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Part 6: Submitting work
to a syndicate
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The main newspaper syndicates are:
Creators Syndicate
(B.C., Wizard of ID)
King Features Syndicate (Hagar, Zits)
Tribune Media Services (Lola, Dick Tracy)
United Media (Peanuts, Dilbert)
Universal Press Syndicate (Foxtrot, Doonesbury)
Washington Post Writers Group (Opus)
(For
detailed submission guidelines for each of these syndicates,
please click here.)
In putting together a syndicated strip, there are many, many
methods of working- here's one:
1) Work up your
characters and concept. Let your work arise from the characters.
Charles Schulz advised me once not to fall in love with a cute
idea; the writing should come out of the character, not the other
way around. Fill your sketchbooks with drawing of your characters.
Don't tell them what to do; ask them what they want to do.
2) Try to write
a minimum of six gags a day, with rough drawings.
3) At the end
of each week pick the six best daily gags and the one best Sunday
gag in that batch. File the rest.
4) Roughly draw
up the dailies and Sundays. For now, just rough in the layouts
including the lettering. Then go back and finish the artwork.
Then go back and add touches.
5) Ink the weeks
work. You ink like this: Before you first dip your pen, make
sure the nib is clean. Scrape off old ink with a razor or X-acto
knife. If it's anew pen nib wash it in soap and warm water. Why?
Because pen nibs are sprayed with oil to keep them from rusting
while they sit in store rooms for years; if you don't clean off
the oil the ink will fly off your pen and destroy your artwork.
Always keep your ink bottle in a clean spot on your desk or side
table, always LOWER than your artwork. If you keep it higher,
you'll spill it. Ink loves to jump onto artwork. When you actually
ink: a little bit on this daily, then set it aside and while
that much dries, do a little bit on the next one, and so on.
Don't try to ink a whole cartoon at one sitting. You'll get tried,
bored, sloppy, your hand will smear a line you thought was dry.
6) Check the
work. Go back and erase the pencil line after all the ink's dry.
Go back over the work again and look at it. Indicate with pencil
any place you feel you need to fill in with black. Put a tiny
"x" there, then go back and spot the blacks all at
one sitting. Add any texture.
Part 7
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