Techniques for Designing Screens That Communicate to the Viewer

The other day, I participated in the "Anime Juku Kyoto Camp" organized by volunteers from the Anime Juku community.
The theme this time was "Layout."
For those who have just started drawing, I imagine you might be thinking, "What is that?"
I would like to share even just a little bit of the lecture content with you.

The hidden "drawing ability" that everyone is unaware of

I have talked a lot about sketching, copying, and perspective on this Note, but I haven't touched much on layout.
When people hear "layout," they might think:
"Hmm, isn't that a designer's job?"
"If you can draw characters well, you don't need to worry about layout."
"Isn't it too early to talk about layout when I don't even understand perspective well?"
At first, I thought the same way.
I thought layout was something you think about at the very end, like, "I drew the characters and background, and this is how it turned out."
That was honestly what I thought.
But
now I have come to believe that this layout is the fundamental technique that determines the quality of a drawing.
For those of you who think, "I've tried various things, but it just doesn't look right."
Learning layout might be good for you.

Start with characters? Or think from perspective?

If you are an illustrator, you draw multiple color roughs before finishing the piece.
If you are a manga artist, you draw storyboards and divide panels.
In my opinion, this is what doing a layout means.
In short, a layout is the "blueprint of a drawing."
Perspective, character poses, colors, and backgrounds are all processes that come after the layout.

Until recently, I would
draw characters somewhat randomly,
draw backgrounds somewhat randomly,
and just draw pictures in a haphazard way.
However, with that approach, it is impossible to take the people looking at my drawings into the world of my art.

I started to feel this strongly after I began drawing storyboards for my doujin manga.
A storyboard, which is the blueprint for manga, involves:
Panel layout (manga frames)
Dialogue placement
Character placement and camera angle
Light and shadow settings, etc.
Even with the same content and drawing ability, the level of interest changes completely depending on the storyboard.

Layout also has a grammar

Just as I have conveyed in articles about drawing and perspective,
there are rules (grammar) for layout as well.
You decide on the frame, and what is the most important thing you want to convey or show?
You build the screen to convey that.
If the concept and what you want to convey are vague at this stage, the layout will not be decided.
If you continue drawing without a decided layout,
you will end up with a drawing that is hard to understand.
Before talking about whether it is good or bad,
it becomes a drawing that is "hard to understand"
or "hard to look at."
In the drawings of beginners, even if the sketching is somewhat off, if the message is simple and the layout is well-done, the drawing will communicate effectively.

A failure in strategy cannot be recovered by tactics

This phrase is often cited in books on business strategy and the like.
If a drawing fails in its layout,
no matter how good the sketching is,
or how detailed the rendering is, it cannot be recovered.
Layout is the foundation, if we compare it to a house.
It is the same as saying that no matter how hard you work on the exterior or interior of a tilted house,
it will never become a good house.

Layout is neither background nor perspective

When people start studying layout, they often start by
setting the perspective and eye level,
deciding on vanishing points,
and that is how they start drawing.
(I was like that too)
When I do this, my drawings definitely end up looking strange.

Perspective is, so to speak, a "ruler"
for drawing pictures that use depth.
It is a tool used to place and draw characters and backgrounds according to a blueprint
for the sake of the layout and screen composition you want to express. If you decide on the eye level and vanishing points arbitrarily, you will end up with a drawing that was not your intention.

Layout is important even in drawings without backgrounds

There are many incredibly attractive character illustrations that often circulate on social media
that are very captivating even without a background.
"See, if you can just draw characters, you're invincible."
"I don't draw backgrounds, so layout is a hassle."
To those who say this, please wait a moment.
As long as there is a "frame," such as the posting size on social media or a B5 sheet of paper,
the "layout" of how to place the characters is unavoidable.
Please look at the rough sketches below.

This is a rough sketch of a panel from a doujinshi. It is a cut of a girl talking on a mobile phone.
I think the one on the left is the easiest to understand. I will explain the reason using the rules I learned at Anime Juku as an example.

For example,
there is a rule: "Draw so that what is happening can be understood by the 'silhouette.'"
Even if you fill the character in completely black,
whether you can tell what they are doing is a hint.
In the drawings above, the middle and right ones have the hand overlapping the girl's head, causing the silhouette to collapse.

You cannot tell what she is doing with this.
On the left, you can see that she is pressing something against her face.
Also, on the left, the area enclosed by the green line becomes negative space, making the pose easier to understand.

Another point is whether the drawing is asymmetrical.
At Anime Juku, there is a rule to avoid "parallel, monotonous, and symmetrical" compositions.
When you become conscious of this, your drawings will gain a sense of dynamism and coolness.
In the illustration above, the tilt of the shoulders and hips (contrapposto) shown by the blue lines and the action line (S-curve) shown by the red line create a feminine movement.

Masterpieces are textbooks for layout.

Mr. Muroi from Anime Juku is an amazing person who worked as an animator at Ghibli, and the layouts in works by top-tier animators like those at Ghibli are also thoroughly thought out. It is said that Director Hayao Miyazaki used to plan layouts down to the millimeter.
Installing good layouts from such masterpieces seems like a great way to study.

Examples of Naruchiku's layouts.

I have also been keeping in mind to "avoid parallel, monotonous, and symmetrical compositions,"
"be conscious of silhouettes,"
and "be conscious of eye-tracking."
I will list a few examples.

↑ The textbook explained to me during this training camp. I highly recommend it.

This was a simple report, but what did you think?
If you have any thoughts or questions, it would be very encouraging, so please feel free to share them. (I may also use them as the basis for a Q&A article.)
Thank you for reading.

Next time, I plan to write the continuation of the series,
"What I have done to earn money through drawing as a 50-year-old beginner."