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THE LUNCH LADY DEBUTS!

Finally! For those of you who followed me before I made my debut in newspapers nearly 3 years ago will know Lunch Lady already. She is of course the force who, some say, created Gooser Dadburn. I am saving the retelling of Gooser for an upcoming comic book fyi. Once it is released next year, you all will see what happens.

Every comic strip hero needs a nemesis. Snoopy has the Red Baron. Garfield has Odie. Dagwood had Mr. Dithers. Charmy has the evil Lunch Lady. Of course everyone else seems to love Lunch Lady except Charmy. Over the past few months, I have used a few comic strips to build up Lunch Lady’s debut, each making sure the readers know that only Charmy sees the evil in her.

THREE FLIES

When something is smelly, I love using some nasty flies buzzing around the stinky object. There are three flies for a reason. When I was seven, I teamed up with my two buddies to work on a comic strip. At the time, I was working on a comic strip called Super Fly because a fly was easy to draw. Super Fly was just a dot with two wings. My strip stunk and my two friends, Adrian Guedin and Carl Werner roped me into working with them on their amazing comic strip. When you see three flies, they are representing Me, Adrian and Carl. Those annoying flies represent my dream taking flight.

CAMERA ANGLES

Once again, I wanted the action to spin. It is amazing how completely redrawing the perspective on the panels of a comic strip can add so much action. When we zoom back in for the last panel, the reader is drawn into the frightened expression on Charmy’s face. This shot not only helps to sell the gag but it also helps the reader see the gag through Charmy’s eyes. This shot helps the reader place his/herself in Charmy’s place, living the scene.

Cartoonists who just use the same shot for each panel are not building impact into their story. If any young cartoonists are reading this, I beg you to take each panel as a new perspective. When you watch shows on television, notice how the camera angle keeps changing. This is to draw interest and give you something new to see every few seconds. Changing up the camera angles in every panel offers the same freshness and satisfaction for the readers.

#comics #comicstrips #webcomics #charmysarmy