WHAT ARE THUMBNAILS GOOD FOR, ANYWAY?
“Why do thumbnails? Why not just start penciling? It just seems like a lot of redrawing!” I’m not gonna say it isn’t; but what if I told you thumbnails have a completely different purpose than pencils? That they are about communication design and the storytelling that lies at the heart of sequential art? That they can save you much more time than you put in for them? Hear me out.
Some folks may see thumbnails as just rudimentary pencils, easy to skip over, and if that’s your method and it works, go for it. But I see them as design and essential. In thumbnails I’m capturing the broad strokes of the action, but also pacing, panel layout, dialog flow, etc. I’m planning out how I’m going to tell the story; what I’m going to say, imply and not say visually, building the foundation all the wonderful details will sit upon. I’m using the layout of panels, pages and spreads as storytelling itself, not just as a container for it.
It’s also much easier to make fundamental composition decisions when you don’t have detailed scenes you’ve fallen in love with; in simplicity you see the weakness or strength of a composition laid bare. Problems are hard to ignore, patterns are easy to recognize and cohesive, meaningful foundations are easier to build.
It is the lack of detail that allows me to do this clearly and confidently, because storytelling through layout is in the broad strokes. Thumbnails are mostly forest and very little tree. But there are a few trees. Finding the balance between broad strokes and details has been an ongoing process for me. Previous to Wuthering Heights my thumbnails were chaotic, quick sketches, sometimes indecipherable and usually very small (think postage stamps). This worked okay for me because before Wuthering Heights no one was going to see them but my partner, Gibson, who would see them in person with me being able to easily fill in any gaps. But I knew it would be cruel to email vague chicken scratches to a busy editor. I also knew that the chaos hadn’t always served me well, and at 258 pages, I needed things to go smoothly and quickly. So I came up with the process I previously talked about here.
They are still small, about 2” x 4”, but big enough that I can include details like expressions and backgrounds in a simplified but visually decipherable way. With all this newly-found space, I have struggled a little with getting too detailed. However, the size is still small enough that my impulses are thwarted. I feel like this is essential. Gibson asked me if I thought I might make them any bigger in the future. Part of me would like maybe another half inch or so, but I’d never want to go much bigger. I know if I did I’d end up doing pencils, not thumbnails, and lose the forest altogether and along with it, something irreplaceable in my way of telling a story.
I’m gonna leave it there for this week. Come back next week for the second part as I pull back the curtain on my own thumbnailing process.