No question, graphic novels continue to gain currency in the publishing industry. More and more colleges are including cartooning in their curricula. Yet for many creative professionals, the process of creating a graphic novel is unclear. For some publishers, children’s books provide a benchmark for creating visual narratives but what more do you need to know to bring a graphic novel to a publisher? We asked a range of industry professionals—some in business for many years, some just starting out—and selected these talented artists to help answer these questions. Thank you to the artists who assisted with this column:

•    Kazu Kibuishi, full-time comic-book artist living in Los Angeles to pursue entertainment industry work.

•    Ross MacDonald, illustrator, comic-book artist, children’s book artist and contributing editor of the Virginia Quarterly Review.

•    James Sturm, comic and graphic novel artist with work translated into several languages, including “Best Graphic Novel of 2001” by Time magazine. Sturm is the director at The Center for Cartoon Studies.

•    Marshall Vandruff, freelance illustrator since 1980 with clients including MAD magazine, Hanna-Barbera, Warner Brothers, Dark Horse Comics, and seminar instructor at Comic-Con, Blizzard Entertainment, Rockstar San Diego and Disneyland.

CA: If the sketchbooks of my students have a tale to tell, this is a timely topic. In your experience, what is the best and most successful approach to creating a graphic novel concept? 

Kazu Kibuishi: I can’t say there is a best approach to this, but what I do is keep a backlog of concepts that I think would be neat to see and then wait until I have a story that fits the concept. The idea behind Amulet, where two kids move into an old puzzle maker’s house and discover a giant underground labyrinth, is one I had for many years before I finally decided to produce it as a graphic novel. When I decided to tackle it, I had some context for a story; I used my experiences of helping my family out during a rocky financial period as the basis for what happens to the characters. The concept and the story came together right around the time that Scholastic Books was looking to publish something in this vein, and I realized it would be a good fit.

Ross MacDonald: I’m working on a graphic novel project now. I also have a regular gig with Virginia Quarterly Review doing a one-page comic, and I do comics here and there for other magazines and newspapers. They tend to be political humor and/or social commentary mostly. Creating a concept depends on what you are doing—single comics or novels.

I would sketch stuff like crazy all the time for concepts, if you just need to pull together loose bits of ideas.
But be careful of falling in love with the drawing! It is a lot easier to cut text than drawings. If the project you are working on is story driven, then I would start with the words. I write everything out, specifically the description of the action in each panel. From there I can sketch some action drawings and then go back and fill in the text.

Since I have to come up with a regular comic for Virginia Quarterly Review, as the deadline approaches I start writing down lines. I then find the art after I have the story. If you can write out your concept, describing the action and then turn the words into pictures then you honor the story, which is what graphic novels are about, the emphasis being on novel.

James Sturm: The best approach in my opinion is one driven by a sense of urgency to first, have something to say, and second, the desire to express it in comics.

CA: Once an artist has a solid concept, how do you present graphic novels to potential publishers?

Marshall Vandruff: With a graphic novel, until an artist has the trust of a publisher, the best way is to simply produce the work as an “ashcan” or mini-comic, which is a self-published copy with no color. Essentially, it’s a portfolio piece that can be turned into a product and it doesn’t have to be finished. It simply has to be good enough to compel the publisher to pay attention to your talent and skill.