The Carver's House

Last Saturday, I sacrificed sleep time in favor of filling up the day with three plays. The first was PETA's Skin Deep , a satiric romp on the ups and downs of cosmetic surgery written by Vince de Jesus. (I was late for this one--the show was 10 in the morning.) Mid-afternoon found me at the University of The Philippines for Dulaang UP's Orosman at Zafira , penned in verse by Francisco Balagtas, but reworked with music and stunning choreography, complemented by delicious production design. After dinner, it was intimate theater with Last Order sa Penguin , the Palanca award-winning play of Chris Martinez. I'm not the best at providing critique for shows like these, but suffice to say I liked them all at varying levels. Then again, it was a bit tough keeping my mind 100% open throughout the day because of the sleep deprivation, but it wasn't enough to stop me from being entertained. Thanks to those who offered complimentary tickets. You know who you are. I really would li...

5 Tips on Drawing More “Realistic” Characters (Even If Your Style Isn’t) Whatever the art style, comics artists have as much responsibility as comics writers in bringing characters to life. While 90s-style "Image" poses in every panel still works, stories will benefit further if artists add a greater level of realism to characters, particularly in how these characters act and react in a story. When characters exhibit more individuality in a story, they look more involved and become distinct to readers. Following are some tips to help comics artists achieve this. 1. Get acquainted. If you know a person by heart, you’ll not only know how he or she may react in a given situation, but also determine the quality of the reaction. Two prim and proper schoolgirls will still have clear personality distinctions between them. Once you’ve determined the physical appearance of a character, think about how the character sits or walks, talks or shouts. Good comics scripts would explicitly d...

Writing for Comics 101: Part II In assigning a number of panels to certain sequence, writers need to determine the amount of impact the sequence needs to give. If a writer is restricted by a fixed number of pages, then the task becomes a matter of checks and balances, and difficulties set in because, certainly, all sequences are important. (Here, let me make a distinction between a scene and a sequence. While a scene occurs in one defined location, a sequence can occur in multiple locations; a running battle, for example, or a cut-to-cut of different scenes.) I’ve mentioned previously that there are two factors that influence page budgeting – Level of Spectacle and Amount of Text. Auxillary factors connected to these are Intensity of Drama and Nature of Sequence, both of which tie in to determining the number of panels in a sequence. Intensity of Drama. Drama involves emotional intensity, and the number of panels that can be used in a given sequence is based on the amount ...

Writing for Comics 101 Writing for comics is not the same as writing prose. While the basic tenets of good and effective writing apply to comics, comics scribes need to have fundamental knowledge on how the comics format affects the way they write. I’ve seen too many scripts that are simply unfriendly to artists. One of the basic steps in writing a comics script is budgeting pages, wherein the writer, based on his plot, predetermines how many pages will be assigned to a certain sequence. Following are the factors that should come into play when budgeting pages. Level of Spectacle. This is essentially your The Authority (cinematic panoramic kick-ass superheroics) versus Strangers In Paradise (slice-of-life drama). If you’re working with a 24-page standard-size issue, a high-spectacle story won’t have the real estate it requires for the proper threshing out of plot points. Low spectacle stories have an advantage here. If your story combines both, the large-scale events will sur...