@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
People often joke that Subaru Outbacks are the “official car of Vermont.” As a kid, I longed for my family to fit in with other families by owning a Subaru. There really are a lot of them here. When I Iived in New York City, every time I saw a Subaru Outback, I would have a sharp little pang of homesickness.
Now, I own a silver Outback. What you see here happens to me a lot. It happened to me yesterday, as a matter of fact, and when I was scrolling through Facebook later in the day, a friend posted that something similar had happened to her—followed by a string of comments from local friends sharing their similar experiences of hopping in the wrong car, trying to unlock other people’s cars, waving to strangers driving by in cars that match friends’ cars, and so on. I guess I’ve finally accomplished my dream of fitting in.
To create this comic I was surprised at how challenging it was to use color. Most of my comics so far have either been black-line outlines, or just very spare amounts of color. I like the way the cars and the grocery cart came out — but I don’t love the grocery store or the person I drew. There’s a lot I plan to do differently next time.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
So far this month, all of my comics have been lighthearted—the form lends itself well to that. However, all my favorite comic authors find a way to capture a range of emotions. I haven’t been able to do that with comics, so far, and I wanted to push myself to give it a try. Once again, I looked to Grant Snider at Incidental Comics as my mentor. Here’s my first attempt at a comic that is less funny. (I already have about six ideas for revision as I’m hitting “Publish.”)
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
For today’s comic, I studied a mentor author. Grant Snider at Incidental Comics, who has inspired me for years. He often creates comics about being a writer, and they’ve always resonated with me. Now, I see his work in a new way—as a comic creator. This was my first time using color.
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
Sometimes I’m just so confused!
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
This is why no one ever asks me to cook.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
This year, for the Slice of Life Story Challenge, I set a goal to write a comic per day.
So far so good.
Today, to mark the 15th day of the challenge (halfway there!) I’m looking back at what I’ve learned so far.
I’ve learned that generating ideas for comics is similar to generating ideas for written stories, but also different. When I’m thinking up ideas for stories to write in words, all I have to do is have a memory, and write it down. When I’m thinking up ideas for comics, I first get the memory, but then I have to ask myself, “Can I draw this?” I’m not much of an artist, so that narrows down the possibilities of what I can create.
Not being able to draw something doesn’t necessarily stop me, though! Instead, it’s more of a puzzle to solve. I tend to think, “Well I can’t draw it that way, but what if I….”
It has helped me a lot to think about problems as a starting point, and then use exaggeration to create humor. I take something small, and make it big. Or something boring, and find the surprising part of it.
It’s been helpful to me, as a writer, to actually SEE the topics that I go to most often. Family, the outdoors, and housework are big themes for me. I think they always have been, but as you can see below, it really stands out when it’s in graphic form. This simultaneously gives me more ideas to write related to these same topics, and also helps me to see the topics I could be writing about that I haven’t tapped into.
Lastly, I’ve learned that comics may look incredibly simple, but they take as much, if not more drafting, revision and work to create than my typical writing. They definitely take more time! I have even more appreciation now for the talent of real graphic artists, and the masterpieces that create.
I’m excited to continue the challenge and keep my learning curve just as steep as it’s been!
Here are all the comics I’ve created so far, in order of oldest at the top, to newest at the bottom. I can see a difference between my first ones, and my most recent. Can you?
This one is a metaphor for my life.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
It’s a constant struggle to resist the urge to do things for my kids. I really do want to teach them to be independent and do things for themselves. But when left to their own devices…. how would we ever get out of the house?
Click on the image to enlarge.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
It’s never ending!
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day. To see all my comics, click here.
Motivation to go to the gym has to come from somewhere, right?
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day.
I know I’m not alone on this. Am I?
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day.
Getting my kids from place to place is always a challenge — but none more so than getting ready for skiing!
@BethMooreSchool
This is officially the tenth comic I have ever created. I’ve been using the app Procreate and have learned so much! Here is a time lapse video that gives you a peek into the process of creating a comic.
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day.
I’m becoming an old lady! Broken wrist, nerve damage, carpal tunnel, cubital tunnel, trigger finger, poor circulation. Bedtime is an actual ridiculous joke now.
@BethMooreSchool
My Two Writing Teachers colleagues and I are hosting the 12th Annual March Slice of Life Story Challenge. Hundreds of teachers participate in creating a story per day. My goal is to create a comic per day.
