Readable Manga Starts with "Kind Storyboards"! 3 Improvement Points You Can Use Right Now, Taught by a Pro [With Correction Examples]

"Why isn't my manga getting read much..."
"I feel like it's different from commercial works, but where exactly...?"

It's sad when you've come up with a good story and good characters, shaped them, but they don't get across, isn't it?
Maybe no one can empathize with my values... you might think.

That might not be a "mismatch of values," but a "mismatch in how you convey them."

Hello, I'm the manga artist 9℃.

I was happy that so many people read my previous idea article! Thank you.

As promised, this time I will talk about
how to create kind storyboards.
I have a small announcement at the end, so please be sure to read through!

What is a "kind storyboard"?

First, I will explain the "kind storyboard" mentioned in the article title.
It's a term I coined myself, but...

The appeal of manga is determined by "storytelling ability x direction ability"

Since the unstable yardstick of "appeal" is hard to use, let's break down the elements that make up "appeal."
The appeal of manga is created by abilities that can be roughly divided into two.

• Storytelling ability... The ability to create plans, scenarios, and characters

• Direction ability... The ability to express the above elements through manga techniques

Differences in the speed of improvement for storytelling and direction ability

The important point is that these two abilities are completely different in nature.

Honestly, it is difficult to level up storytelling ability in a short period of time.

The foundation of storytelling ability depends on sensibility, experience, perspective, and creativity, etc.
This doesn't mean "you can't improve because you have to compete with what you were born with," but rather
"it's difficult for everyone to improve using the same method with reproducibility."
Since everyone should choose the path that suits them, it's not like you'll get better immediately just by reading this book or taking a course!.

Conversely, storytelling ability is a 'skill that you can spend your whole life improving as much as you want.'
Because there is no ceiling to how good it can get. Isn't that fun!

On the other hand, directing ability can be raised to a professional level in a relatively short period of time.

Directing techniques (paneling and composition) have somewhat universal patterns, and they are all set with the goal of
having the reader read without stress or misunderstanding.
The necessary foundation is only knowledge, practice, and objectivity, and even if you put the amount of knowledge into a book, it would be small.

In short, what I want to say here is,

while nurturing your storytelling ability in the long term, first raising your directing ability, which can be improved immediately,

is recommended because you can feel the improvement and it brings you much closer to getting published!

Improving directing ability allows you to create considerate storyboards

I just talked about the reason why you should acquire directing ability.
"Having the reader read without stress or misunderstanding"
This is everything.
This is just another way of saying "considerate storyboards."

Why are "inconsiderate storyboards" bad?
Who loses out when you cause stress to the reader and they misread it?

The author.

There is a proverb that says "kindness is not for others," and it is the same thing.
Considerate storyboards are not for the reader.
By having the reader read without stress or misunderstanding, they will read the manga you worked so hard to draw until the last page.
In the panel you directed with the thought, "Stop here and be moved by this scene!", they will stop and be moved.
Let's realize the consideration needed to be read through technique.

What are "inconsiderate storyboards"?

Now that the goal is clear, next is grasping the situation.

What is a manga that lacks directing ability?

Please forgive me for having to be harsh.
I sometimes read amateur works on submission sites, and what I often feel is

• hard to understand

• somehow tiring

• The story doesn't stick in the reader's mind, etc.

Do you understand the gravity of this situation...
it's hard to even reach the point of discussing the plot, themes, or characters in the case of an unkind manga.

And standing as an even harsher reality is the fact that
editors (readers) can basically sense this "unkindness," but not many can suggest exactly what needs to be improved.

I have been correcting storyboards for serialized works in various places, and my experience is that

Something like that.

That's why manga artists basically have to think for themselves.
What kind of expressions of mine are leading to this unkindness?

...However, it's difficult to just say "Let's think about it!" all of a sudden.

The main topic starts here!
I, 9°C, will introduce 3 frequently occurring expressions in "unkind storyboards" and propose ways to fix them.

Let's get right to the 3 specific examples!

3 Common Errors in Unkind Storyboards

To put it bluntly,

• It's hard to tell who is saying which line

• The character feels like they are rattling on quickly

• There is little motivation to turn the page, and little payoff even if you do.

Honestly, it's mostly just this.
I mentioned earlier that the knowledge required for directing is minimal, which means there isn't that much variation in unkindness either.

From here, I will talk about 3 specific improvement methods.
By the way, they are easier to fix in order from the top. The third one is a bit of a challenge.

3 Ways to Quickly Improve "Unkindness"

1. Add tails to your speech bubbles

First, let's address the first error: "It's hard to tell who is saying which line."

Add a tail to the speech bubble. That's it.

