The Yeti Story

[CWmax]

agghhhh...I havn't been doing much drawing lately...but a month or so ago I had posted some of my sketchwork for this short story...Anyway, I sure would appreciate your opinions....Thanks.

Oh Yeah...There are some links to the sketches below the story...

YETI STORY –
C.W. - DEC 2003


The two Sherpa guides and the two Western Mountaineers make their way up the snowy mountainside.

As they press forward, tall shadows, barely visible through the snow, loom in the distance.

The Sherpas look scared as the Westerners stare into the white trying to make out the shapes.

As his partner tugs on his sleeve pleadingly, the other Sherpa indicates to the Western Leader that the group must turn around.

The Western Leader stubbornly insists that they press on and investigate. The shapes are gone.

The Sherpas suddenly look scared.

The Western leader looks at them quizzically as shadows loom by the rocks behind him, closer than before.

The Westerner spins around, but the shapes have disappeared.

The Westerner turns back toward the Sherpas, only to see them running away down the mountain.

The Leader and the other Westerner watch in dismay.

The Leader gives a stern look to his nervous partner.

They boldly continue on.

The Westerner guide suddenly points with his hand to the side of the mountain.

Through the mist and snow some humanoid shapes are scaling the rock face.

As the mountaineers stare, large shadows loom in the snow very close behind them.

The two mountaineers turn and start to shout in surprise as shadows cover their faces.

The Western Mountaineer leader has his eyes closed. He has been knocked out and is on his back.

He starts to stir because he is being uncomfortably dragged up a rocky trail.

As he tries to sit up, he can see the large apelike hand that is dragging him along by the leg.

The Yeti is entering a rocky clearing in the snowy mountainside. He is dragging the Mountaineer by the leg into the camp. The mountaineer is pulling to get away but it is no use.

Several Yeti are sitting in the Yeti Campsite. The other mountaineer lies crumpled in an unconscious pile in front of them. Icicles drip from the rock walls. There are some bones around and some tattered fur. The Yeti have very big teeth.

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[Vendetta]

is this short story as written or is this a kind of outline, free thought kind of plotting? Most of it reads like panel descriptions to an artist. I don't know if that is what you are going for or if you just think that way, being an artist type. A little insight as to what your thought process is with what's written will help me give you a proper crit and thoughts on what you've done.

[CWmax]

Originally posted by Vendetta
is this short story as written or is this a kind of outline...Most of it reads like panel descriptions to an artist. .

Yes that is exactly it....I was going to mention that in my first post.

I basically tried to capture each action as it could be presented in comic panels.

I am also interested to hear thoughts on acceptable formats for comic writing....

Thanks,

CW

[Vendetta]

in today's market, formats for the way a comic is written is pretty friendly. Many writers develop their own ways of writing and laying out the page.

There are two "standards" if you can call it that.

The Marvel Style
This style is a page by page description in which the content of a page is laid out to the artist in a "This is what needs to happen on this page" and all the dialogue that should appear. How it happens, number of panels, layout, etc are all up to the artist. This method gives the artist a lot more freedom and creativity and personally, I think works best when a writer and artist know each other and can gain maximum potential for a page that way, letting the artist explode on the page as only he or she can. Yet the writer, knowing the artist's style, strengths and shortcomings, can maneuver his/her writing and descriptions to best access the artist's talent. (i.e. If the writer knows the artist has trouble populating a given type of room (say, an office) with appropriate items and tends to draw offices bare, the writer is sure to include lists of things that we should see in the office) conversely, if the artist blows up on city scapes, the writer might just say "Cityscape. Make it cool."

The Dark Horse Method
This method is not so much "the way Dark Horse does it" as it is that they put up a "submission How to" and included a how to script a comic book so that the wild array of script submissions they were getting and wanted to try to get some sort of order in the way people were writing scripts for their submissions. (A sign of the times; they took down the script "how to" about a year and three months ago. Most writers have a better grasp on how to write a script than they did 30 odd years ago, I guess)

Anyway, this style became the standard sort of by accident. It is very clear and easy to follow and other companies and writers just accepted it as being good (except marvel that tends to use their own style more often... which is funny as the style is sort of opposite the way it was in days gone by when it became the way it was done when Kirby would draw up all the pages and Lee would then give them dialogue)

The "dark horse" style is a panel by panel description in which the writer controls more of what the comic book should show the reader. A typical page would begin like this
Page 4, 5 panels
Panel 1. yadda yadda yadda blah blah blah

then the writer would describe what's seen in panel one and follow that with the dialogue that is to appear there. wash, rinse, recycle.

This style is better for a new artist/writer team in that the writer doesn't know what the artist is going to "get" or "miss" in the script. A big mistake a lot of new writers make is assuming the artist will "just know" "understand" or "get" what they want to happen and don't detail it out fully. Then when the finished pencils come down, they see something they were NOT expecting which can often ruin something in the book and even the whole story. Secondly, for someone like Alan Moore, this method is prefered as every detain and nuance is "VITAL" to him and details out with great pains exactly how each panel should look, down to the color and pattern on the wallpaper. (I don't recommend going that far... most artist would hate you... but Alan Moore is ALAN MOORE and can command that of most artists)

anyway, if you are thoroughly confused, let me know and I can provide some samples of these two methods. Personally, I like to write in the "established" methods. I figure that I'm an unknown nobody and should make my work as absolutely accessable as possible. Later, when I'm a famous and well paid (hahawellpaidhahahaha) comic book writer, I can let my own preferrences influence the way that I write a script. I'd hate to lose a potential opportunity because an editor was having a headache and looked at my script and thought "What the... " and tossed it aside.