Peter Derk asked Peter Derk:

from Yahoo! Answers: i have some ideas for stories and the only medium i can think that it can be expressed through is like comic books but i have no drawing skills at all. i saw some kits at michaels, one 15 and the other 30$ that shows you how to draw comic characters. so how would i go about learning?

Peter Derk First of all, put that money away.
This is kinda a debate in the comics world. James Kochalka published a really controversial article called "Craft Is The Enemy". In it, he basically said that people in comics spend a lot of time honing craft, and meanwhile they actually make fuck all in terms of finished comics. His proposal: Make stuff, and get good by doing. Of course, there are many people out there who have been working on their craft for decades who got pretty pissed off, understandably. If I was shoveling out a couple hundred a month for an art school student loan, I'd be a little pissed at someone explaining to me that I'd wasted my time and money.

Buuuuut Mr. Kochalka makes a good point.

I'll give you an example.

I'd like to build a house someday. A small one, even a shed to work in.

Now, I could have started by looking for a warehouse or place to build, buying an expensive kit, dropping a couple thousand on tools and supplies. I mean, I couldn't ACTUALLY do that because I don't have a couple thousand to drop. I use a CoinStar machine on a fairly regular basis. This is where I'm at, financially.

What I did instead is start small. Last night I put together a few planter boxes. Nothing fancy. Rectangles made of fence posts stacked two high and drilled into posts. $30 in materials. I learned a couple things, made a few mistakes, and found that I sorta like doing that stuff.

Whenever you're going to try something new, the worst way to do it, if you ask me, is to start by buying something. I don't want to get all Joe Rogen here and say that we're conditioned to start every new task with this idea of "What can I buy"", but it feels like it sometimes, doesn't it?

Here's what I did to make a comic book. Because I can't draw either.

I used Powerpoint. I copied and pasted stuff, drew using the tools available, and found stuff on morguefile.com, which is a great resource for free images that are totally open for use, no attribution.

And what's really interesting, it turns out the big boys do this too. Did you know that Marvel uses Google Sketchup to place the Baxter Building into its comics? That way, everything stays consistent. And in fact, it's becoming increasingly popular to create 3D models of characters as well, and then they can simply be posed in panels.

So while it's cheating, to an extent, it worked for me. That's how I was able to make my own comic book. And for free.

And what's good about it, when you start with the free version, you can learn a hell of a lot, get better as you go, and figure out if this is really what you want to do.

If what you want to do is learn how to draw, then you can get some kits. Or, even better, check out some books at the library. Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain is a popular one, especially for people who have never been great at drawing. I personally recommend Cartooning by Ivan Brunetti, which has some great hands-on exercises bound to make you a better artist. If you want to draw, go to your library.

If you want to make comics, then start making comics.

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