A thumbnail showing finished colours for page 10 of The Troll Bridge

How I Do: The Colours!


Thursday, November 24th 2022

Probably the most transformative part of the process, adding extra depth and richness to the page. Compare the inks with the finished colours, and you'll see what I mean. Like most aspects of comic art, the more pages you colour the faster you get at it. Many of my techniques came from an excellent …

A closeup on a page of inks for The Troll Bridge.

How I Do: The Inks!


Monday, July 4th 2022

This is the most straightforward step as I'm mostly just translating what's already been drawn, but adding more definition. My pencils are loose enough to allow me some interpretation and artistic license during the inking stage, but tight enough to keep me on track. Until this step, I've been …

A pencilled comic book page

How I Do: The Pencils!


Thursday, May 26th 2022

This is where things really take shape. Working on a new layer (in blue) above the rough layouts (in red), I flesh out the loose sketches and add backgrounds using the built-in 'Darker Pencil' tool at around 0.4 size. I tend to make sure that the first panel on each page includes a background. This …

A closeup of a thumbnailed page

How I Do: The Layouts!


Saturday, April 30th 2022

With a finished script in hand, I start working on the art. The first stage is thumbnailing! I work digitally, mostly on an iPad Pro in Clip Studio Paint . I have a template set up for the whole book, so I open up the page I'm working on and get cracking. Working in a zoomed-out view on a single …

A screenshot of the overview document for The Troll Bridge graphic nover

How I Do: The Script!


Tuesday, April 19th 2022

Now that I have some characters and a loose plot idea , it's time to turn it into something I can work from. I use an app called Scrivener for all my writing. has some incredibly useful features, such as folders for reference materials and linked documents for writing out detailed notes. It's also …