Guest blogger: I.N.J. Culbard on 'The Three Page Problem'

Every time I finish work on a Sherlock Holmes graphic novel the last panel I draw and letter has some appropriate line that sums up the journey’s end.  For example, in A Study in Scarlet it was “and freedom lay ahead.” For The Sign of the Four it was “there is the end of our little drama!”

Appropriate and quite by chance.

You see if I get stuck drawing a page I find another page to draw, one that’s comparatively easy to draw and while I’m drawing that page I almost subconsciously solve the problems of the page that got me stuck in the first place. A bit like when they tell you during exams “if you get stuck, move on to the next question”. 

Since working on Holmes, a particularly difficult page has come to be known as “A Three Page Problem”. The old maxim ‘sleep on it’ has also proved invaluable and saved my bacon on more than one occasion. I problem solve when I go to sleep, as we all do, so if I have a particularly hard page to draw I process all that I have to do before I go to bed, play a quick game of Klondike on my iPod and then go to sleep. I wake up and set to work and somehow know exactly what to do. The hurdle of the night before has magically disappeared. Not sure how Klondike figures into it. Forget Klondike. 

The method as I have described above means I’m constantly working. I have in my studio, what I call, a prison sheet. Its a couple of sheets of A4 paper with boxes printed on them. Each box is a page and each of these is divided into panels. When I’m finished drawing a panel I take a pencil and mark off the panel on the prison sheet. Done. And then I move on. And slowly but surely, bit by bit I chisel away at the book till I’ve filled in all the gaps and all the pages on the prison sheet are marked off.  It’s a method that gives me an overview of the entire book so I can keep track if I need to suddenly jump to page 101 because I’m stuck on page 42. It’s kept me busy and it’s kept me moving and it’s got the job done. Anyway, I digress...

So, those final apt words are not always the last words of the book.  I never intend to finish on those words... it is something that happens quite by chance and I find it peculiarly satisfying. Will the last words I letter for The Valley of Fear signal a fond farewell or tease us all with the promise of further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes I wonder? We shall see...

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I.N.J. Culbard is the artist of the following graphic novels by SelfMadeHero. There'll be more from Ian next week on the SMH blog.You can buy titles illustrated by I.N.J. Culbard from the SelfMadeHero online store:

The Picture of Dorian Gray

The Hound of the Baskervilles

A Study in Scarlet

The Sign of the Four

The Valley of Fear (not available for pre-order yet)

At the Mountains of Madness (available for pre-order)