all? Compared to the majority of the manga, which has spaced text of no more than 15 words per bubble, taking in fewer lines in less dense formats allows people to take in the information without really thinking about it.

But is there a way for people to take in larger amounts of text more easily?

If we have a different format to perceive information in relation to the picture - text format. Most words are contained within bubbles, and in manga, sometimes is generally hard to follow who says what without knowing the conventions. (I made this mistake in OH MAN quite often, with bubbles being squashed everywhere to fit in tons of lines of text).

When people are confronted with many chapters to read in any subject medium, people will tend to want to read in the least amount of time as a result of the overwhelming amount of chapters ahead. But if you follow a weekly release, you may find yourself re reading chapters that send out a certain feeling, and read it slowly compared to starting a new release. This doesn't apply to everyone, but I know people that read very quickly through manga. Of course, if it's really good, it warrants a re read as you didn't know what you were getting into before. But if it's mediocre, you'd be glad you didn't spend a lot of time trying to read something that you wouldn't have understood in the first place. A fear of the second option and a desire for the first option is the reason why people try out almost every different manga, and read through it very quickly.

If I can get readers to read through something slowly, while still maintaining enjoyment, would be the most optimal form of execution in a work. However, since everyone is different, to devise a form that is best suited for everyone is a difficult task. A format I had in mind are here:

Richer Dialogue will be presented almost in a forum like style, while phrases in action oriented scenes will still be in bubbles. These will have a max limit of 15 words, while the dialogue will have 15+. Since scrolling will the major form of progression still, the use of vertical spacing will be utilized a lot more to direct pacing, instead of cramming every panel into a page by page format.

 

If any more formats come to mind I'll try and post them.

 

Thanks for reading!

ceroblitz