Advice: Breaking into Comic Book Writing

This is a letter written by Steve Lieber discussing the topic “How to break into Comic Book Writing”

Steve Lieber (born May 19, 1967) is a comic-book illustrator. His best known work includes runs on Detective Comics and Hawkman, the graphic novel Whiteout and its Eisner Award-winning sequel, Whiteout: Melt. He is also the co-author (with Nat Gertler) of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Creating a Graphic Novel. Lieber is married to the novelist Sara Ryan. He was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and lives in Portland, Oregon, where he is a member of Periscope Studio.

To the fellow who asked about breaking into comics:

First, don’t even THINK about quitting your day job. Writers I know who’ve
worked in comics and Hollywood have told me it was a lot easier to sell
their first tv or film script than their first comic script.

There is just about no chance for someone without a track record of published
work to break in as a writer without having a close friend in a position
to hire you. This leaves a couple of options– get a staff position at a
major company and start networking from the inside. This means you’ll have to
move to NYC or CA and take a job that won’t pay you enough to live there.
Or, and this is the recommended option, start writing small press comics.
Self published minis are a good start. Make friends with artists with
tastes similar to yours. Get them to illustrate your stories. Send the
stories out as samples. These’ll be read -months- earlier than written
submissions. You can meet artists at local cons, art schools, coffee shops
and, of course, comic stores. Publish your own work. This is how guys like
David Quinn (who was already a produced playwright) broke in to the
mainstream. Start developing your networking skills. You’ll
need them to find paying jobs.

just how much control of the finished product does the writer have?

In the end, none at all. Think of it as a game of telephone. The more clearly
you communicate what you want to your illustrator(s) the more like your
original message the final story will be. Keep in mind that, (particularly
in mainstream comics,) the editor can ALWAYS overrule you and the artist(s)
vision of things may differ from yours considerably- (and you’re always at
the mercy of the color separators and printers.)

I mean, the script is self-evident, but does he or she tell the artist what
to draw, the angles, expressions and such? or is it different for every
artist-writer relationship?

Sometimes the company dictates this, other times the team gets to set up it’s
own way of working.

It’s inportant that you don’t restrict yourself to being a -comics- writer. Be a
*writer.* Write essays, short fiction, poetry, journalism, screenplays, ad copy.
Anything that allows you to develop your craft is crucial, and may open
a door for you down the line.

Above all, be persistent. As you noted it’s a lot easier for an illustrator
to get hired, but DC saw over one hundred pages of artwork from me before they
gave me my first job. If it happens at all, it’s gonna take a long, long while.

And one more thing. Consider looking into starting sentences with capital
letters. Take spelling, grammar and punctuation seriously. They’re the
tools of the trade.

Good luck.

Steve Lieber