...I'm sure you're thinking, "Wait, that's it?" so let me explain.

When a character inside the panel is speaking,you should point the tail of the speech bubble toward that character's face (mouth)... that's what I mean.

It is unnecessary when a character outside the panel is speaking. (*There are ways to use tails in such cases, but this often leads to a mismatch between the author's and reader's intentions, so I don't recommend it unless you have a specific reason.)

Also, there are exceptions, such as using tail-less speech bubbles in scenes where you want to emphasize emotion. In those cases, you need to be more careful with other techniques.

People who draw manga are usually good at reading it.
Because of this, they tend to think, “It should be obvious from the content of the dialogue” or “It should be obvious from the tone of voice.”

However, in reality, it puts more stress on the reader than you might imagine.
It's surprisingly difficult to judge that while simultaneously enjoying the story and the art in a manga you're reading for the first time.
Also, there are cases where it's so unclear that you can't determine who is speaking even after thinking about it carefully. If only there were tails... if only there were tails...

If you don't make it a rule to always add tails to dialogue within a panel, you'll run into trouble when you have a panel with
a combination of "dialogue + someone who isn't the speaker." You end up thinking, “With this author, I can't tell who is saying what...” If you always do it, it's easy for the reader to grasp that “this panel has no tail, so someone else is speaking.”

Introducing a Good Example

For those who were struggling with this, I definitely want you to put this into practice right now and level up, so I will provide another very helpful example from an author other than myself. (Without permission)

This is a work called "A Date That Doesn't Get Exciting" by Suzuyuki-sensei.
The content is excellent, of course, but

・The tone of the two main characters is polite and similar
・It's hard to differentiate expressions because the emotional expression is delicate
・It's mainly a conversation drama
are difficult elements that are covered by "kindness," resulting in a unique charm. It's a good example.
There are almost no scenes where it's difficult to tell who is speaking.
Techniques that don't confuse the reader are scattered on every page, so I want you to focus on that when you read it.

2. Don't make speech bubbles too thin/long; increase line breaks in dialogue

Speech bubbles again. They are that important. And they are easy to fix immediately. It is no exaggeration to say that
the shape of the speech bubble is the number one cause of an "amateur feel".

Regarding the shape (ratio) of speech bubbles, look at various works and imitate them. I recommend looking at multiple works to establish a standard. Using assets is also fine.

And, regarding the second error I mentioned, "the character feels like they are rattling on quickly," the true nature of this problem is

the discomfort caused by having too few line breaks in the dialogue. This discomfort can also be rephrased as "not feeling like manga."

In the first place, the problem of having too many characters in the dialogue also occurs simultaneously. It depends on your style, and you cannot necessarily set rules like "keep dialogue to this amount!" or "add a line break every X characters!" However,

• Is this dialogue really necessary for this work?

• Are you unnecessarily overlapping what can be conveyed through the art?

• Can't it be conveyed more accurately with shorter expressions?

These are things you need to keep thinking about even after you become a pro.

I will introduce these improvement examples all together after talking about the third point.

3. Be conscious of the flow between back-to-back pages

The level of the discussion goes up a bit from here. It is fine to master this after you have done the first two, but please read it for now!

When reading storyboard corrections or technique books, I feel that many of them
provide correction and commentary on paneling and composition for a single page or a two-page spread. There is a lot to learn from that too, but

what you should prioritize improving is the ability to organize the flow of information for each back-to-back page.

The number and size of panels, the content of dialogue, and speech bubbles are also very important elements of direction.
However, even before that,
if you cannot make good judgments about what information to include on the previous page and what information to start the next page with,
you will not be able to sustain the reader's interest or expectations. At worst, they will stop reading halfway through.
This is because the act of turning a page or reading forward cannot be established unless it stirs up an active desire to "know what happens next."
Conversely, if you create it well, you canintentionally fuel the reader's expectations and increase the excitement of "this is interesting."also.

In a previousarticle about storyboard production, I touched on "layout plots."
The intention behind creating a layout plot was actually right here.

・Bring an impressive scene to the very first scene after turning the page (in many Japanese manga, this is the top-right panel)
And at the same time,
・To build expectation for that scene, end the previous page (bottom-left panel) with a setup direction
Let's be conscious of doing this.
Thinking about the balance within the page or across a spread comes after that.

Since more people are reading manga on smartphones these days, the reality is that regardless of left or right,
all pages are in a back-to-back relationshipsituation.
In other words, you need to be more conscious of page turns than ever before!

Supplement and preview: For those whose information within panels feels disjointed

Something I feel is also common in unkind storyboards is the point where
you get the impression that the adjacent panels are disjointed.

