Titling Pompfiction
on January 24th, 2011So OS9 on Deviantart asked me if I happen to have a tutorial on coming up with a good name for a story/comic, so I used the example of Pompfiction.Truth be told, Celest came up with Pompfiction XD But here’s how I started, when trying to choose a fitting name:
Basically how I started was to write a list of words that really defined what the comic was about. Any words I could think up “grease, pompadour, combs, leather, boots, hot rods, pinups, 50s” etc, then to narrow down that list to only what REALLY defines my comic. I’d cross out things like “boots, combs, pinups” etc. Then try to think of varations upon those words. Grease: Greaser, greasy, greased.
Some things you want to consider when making a good title is your branding. Your comic is your brand. EVERYTHING about your comic should fall under that brand. Mine is all about the greasy 50s, and all that implies. It’s funny, it’s serious, and it’s campy like a pulp fiction novel. So PompFiction, a parody of Pulp Fiction the movie, worked perfectly. XD It had that Pompadour feeling to it, and it is indeed Fiction, as my site not only includes comic pages, but ALL forms of story telling.
If you’re making it into a webcomic, consider your domain name strongly. Don’t just slap on whatever you want. Under 9 characters long will highly increase your direct site traffic. It doesn’t sound like it would help, but typing out “omgthisistotallymycomic.com” every time you want to read the comic is annoying. Consider Alliterations: “GreaseyGears” etc, that will be more memorable. If your comic name is uber long, consider a real memorable catchphrase or something short you can use as the domain name. Like if mine was called “Pompiliciousness” then I would just call it “PompComic.com” XD Player Vs Player webcomic uses “PvPOnline.com” So definitely consider that. The ONLY excuse for an uberlong comic name is if its shockingly memorable like “devilspanties.com”
Unfortunately it takes me FOREVER to come up with good names. I originally bought the domain name “pomprats,” but felt like it was way too generic and not memorable. It doesn’t really carry the FEELING of the comic, you know? You want to capture the feeling of your comic, more so than the literal content. Don’t just call it “A bunch of badasses in the ghettos.com” XDDDDDDDDDDDD Try to capture that feeling of it. If it’s grunge, go for a real grungy title. Something that strikes up an emotion, or imagery in the reader’s mind. That’s ultimately what you’re going after.
That’s kind of what we did. Our comic is actually called Comic Action Role-Play, but we shortened it to CARP (a play on LARP of course). Since there was already a Carp.com, I just appended comic and voila! carpcomic.com was born! And I’ve actually really started getting behind the fish thing, as our blog is called the fish-wrapper (English slang for the news paper of course). And the tag line is “a comic having nothing to do with fish”. Wow. . . this comment is kind of random. Sorry fyu!
That’s awesome insight though! Thanks for sharing, no need to apologize! n.n
I’ve been working on a Science-fiction/Comedy comic about a genetic engineer for quite some time and have recently started hosting it online(on DA, I don’t have a website). I call it “SigFigs”, how do you think that sounds name wise?
P.S.-Awsome insight on the comic making process.
That’s a great title, because it’s simple, short, and rhymes. Rhyming names tend to do very well, and the shorter the better. Rhymes and alliterations: guru, lulu, etc. If you can get the domain name for that, I’d get it soon before it gets taken if its not already.