www.comixology.com/Edison-Rex-…
<p class="">This issue takes place in the Golden Age where we see Gladiator Gladstone in his prime and meet the first person to don the mantle of The Eclipse as well as his partner in justice: Mister Oni.</p>All for $.99. Buy it Read it Rate it Tweet it Reblog it (technologic!)
Basically it breaks down like this. He proposes that you can comfortably fit 210 words on a comics page without it looking too text heavy. So if you have a six panel grid you've got 35 words per panel.
I think this is a great tool for writing comics where it's important to say as much as possible with as few words as possible as space is limited and the word/picture ration is important as far as being pleasing to the eye. Another way to put it: If it's too long for a tweet it's too long for a word balloon.
I keep a chart pinned up in my workspace that looks something like this:
1: 210
2: 105
3: 70
4: 52
5: 42
6: 35
7: 30
8: 26
9: 23
12: 17
16: 13
While I find this a useful writing reference for tightening up wordy dialogue, I also find it's a helpful reference for laying out collaborative comics pages.
<p class="">If I'm have trouble figuring out a tricky layout where there's a lot of dialogue I might do a quick word count to determine the panel size. Lots of words = bigger panels. Alternatively if I want more space for a visual I might do a word count for another panel to figure out how much space I can steal. So 52 words or so is a 1/4 page panel.13 words or so is a 1/16 page panel.</p>I tend to stick to more traditional page layouts with clearly defined borders and gutters so YMMV.
Also I don't use this all the time because that just reduces everything to math which is boring but it's a good tool to have in the box when space is an issue.
originally posted on my tumblr: dennisculver.tumblr.com/