Submission Guidelines
Last Updated: 8/11/25
Thanks for your interest in submitting your work to Spokane Sequential! We're a quarterly magazine powered entirely by a volunteer staff and contributions from creators in Spokane and the Inland Northwest. We wouldn't be here without you!
The focus of our magazine is full-page comics, so those get the highest priority for publication. Comic strips, art, and written works (especially if illustrated) will also be considered.
Technical Guidelines
- Our pages are 8.5x11 inches, with a .25 inch margin. There is no bleed, and anything important like text should probably not be in the margin area. A template is available so you can lay out your page exactly to our dimensions, or if you're submitting something smaller you can send it to us and we'll figure out a way to make it work.
- Black and white/grayscale submissions only. Please ensure your art is clean, sharp, and ready for print!
- Please create (or scan) your work at 300dpi or higher, and submit them in a lossless image format like PNG or TIFF, or low-compression/high quality JPG.
- We can do a bit of limited proofreading and editing, but please make sure any text is legible and free of errors.
- If you use any digital fonts, make sure you have a license to use it. Here’s a couple recommended font resources:
Content Guidelines
- Submissions should be between 1 and 6 pages in length. Longer stories will be considered but we'd like to fit as many different stories in as we can.
- No excerpts from longer stories. Recurring characters are great but each submission should stand on its own with a beginning and end.
- No title pages. It can be appealing to include one, but we only have so much space so it's better to integrate your title into one of the first panels of your comic. (We do recommend including the title!)
- We do not accept AI generated content. Besides basic legal concerns over ownership of any AI art, it is not in the spirit of our publication.
- Stories should be original and not derived from other works.
- We prefer previously unpublished work.
- Spokane Sequential is a community project meant for everyone. It is distributed freely to libraries, cafes, bookstores, and other businesses in the Spokane area and could be viewed by anyone, including kids. You're free to explore heavy topics with your submissions, but please keep that audience in mind. If you're unsure about something, feel free to contact us. Pornographic content, excessive violence, and/or hate speech will not be considered.
Tips for Strong Submissions
- Readability is the most important thing in comics! A comic with "bad" art and a layout that flows well and has clear, legible text will always win against great art with a confusing layout and text that's hard to read. A little research about comic layouts and having a friend read your comic for clarity (let them know why you're having them read it, not just "do you like it") will go a long way! (You can send comics to us for feedback before submitting, too.)
- Please include a title on your first page (preferably in/around the first panel), and a clear end indicator, like a little text box that says "end" or a signature/social media account. In an anthology format like ours, this helps make your comic stand out and clearly separates it from its neighbors.
- It's cool to have some areas in solid black or dark gray values, but make sure to do it purposefully, because it can be a lot of ink! Pages that are bordered in black may not print the way you expect, since we don't have full bleed the black border will end up with a white border around it, so try to design with that in mind.
- If you're working on physical media, please scan your work rather than sending a photo. It's the best way to ensure your comic will look great in our pages. If you don't have access to a scanner, there are many services where you can have this done for you, and many libraries in town even have scanners that you can use for free!
Submission Agreement
We ask that all contributions to Spokane Sequential include a signed Submission Agreement. This is a pre-prepared document we've made that indicates that you've given us permission to print your work in the next issue (or the one after that) and our website. To be clear, we will never own your work! Creators under the age of 18 should have a parent or guardian sign the form with them.
Click here to view or download the agreement.
Click here to submit your work via a Google Form.
About Advertising
Spokane Sequential is distributed for free. We don’t make any profit from it, but we do have expenses! So we may run advertising from local businesses and services to help cover printing costs or for promotional purposes, like attending conventions or other events. If you would like to advertise with us, please get in touch!
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