This is not something you need to worry about too much if it's a 2-4 panel manga or a one-page completed manga, but it becomes a problem when it spans multiple pages.

I talked about "page turns" this time, but the need to create expectation is the same between panels.Manga panels need to be created with the awareness of "receiving a pass from the previous panel and connecting the pass to the next panel" in terms of art and dialogue.

I intend to cover this in corrections or write about it in detail in an article eventually.

From unkind to kind, storyboard correction examples

Since I've raised three improvement methods this time, I will use them as a basis to specifically fix the storyboard.

The material I'll use isan original doujinshi I drew 11 years ago.So embarrassing
I'll extract and correct 4 pages! (I'll post the link to the full text at the end)

First, let's look at the 4 pages as they were back then.

Original manga (uncorrected state) Created by 9°C in 2015

Something like this.
The frame lines are messy and there are various things that bother me, but setting that aside,
let's look at it while checking against the 3 improvement methods!

3 improvement methods, applied specifically to corrections

First, let's start with ① Add tails to speech bubbles.

You've got a lot of this right.
However, there are a few places where 'there are two lines of dialogue in a panel, but one doesn't have a tail.' Why is that?
Conversely, it becomes confusing, so let's fix it.
The way the mouths open is almost perfectly natural.

Next, regarding ② Don't make speech bubbles too thin/long, and increase line breaks in dialogue.

That's a bit long! Sometimes it's too fast-paced!
The size of the art ends up being small due to the dialogue density, and because of that, I feel a 'lack of highlights.'
Trim the dialogue that can be trimmed, be conscious of line breaks, and let's dedicate more space to the impact of the art.

Finally, regarding ③ Be conscious of the flow between back-to-back pages.

These 4 pages start from the left, so the page turns occur at the beginning of the 2nd and 4th pages.

The 2nd page depicts the protagonist's feeling of 'admiration' following the end of the 1st page where they 'learn a surprising side' of the character, but it's too natural and therefore a bit weak.
If you're going to cut it there, it's better to leave an impression of the 'learning a surprising side' part, as that leads to increasing favorability toward the character, so let's shift that to the back. By doing so, at the end of page 1, you can create an expectation-building effect of 'it looks like I'm going to see a side of him I didn't know'.

The content of the 4th page isn't bad. It's a scene where the protagonist is grinning even though they are being scolded, which creates an effect that makes the reader feel an increase in favorability toward the other person.
However, the art is small and the impression is diluted. I want to treat it as a larger element, so the layout within the page needs to be organized.

I haven't talked much about the size of panels this time, but the point is
to make the panels that handle important developments/emotional shifts larger.

This time, I wrote out all the developments and the emotional changes in those developments, and lined them up. (See the image after this.)
Then, I numbered the emotions that emerged and picked out the emotions that are particularly important in this story, and identified 4 places as important.
That is the content that should be made larger and more impressive in the panels this time.
Conversely, other panels play a supplementary role, so you also need the courage and resolve to cut them mercilessly or lighten them up.

Based on the above, here is what I wrote down as a correction.

And here is the storyboard redrawn based on the corrections.

How is it? Isn't it easier to read?

I made quite a significant change this time, but I think you can improve the kindness just by fixing the speech bubble tails & dialogue (the parts in green pen).
On top of that, if you can be conscious of page turns, a step up from 'being read' to 'being enjoyed' is also possible.

Summary

So far, I have explained the two abilities that make up manga, and in particular, I talked about directing skills, which is something that can give you an edge just by "knowing" it.

This article is written especially for those aspiring to be manga artists and those who do it as a hobby but want to get better at drawing manga.... I would be very happy if you could use this as an opportunity to compare it with your own manga and review whether you were placing a burden on your readers without realizing it. I thought to myself while writing this that I need to keep making kind storyboards in mind, so I will tighten my focus again too! Let's do our best together!

Announcement: Accepting Correction Requests!

Based on the concept of "Let's make kind storyboards!" that I talked about this time, I have decided to
start accepting requests for storyboard advice on Skeb.

I've said a lot of things, but it is highly difficult to view your own manga objectively.
I also mentioned that not every editor can provide concrete improvement suggestions.

Therefore, I thought I would like to help organize your manga into a "readable" format.

I plan to do things like organizing, red-pen corrections, and providing revision suggestions just like the correction examples in this article.
Since Skeb is a service for simple one-round interactions, I will be accepting these as a kind of monitor test for accepting full-scale corrections and brainstorming consultations in the future.
The strength of this is that the price is kept low and you can request it quickly, so I would be happy if you would feel free to send me your storyboards or past works!

Thank you very much for reading to the end.

See you later!

9°C

Reference