It’s really hard for me to list off any kind of authoritative mistake list, but I’ll try to hit a few key things here.

• I know many first time comic creators want their first project to be be something really huge and epic to make a big splash but, more often than not, that kind of story tends to be too much for a new creator to deliver on at the start of their career. Build up your storytelling skills with smaller more focused stories, learn the craft, and then build something big later on. If you’re in to make comics over the long haul you’ll have time to do something epic later on.

• It’s better to create a project from scratch that plays to an artist’s strengths than to try and force an artist to illustrate something that isn’t a good fit for their style.

• Don’t treat the lettering as something incidental. Lettering can make or break a comic. It controls how a reader moves through each page. Good lettering is crucial to your comic’s success.

• It’s all well and good to be influenced by other things, but make sure your story is more than just a Frankenstein monster of influences stitched together. Bring something new and interesting to the table to justify a story’s existence.

• Don’t worry about riding pop culture trends or trying to figure out what will sell, just tell a story that you as a reader would love to read. Stories that come from a genuine place of inspiration and excitement tend to be the stories that resonate with an audience too.The amount of work involved in making something new is daunting and you’ll need to love what you’re working on to carry you through the rough spots.

• Every idea evolves as it develops into a finished project. It will never be the “perfect” thing it was in your mind when you first came up with it, but that’s okay. It’s all part of the process.