Are They Always Like This?

MARGARET LISS:

A few years ago I scanned all of Dave Sim's notebooks. He had filled 36 notebooks during the years he created the monthly Cerebus series, covering issues #20 to 300, plus the other side items -- like the Epic stories, posters and prints, convention speeches etc. A total of 3,281 notebook pages detailing his creative process. I never really got the time to study the notebooks when I had them. Just did a quick look, scanned them in and sent them back to Dave as soon as possible. So this regular column is a chance for me to look through those scans and highlight some of the more interesting pages.

Last week we saw a single page from Dave Sim’s ninth notebook, which covers Cerebus #80 to 86. That single page, page 43, had thumbnails for three pages from Cerebus #84. Page 44 had some dialogue, which since it was for the pages shown on page 43, we’ll skip. Then page 45 has more page thumbnails:

Notebook #9, page 45

Once again, you can see how Dave roughed in some backgrounds, word balloon placement, and sound effects, and then compare them to the finished pages:

Left: Cerebus #84 page 4 (aka page 658 of Church & State II) 

Right: The notebook

The sound effects are a bit different, more fighting noises than just falling noises, but other then missing Ger’s background, pretty similar. On the next page we see our first major difference:

Left: Cerebus #84 page 5 (aka page 659 of Church & State II) 

Right: The notebook

Not only is the first panel different with regards to the word balloons and the sound effects are different, panel four doesn’t have the Countess and Cerebus. Instead Dave inserted an extra panel of the empty doorway and then put the panel with roach brother peaking around the corner.

Don’t worry about that fourth panel, it was used on the next page:

Cerebus #84 page 6, panel 1 (aka page 660 of Church & State II)

And don’t worry about the thumbnails for page six and seven, as they’ll show up on page 47 of the notebook. Instead, I wanted to show you page 46. So notice how the wire spiral is on the right side of the notebook on page 45 above. On page 46, it is on the left side. Dave could lay the notebook down flat with both of these pages showing at the same time. 

Notebook #9, page 45 and 46

Makes me think he’d do the thumbnails first, and then looking at them, write down the dialogue. Similar to how he says he does a page at a time in Swords of Cerebus #1: writer thinks of something, artist roughs it out, letter comes to write it down. But the writer comes back in and struggles with the letter so they can get something worthy of being put down in ink.

So speaking of the writer and letter, here is page 46:

Notebook #9, page 45

So the big dialogue is the roach brothers, pretty close to the finished page 4 and 5. The smaller dialogue about 1/3 of the way down the page is actually used on page 6 in that first panel of the Countess and Cerebus. Perhaps writing down the dialogue prompted Dave to move that final panel of the Countess and Cerebus to the next page.

The dialogue at the bottom of the page appears not to have been used at all:

So what you’re saying is you feel Lord Julius raised this. . .this Cerebus above his station.

Oh not at all. . .quite the contrary.