Educate Yourself With Bruce And Roos: Word Balloon Order
Added 2018-06-14 00:02:10 +0000 UTCOkay so it turns out my biggest pet peeve with amateur comics is people not knowing what proper reading order for word balloons is. You can’t just put them wherever is most convenient for the rest of the picture, unfortunately.
Naturally, this applies to English, manga has its reading priority facing the top-right of the panel instead, and tends to finish columns before continuing rows, on account of the native top-bottom right-left writing direction.
Comments
Yes! All the yes! I have read so many amateur comics where they just didn't get balloon placement. Thank you, thank you for creating this! It's great guide and something more people should be aware of.
Tygepc
2018-06-14 16:01:13 +0000 UTCIn the second panel I went directly to the upper right corner because it was above their other balloon, although I do agree that the large blank space in the upper left corner looks awkward. Maybe sticking a particularly interesting bit of art there could make that go away.
erroneum
2018-06-14 04:45:18 +0000 UTCThis applies to the art as well, as we are taught to 'read' a picture top left to bottom right. If your are flows counter to this, it can make it feel awkward and stumbling.
Flinters
2018-06-14 01:29:17 +0000 UTCAlways wondered if I was the only one bothered by this.
VGR
2018-06-14 00:28:21 +0000 UTCI remember that and that bothered the crap out of me
Rick Griffin
2018-06-14 00:24:42 +0000 UTCNot just amateur comics; "The Boondocks" used to give priority to the leftmost speaker instead of the topmost balloon. Of course, Aaron McGruder did get an early start.
Stephen Gilberg
2018-06-14 00:21:15 +0000 UTCThat's super helpful and totally going over the art desk.
Scripted Anarchy
2018-06-14 00:07:04 +0000 UTC
