Final Draft Templates for Comics
It was Antony Johnston who first switched me on to the joys of Final Draft, and gave me a copy of his own comic-book template to go along with it.
Since then I’ve developed my own version of the template, which more closely resembles traditional screenplay format – right down to the pig-ugly Courier font. You can download it for Final Draft 6 here.
Many thanks to Andy Diggle for making his comic book template for Final Draft available again. If Andy’s template does not blow your skirt up, you might also check out the source material from Antony Johnson, another professional comic author. Thanks to William Satterwhite for the heads up on Johnson’s template.
Interested in the work of Andy Diggle and Antony Johnson? Check out their blogs by clicking on their names.
Author Neil Gaiman discusses blogging
Re: Journal – by burrows
William Gibson just stopped blogging [williamgibsonbooks.com], stating that informal blog/journal writing gets in the way of writing fiction.Is there a conflict for you between maintaining your journal and writing fiction? How do you manage your time / ideas / approach, in order to stay active in both?
Neil [Gaiman]:
I’ve enormously enjoyed the immediacy of having the blog. In some ways it sort of bypasses established promotional and advertising systems. It means that, for example, if I’m giving a talk or doing a signing, many of the people who would have wanted to know this, know it. So while Steve Martin and I were both headlining at New York Is Book Country, and his face was on the ad material, mine was the talk that sold out. And if he had a blog, and blog readers, and so on, like I do, his would have sold out as well. It also means that I have several hundred thousand people cheerfully being some kind of a knowledge pool, for when I need to know things (especially techie things, which are always very mysterious to me) and more questions always being sent in than I could ever answer.
I found this snippet really interesting. It is very telling about the power of the blog/online journal. Not only can blogs be a non-intrusive, opt-in marketing tool (intended or no); the medium also provide an unprecedented means of two-way communication between artists and thier audiences. This recipriocal and potentially symbiotic exchange has tremendous potential.
The Baghdad Blog (Book from a Blog)
‘MY MAN SALAM. I’M A TOTAL FAN. TELLS IT LIKE HE SEES IT, AND SEES IT LIKE I CAN’T.’ — William Gibson
In September 2002, a young Iraqi calling himself ‘Salam Pax’ began posting accounts of everyday life in Baghdad on to the internet. Written in English, in the form of a web log (or `blog’), these bulletins contained everything from musings on his CD collection to open criticisms of Saddam’s regime. In keeping this web diary, Salam took a huge risk: if he had been caught condemning it could have cost him his life.
Salam Pax’s incisive and sharply funny diary entries soon attracted a worldwide readership. As the American-led force gathered to invade Iraq, Salam’s diary became an extraordinary record of the anticipation, resentment, bemusement and sheer terror felt by an ordinary man living through the final days of a long dictatorship, and the chaos that has followed its destruction.
The Baghdad Blog tells the story of the war in Iraq from inside that besieged country. It provides a gripping and wholly unique perspective on the conflict and its aftermath.
Now, this is interesting. Salam Pax vaulted to to international Internet celebrity because, as Peter Maass of Slate put it, he was ” the Anne Frank of the war … and its Elvis”. Now, Pax’s blog has been turned into a book. More proof that the Internet in general and blogs in specific are changing the face of the publishing industry.
Another Iraqi Blogger
Zainab,
I found your blog through Salam Pax. It is good to have another voice from Iraq.
As an American, I’ve found the entire Iraq War a difficult thing to digest. On the one hand, Saddam Hussein was, by all accounts, a ruthless dictator who has needed to go for a long time. On the other, I question the Bush administration’s motives for marching on Baghdad. At times, the whole things smells a bit like an American jihad, albeit a politically correct one.
I read the reports of sky-rocketing unemployment and lawlessness in Iraq and have nothing but compassion for her citizens. No one in the U.S. has a clue what life must be like for everyone there. And, I do not subscribe to the train of thought that Iraq is an inherently lawless society. Hussein apparently dumped the worst criminals in your prisons back into society last fall. I suspect they, and Baath hardliners, cause the majority of the problems.
On the other hand, regardless of Bush’s motives, America’s sons and daughters gave their lives to liberate Iraq and continue to do so as they try to help Iraq establish order and rebuild her infrastructure. So, it disturbs me to see such strong anti-US sentiment and violence directed at US troops who are just their doing their jobs.
I don’t claim to have the answers. All any of us can do right now is pray (in our own particular way) for peace and a quick exit of coalition forces from Iraq. Regardless of whatever plans the White House might have, the American people do not want our soldiers in harm’s way any longer than neccessary.
Wishing you peace,
Doug Daulton
apakuni.com
I discovered Zainab while reading Salam Pax’s blog. Her first post raises some eyebrows and prompted the above comment from me. I am hoping Mahmood will read and offer his perspective as well.
“Dear Raed” back online
The streets markets look like something out of a William Gibson novel. Heaps of cheap RAM (stolen of course) is being sold beside broken monitors beside falafel stands and weapons are all available. Fights break out justlikethat and knives come out from nowhere, knives just bought 5 minutes ago. There are army sighting thingys, Weird looking things with lenses. And people selling you computer cases who tell you these are electric warmers, never having seen a computer case before. Really truly surreal.
Salam, the Iraqi Blogger is back online. If you want a worm’s eye view of life in post-Saddam Iraq, this is definitely a blog for you.
Peace.
