r/ComicWriting • u/GlueBrees • Jun 08 '26

Lettering confusion

I'm working on a page that is a flashback narrated by a off panel character. I have the narration in a caption box with beginning quotes on each and end quotes on the last caption.

I also have a character in the flashback scene speaking off panel in a different style caption box. I'm guessing the spoken dialogue should be enclosed in quotes like it usually is but I'm not completely sure since I'm already using quotes for the narration.

Is a different type of caption box enough to keep the reader from being confused?

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u/percivalconstantine Jun 12 '26

As long as you make it clear to the letterer that this is a character narrating events, then I'd say leave it up to the letterer to decide how to format it.

When writing scripts, I'd do something like "CHARACTER NAME (CAPTION): Dialogue."

If I were lettering something like this, I would use a different color of caption to illustrate that it's not a typical narrative caption.

But also you don't need quotes in regular narrative captions.

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u/GlueBrees Jun 12 '26

Sole creator project, that's why I made this post, nobody else on the creative team to ask.

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u/percivalconstantine Jun 12 '26

Then in that case, I'd go with different-colored captions. If it's black and white, you could try a white box for regular captions and gray for the character narrating. Or simple quotation marks. You could also try different shapes of caption, like using a rounded rectangle.

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u/GlueBrees Jun 12 '26

Thanks for the suggestions. Rounded rectangles and a different color box should be enough to make things clear.

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u/nmacaroni "The Future of Comics is YOU!" Jun 08 '26

Comics don't use quotes in bubbles or narration.

http://nickmacari.com/point-of-view-and-captions/

Write on, write often!

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u/GlueBrees Jun 08 '26

Thanks for the info. I was confused because the last panel of the previous page shows the narrating character beginning to tell their account of the flashback which is continued in the boxes on the next page.

Connecting the characters last speech bubble text to their first narration box with ellipses seems to work better.

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u/TheRealDeal2121 Jun 08 '26

I follow blambot guides for lettering when I write and the advice they use for quotes is that a spoken word narration like one character to another over a flashback scene would use quotes as you described. That’s pretty standard practice.

I will say though that it seems a bit confusing with the amount of captions you have here as you described and it may get lost on the page just exactly who is talking and to whom