Tomorrow brings a big new Boom! Studios title to the world, as James Tynion IV and Michael Dialynas bring “The Woods” to life. This story, which finds an entire school being transported from Wisconsin to another planet, is one that is earning a lot of buzz and is certain to earn a lot of fans with its debut.
To share the love about it, we talk with Dialynas about bringing this world to life, working with Tynion, the art of visual storytelling, and much more. This guy is one of the next big talents in comics, and if you missed “Amala’s Blade” at Dark Horse, we hope you get onboard with “The Woods” from day one. You’ll be happy you did.
Also, take a look at the bottom to see some roughs and inks from the issue to see how Dialynas developed the look of the book. It’s great insight into what makes his work so incredible.
The Woods looks like a very weird, very interesting and very fun story, and to me as a reader, the appeal is very obvious. But for you as a creator, what is it about this idea and this world that agrees so well with you as an artist, and drives you to really push your art?
Dialynas: Well leaving the obvious reasons like Aliens! and World-building out of it, one of the main reasons I wanted to do this comic was because its something I’ve never drawn before. I’ve never really drawn something with real-life elements before like the school and all the main characters in The Woods. I’ve always drawn my own kind of worlds and weird fantasy and cartoony stuff so when I first read James’ script I took this as a challenge to give the world a try!
Did I mention I get to draw a Space Monkey? heh!
Your main partner on this book is writer James Tynion IV, and from what I’ve read, he’s pretty enamored about working with you. As an artist, what’s the process like with James, and is there anything about the way he writes that works particularly well for you as an artist?
Dialynas: It has been awesome working with James! This is his baby but I think we are on the same wave length when we Skype about each script and whats going to happen further down. I love the way he scripts, he has a great grasp when writing the dialogue and tension between characters, I alway have fun when reading the script for the first time i.e. last night i was reading for a good hour to let everything set in my mind for the 5th issue, man I have some cool things to draw on that issue!
There are a lot of different options for artists these days in terms of bringing their work to life. How do you work? Are you more of a traditional guy, digital only, or some combination of both?
Dialynas: God I wish I could be more traditional, I used to be! When I started working on Amala’s Blade i chose to do it all digitally cause i was on full art chores so it was quicker for me to draw a full page from pencils to colours than drawing by hand then scanning to colour in Photoshop but and after doing over a hundred pages that way it just stuck. Its a lot quicker for me to draw digitally but I choose to leave a few pages out whenever I can and draw them by hand and of course whatever cover I do I use ink. Hopefully one day I can find my speed in inking and revert back but for now digital is the way I work.
With this page, the thing that stands out to me the most is your work with the characters Adrian and Isaac. In teasers, the former was “the genius” while the latter was “the wimp”, and honestly, even without words on this page I’d know exactly what was going on with them because of how you delivered the story. Where does that come from? What’s your approach when it comes to things like conveying Isaac’s dejection and Adrian’s smarmy confidence without making either of those moments go over the top?
Continued belowDialynas: That is kind of a hard question, I’ve never really thought of that sort of thing. I do believe that with comic storytelling you should be able to figure out whats going on in the story with a first glance, the dialogue and art go hand in hand and need to compliment each other.
The fourth panel on this page could have been handled a lot of different ways, but the delivery of Adrian’s knowing agreement and a snippet of his bad news email is, in my mind, the most powerful way to deliver that story beat. When it comes to a panel like that, is that something that James has hard scripted, or is it very much a situation where he knows you’ll find the way to visually represent that?
No this frame was all James, I’m given the “Do-what-you-want” pass when his comes to action scenes but with the character driven scenes James knows exactly what he wants.
This page finds the school making its big move, and it is a powerful page both in how you deliver it and Josan Gonzalez’s colors. One thing I’m curious about often is the interaction between the artist and colorist, and how – if at all – you two work together. Is it very much a hands off type thing, or do the two of you discuss things at all beforehand?
Dialynas: Josan did a great job with this page, it’s one of my favourite moments and he nailed it!
This is my second time working with a colourist, I’m used to being a one-man-army on art but when we talked I knew I didn’t have to say anything. Josan knows what he is doing and has chosen a pallet for this world. Only a few times I’ve pointed out how i want specific things coloured like the giant gas giant, aliens and the main characters. Other than that Josan takes the ball and runs and I eagerly wait for a email with freshly coloured pages!
This page furthers the school’s move from its natural home to its new home, and the depiction features the school going through some serious convulsions. I’m always curious about motion conveyed in art when there isn’t any real way to display true motion. For something like the first panel at the top on this page, what’s your approach, and how do you convey what’s happening in the scene in a way that’s clear for readers but not over the top?
Dialynas: Well this is one of those frames that took a little “trial and error” to nail down. We still haden’t figured out how the school “moves” to the other planet visually and my first draft was having the kids experience a tremor then boom! we are there.
Then we had a talk with Jasmine and Eric, our editors, and Jasmine pointed out that this frame would be cool to have a “Misfits” feel to it, if you are not familiar with the UK series Misfits, there is a scene in the first episode where all the protagonists get struck by lightning and there’s a freeze frame with all of them mid-air.
So with that in mind I tilted it so make it more unnerving, gave the frame a look like gravity is lost for a second to show that the school is shifting to its new whereabouts and voilà!
A school is going to have a ton of students, and based off the events of the next page, there are going to be a fair amount of redshirts or sacrificial lambs amongst their number. Yet you make sure to give definition and character to each of them, displaying faces and characteristics even in the background when many artists would leave those characters to be somewhat faceless entities. For you as an artist, how important is it to you to give depth to the world’s you’re building, and ensuring that even if a character isn’t hugely important, they at least have some level of a visual impact?
Continued belowDialynas: I try my best, I honestly do. It’s a head-ache to draw loads of people but you have to make it believable that in this case a whole school has moved and not just our core team and a bunch of random kids. Some of the kids I’ve drawn will show up again and some are just for fun but I want to have a small roster of faces so that I can use again and again in the background. There was a scene in issue 3 where I had to draw about 60 kids in a frame…lets just say I drank a lot while drawing it and was watching Veronica Mars in the background.
This page introduces readers and the kids and staff at the school to the dangers that live in this new world, in the form of the rather horrifying many winged bat like creatures that explode out of a tree. I have to imagine that these are just the first creatures we see, not the last. When you’re designing the creatures of this world, is this a case where it’s all about your imagination running wild, or do you and James talk it out first to get a good feel for what look you want to go for?
Dialynas: We talked a lot about the horrors in the world after reading the first draft and have given these creatures a reason, these are not random designs. I wanted to keep them grounded and think that when a monster is familiar to something you know is real then that makes it even more terrifying. I didn’t want to go too alien with the look, I want an element of “same same but different”
There are going to be a lot of weird creatures to come and especially in the new arc which I’m working on now, but we’ll get deeper into the Woods soon enough.
This page gives us the first look at the world the book takes place in, and, well, it’s a hell of a thing. When it came to building the world and what it looked like, what were you looking to convey? What do you want readers to feel when they’re seeing when they first see this world?
Dialynas: I think I’ve already answered this question above. “Same but different” is the feeling i’m going for here for now…
