Self-publishing is significantly better than traditional publishing since you get to keep between 50 and 70% of the proceeds from your book, and self-published publications have a much higher royalty rate than books from traditional publishers.
The publishing industry anticipates that self-publishing will be the dominant trend for the foreseeable future. This entails distributing your work to readers in the fewest steps possible for a first-time author. The process for book self-publishers has been considerably easier and more accessible thanks to the iPad and other touchscreen devices. The best part is that publishing your book now costs a small portion of what it would to print and distribute physical copies ordinarily.
But many people don’t know how to self-publish a comic book or others. In this guest post, I’ll explain how self-publish a professional comic book.
Five Steps for Self-Publishing a Comic Book
The challenging portion is complete. You’ve carefully planned out your comic book, written the script, and polished the illustrations. It’s finally time to publish your comic book and pass it out to your readers. Below I describe the five steps to help know how to self-publish a comic book.
- Select a Self-Publishing Site for Your Work
Pick the right self publishing house for a self-publishing comic book is important. There are several online stores where self-published comic book authors can sell their books, so it’s important to take your time choosing the one that’s right for you.
The best opportunity for the relevant readers to find your work is on an acceptable platform. Your best beginning point is to hunt for independent comics similar to yours and determine where they are being sold because readers of certain genres of comics don’t want to search too far for new indie creators.
- Create the Narrative
It’s time to start writing the manuscript right now. This will include the conversation that helps your plot go forward in conjunction with the visuals. Writing a standard book is different from structuring a comic book or manga. Instead of being a collection of several chapters, the approach is more analogous to a 3-act screenplay.
Create tale panels that allow you to doodle the major events and actions in the story arc. The composition of the narrative will receive a lot of attention when creating a graphic novel
- Make a Comic Book
A comic book typically has between 30 and 50 pages. Text and photos must be included on these pages. The talks and conversations between characters are displayed in bubble speeches. If you need to define the storyline, setting, behaviors, background, point of view, or anything else about a comic book character, write the text on the page where it is simple to read. However, there are both commercial and unpaid online resources for creating comic books. They are useful. You can download a tool from KDP, for instance, to create graphic novels for no cost.
- Explain Your Idea
You must choose a theme before you start writing and self-publishing your comic book. Fantasy, science fiction, adventure, comedic, horror, and romantic themes all fit well in comic books.
Create an outline from which to work that incorporates the main characters, the scene, the overall plot, and the emotional journey. Although it is likely to change a little as the project progresses, the outline provides a structure.
- Edit the Written Work
It’s time to send the book off to a skilled editor once the text has been finished and a meticulous self-edit has been performed. The editor reads the manuscript and offers comments on the narrative, dialogue, character development, storyline, and structure. A line editor will perform the last proofreading to identify any typos, spelling mistakes, or grammatical errors after any revisions have been made.
- Drawing
You can get a professional to create quality illustrations for your comic book. You can draw every cartoon character or image from your comic book if you believe you can draw anything and your work is good. If your drawings need some editing, you can hire a comic book cartoonist and ask him to do it. Nowadays, you can create characters using computer graphic tools instead of drawing them by hand with a pencil.
Top Two Self-Publishing Platforms
Many online self-publishing websites offer professional self-publishing services. Below I describe the top two of them that help to choose the right one.
Barnes and Noble Press
Barnes and Noble Press, formerly known as NOOK, is the self-publishing website of the aforementioned bookstores. This is yet another merchant who only sells eBooks. Only Barnes and Noble’s physical and online bookstores can sell any of the books that have been published here.
Print-on-Demand services are a bonus offered by Barnes and Noble Press. This means that the stack of unread paperbacks taking up a corner of your living room is no longer necessary. All books priced over $2.99 receive a 65% royalty, demonstrating how competitive Barnes and Noble Press’ royalty payout rates are.
Amazon Kinder Direct Publishing
Amazon is one of the first organizations people think of when they consider self-publishing a book. Authors can self-publish their print books and eBooks via Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing [KDP] platform.
Amazon alone sells 40% of self-published digital books in the United States. As a result, you cannot afford to disregard Amazon’s influence on the book publishing industry.
Conclusion
The most important step of self-publishing is choosing the right platform for self-publishing a comic book. In this guest post, I briefly describe self-publishing, top self-publishing companies, and essential steps to consider when self-publish a comic book. I hope after reading this guest post you can understand how to self-publish a comic book.
