I’m continuing to post, in serialize fashion, the rough pages, along with the final printed pages (and the original pages if I still have them) to my run on Batman Adventures. Today we’ll look at pages 8 and 9 of Batman Adventures #5, published by DC Comics in February 1993. This is part two of “Riot Act”, part one having appeared in Batman Adventures #4.
“Eye Read” refers to the way a reader’s eyes move across the page. In the west, it’s left to right, top to bottom. The comic book artist (and, hopefully, writer) must take this into account; if a page doesn’t work, chances are it’s because the cartoonist hasn’t. One can take in a panel, a page, a spread, in a glance, but to really absorb in the eyes more in the manner described. Dialogue balloons and captions need to conform to this. Dialogues should be laid out so that the first speaker is located to the left of the second speaker. Compositions should follow this rule as well. Actions, if not broken into more than one panel, should start on the left and pay off on the right, lower in the panel.
In the case of page 8, I had two contradictory requirements to fulfill, as one can see by the difference between pages 8 and 8A. Page 8 works for eye read, but has Robin leaping from the wrong side of the room. Page 8A has Robin coming from the correct side, but is inelegant in terms of eye read. As you can see, I chose spacial logic over readability (it’s my training as a storyboard artist).
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