Maggie Shang

Behind the Scenes of “Runaway Train”

~ Johnell DeWitt ~ 1 Comment

Tech and time weren’t my friends this week, but I did manage to mostly edit a video that I’m excited to share because it shows the evolution process of the script for “Runaway Train,” my and Maggie Shang‘s collaboration for the Let’s Go!: A Kids Comics Anthology. But instead of having all the cool captions and corresponding pictures added to the video, I ran into tech issues that I couldn’t solve in time to tag team with Maggie’s post about her process.

So here’s the video with loads of info about how we started our collaboration, how the scripts changed over time, Maggie’s artistic decisions plus really valuable insights she learned along the way, my scripting decisions, and what I learned from the comic’s scripting process for this anthology project. For the time-limited among us, I’ve included time codes and supplementary graphics and info below. I hope you have as much fun watching this video as Maggie and I did making it.

Time Codes:

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I’m in an Interview!

~ Johnell DeWitt ~ 1 Comment

Barney Smith, the host of Story Comics, a really great resource for comics and graphic novel creators, recently interviewed Maggie Shang and I about “Runaway Train,” our short comic for the Kids Comics Studio Anthology, which, by the way, was funded on Kickstarter within 15 hours of launch, but we still have two more stretch goals to meet, including the biggest one of sending a panel of anthology creators to the San Diego Comic-Con.

art by Maggie Shang/Runaway Train

But back to the interview. Maggie and I got to share some things we’ve learned about collaborations, anthologies, and short-comic creations. In the near future, we’re going to share the different scripts, how and why we changed them, and what we finally ended up with and why. It’s been a mini-course is editing, hitting deadlines, and crafting scripts to leave room for the art. But for now, please enjoy this interview:

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How to Pick an Anthology Theme: Plus a Sneak Peak of My Short Comic Collab

~ Johnell DeWitt ~ Leave a comment
art by Gina McMillen

The KCS Anthology team is hard at work finishing our upcoming anthology. Our newsletter crew ran an article about how the editorial committee picked our theme. It’s chock full of tips on how to create a cohesive theme that’s also broad enough for each creator to have the freedom to be themselves. One other fun nugget in this article is a glimpse into my and Maggie Shang’s anthology collaboration called “Runaway Train.”

As you can see from Maggie’s incredible graphic, it’s going to be a visual treat. This specific panel won’t be in the final, but these two characters will be. Especially that phenomenal train.

The script for “Runaway Train” is a spin off of a graphic novel I’ve been working on. When I shared various ideas with Maggie, she liked this one, so I got to work creating a new and fresh script that would fit into eight pages.

Eight pages is hard, folks. This story wanted to be at least a couple pages bigger, but I wrote and rewrote and Maggie drew and redrew and we finally got our ideas into an eight-page story that we hope will inspire young and old.

Maggie’s art is superb and perfectly suited for this story. In fact, her magical style inspired how I developed the story. I wanted her incredible art to have as much room to shine while still trying to maintain the pacing, plot, and tell the story I hoped to tell. It’s been an exciting project.

Maggie and I will be doing a podcast interview in March with Story Comic and will have more reveals soon, but for now, I hope you enjoy this little peek into what’s coming up.

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