The Whys and the Wherefores. Mostly the Whys.
As a webcomic creator, one of the most common questions I get is "how do I start my own webcomic?" Not a bad question, as there are many active imaginations out there looking for an outlet for their creativity. The problem with this question is that it's a simple question with an incredibly complex answer. "Start" can mean many things, such as the conceptualization of a webcomic, or drawing it out, or posting it on the web. However, when someone asks me "how do I start my own webcomic?" I assume they mean they mean the very beginning part of the process: creation.
And this is where I ask my most important question: "Why do you want to start a webcomic?"
I wouldn't ask this to be mean, but to be sure the person I'm dealing with is serious about his or her work. And that's what webcomics is. WORK. It's not a fun, little hobby. It's not as effortless as updating your Myspace bulletin. It's. Hard. Freaking. Work. And if a creator wants to make a GOOD webcomic, he or she should think of this task as anything less.
There are many bad reasons to want to start a webcomic and only one good one. Everyone thinks they're doing it for the right reason, but the people who do it best are only doing it for the one right reason. So let's go over a few of these motivators for getting into the world of webcomicking and why only one will do.
1. Money
There are people out there who look at webcomics as a means of making money. After all, all one has to do is put out a comic that updates thrice a week, put up a banner ad, and watch the dollars roll in! I assure you, the money you get does not equal the time and energy you put it into it. Webcomics is not a get-rich-quick-scheme. There's such a ridiculous amount of effort that goes into the storycrafting/writing, art, web maintenance and marketing that it's simply more trouble than it's worth. There are plenty of more lucrative ways to make money on the internet that require far less effort. Online poker, t-shirt printing, porn, pick your poison. All of these are far easier ways to make money on the internet than webcomics.
2. Boredom
This is the impetus for 90% of the slice-of-life material out there. For some reason, there are a lot of bored college kids out there who think that they can fill their time by doing a webcomic. While this occasionally produces good results (I'm being optimistic as I've never seen a good college webcomic born out of boredom), for the most part bored college kid comics tend to be all sorts of awful. They're either about the lives of said bored creators or random spork-cheese-monkey humor the Hot Topic kids find so amusing. The former is terrible because nobody wants to read a comic that's about somebody else's boring life, as comics are supposed to be an escape from the mundane world. The latter is terrible because this is not humor. These are references to nonsensical things. If you don't understand the difference between a joke and a reference, you don't know what the hell comedy is, and therefore you REALLY shouldn't try writing any. The bottom line here is that there's so much garbage in the world of webcomics. Don't contribute to it any further.
3. The "Rock Star" Complex
In my opinion, this is the biggest, baddest wrong reason to start a webcomic. There are many folks out there who want to be rock stars, who want adulation and praise, but don't actually want to do the work involved in building skill. They just...want to be a rock star. So, if they actually manage to get up off their keister to put out any material (they usually don't), they put out the most mediocre stuff that's just "good enough" just to see if they can get fans and readers to cheer for them. Or worse yet, they put out material that panders to the lowest of the low. Either way, doing something as time/energy/life consuming as a webcomic is not something one should do to please others. If you really want blind admiration from fans, open up a deviant art account and put out a whole bunch of Twilight fan art. Or Final Fantasy 7 fan art. Or Naruto fan art. Or pick a franchise with a rabid fan base. People who troll that site will lavish love on anything that pays homage to their obsession, so have at it. What's that? You don't know how to draw? Write fan fiction of the aforementioned franchises. What's that? You don't know how to write? Well, if you don't know how to write or draw, why are you getting into webcomics? Because you wanna be a rock star. Stop that.
Yes, these are the biggest offenders in the wrong reasons to start a webcomic, but I had mentioned earlier that there is one good reason to want to get into webcomics (or anything else for that matter). This is the reason that will carry you through the late nights, the times when nobody comments on pages, the bad reviews, this will get you through the storm:
Because you MUST.
You have that magic idea. It's knocking around in your head. It's screaming to get out. Howling. It gives you no peace. It haunts you. It will not stop rattling until you make comic pages to appease the voice in your head telling you to make this creation. This is the right reason to get into webcomics, because you have a passion for it. The passion to create, to improve one's craft, to self-criticize, to know when not to self-criticize, this is the right reason to create webcomics. You do it because you love it. You do it because you can't live without it. You do it because you MUST.
The "Why" question is very important to the beginning creator because it makes sure you are on the right track. The creation of a webcomic, whether it's a gag-a-day strip or a long form story is either way a herculean undertaking. It requires effort to put out the writing, the artwork, and all the wonderful things that go with publicizing your webcomic. The best way to ensure it succeeds is to be sure it's fueled by passion.
Check out Jules Rivera's Series
www.marsh-rocket.com
Marsh Rocket is an action/black comedy web comic that takes place several centuries into the future. Marsh, a corporate hitman, must retrieve a mysterious briefcase for a sleazy loan shark at the risk of betraying his own people. With warring factions after Marsh, the briefcase, and each other, the blood, knives, and even breakfast foods are bound to fly.
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