Hello, it’s me, Tina Anderson.

I want to say sorry for the lack of participation on both my and Laura Carboni’s part here at the Rush Blog; our excuse of course is, our careers. As much as we love DramaQueen [and we truly do] they’re not our only publishers, and because of this, our time has been ungraciously tight. (>_>) However, we have set aside the last few weeks to work on Roulette, and I’ve chosen today to make a post here, so no one thinks we’re in permanent absentia. 0_0.

I wanted to also weigh in on the ‘how-to’ aspect this blog has been taking by posting a ‘how Roulette gets made entry’, because Roulette, unlike the other great stories in RUSH, is not made by one person. It’s written/lettered by me, and illustrated by Laura Carboni. The writer/artist team is a standard in most manga genres, only within the last 10 years has the individual artist as story writer, become more prominent. Also, it seems to be the norm to many fans, because one-person creators are more active, in the popular licensed genres stateside [shoujo/shounen].

In Japan, the storywriter is called the gensaku-sha; the artist is called, a manga-ka. I tend to call myself a comics writer, since I’m neither from Japan nor in Japan. ((^_-)); popular BL teams making ‘manga’, as opposed to just BL novel projects, are Honami Yukine/Takaguchi Satosumi [Kiminiwa Katenai!], Momoki Sae/Nanbara Ken, [Junjou Heart Kaihouku ], and Ninomiya Etsumi/Sugano Esumi [Isoganaide].

Note: There are times when a pair of mangaka form an alliance under one name—the usual reason for this is because each does not limit herself to one aspect of production; both write and draw, and usually tag team their way through creating a manga: Japan artists Akatsuki Haruka and Watanabe Nobuyoshi AKA Duo Brand. is a prime example, as is Spain’s Studio Kôsen. Teams like this work in tandem artistically, and in prose, in order to create their title. They also tend to work together exclusively, on all projects, whereas Laura and I, and the teams mentioned earlier in this paragraph, also maintain careers in short works, anthology comics, and our own full-length material. For example, I’ve a graphic novel coming out from Iris Print with Caroline Monaco as illustrator – Laura has her own debut stateside with a full length graphic novel from publisher Yaoi Press. Each of us is currently featured in separate anthologies from these publishers, but we did not make these short works together, ergo, no reason for one singular identity. Will Laura Carboni and I keeping working as a team? Yes indeed. We’ve got three graphic novels due out within the next three years, and that’s not counting Roulette! And yes, our next one will be with DramaQueen, we love the freedom and respect we get from them as our publisher, and we’re in love with Rush!

Now, on to the stages of how Roulette gets made:

Image heavy content under the cut:

1. The Outline. This is the part of the manga that gives your editor an idea of what’s going to take place in every installment [or scene].

2. The Script. The script is then written, and [depending on the writer] artists’ direction sketches are made. These are done by the writer for the artist only as a guide. They aren’t meant to be published, or put on display. As you can see, if I could illustrate like Laura, I wouldn’t need her! The editor goes over the script and makes suggestions and or grammar changes…
[see final letters image on this post to spot them ^_-]

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3. Pencils are then illustrated by Laura, based on the script. If Laura needs to make changes because the direction sketches are unbalanced or the frames aren’t working, she does so. She is a collaborative equal on Roulette, not just an artist hired to draw it. ((^_-)) Laura uses 240gr smooth paper.

4. Inks. Laura applies India ink, a using a brush and a nib, over the pencils. And while she admits that digital inking is cleaner [she is very impressed with MS Ex’s line correction feature] she finds she can only achieve her unique style of heavy lines, by hand.

5. Screentones, for the sake of Roulette, are applied in Photoshop. Laura can use other programs, and even actual tone paper; but Roulette is all about 80’s shine and style, decadence and old-school style gaudy! Toning in Photoshop delivered the perfect look, and feel, for what we are striving for.

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6. Letters. Once the tones are set, we send the images to our editor Akito, so she can score the trim and bind lines properly. Once these are in place, then I open the files in MS EX and letter. I’ve managed to learn new ways of making balloons recently, and so I’ll no longer be tied down to the default balloons in the program ((Go me!)).

Once complete, the pages are sent back to Akito [or her assistant…for proofing!] and once the grammar is checked, Akito prepares the files for the printer, and then weeks later…books are in and shipped to you.