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Make your first strip
Glossary
A quick plain-language guide to the words you’ll see around whimstrip.
What is a comic strip?
A comic strip is a short, self-contained cartoon that tells a little story or joke in a row of a few panels (boxes). You read them left-to-right, and the last panel usually lands a punchline. For decades they ran every day in newspapers; today they mostly live online and on phones — which is exactly what whimstrip is for.
A few classics that defined the form:
- Garfield — a grumpy, lasagna-loving cat who hates Mondays (a 4-panel daily).
- Peanuts — Charlie Brown, Snoopy and friends; gentle, wistful humor.
- Calvin and Hobbes — a wildly imaginative boy and his tiger.
- The Far Side — surreal one-off jokes in a single panel.
- Dilbert — deadpan jokes about office life.
whimstrip is built in that same “gag-a-day” tradition — a quick setup and a punchline, starring a cast you’ll come to recognize. Our 4-panel format is like Garfield or Peanuts; our 1-panel format is like The Far Side.
The basics
- Strip
- A finished comic. Strips come in three shapes — a 3-panel row, a 4-panel strip, or a 1-panel cartoon.
- Panel
- One box (frame) of the comic. A 3-panel strip is a single row of three; a 4-panel strip is a 2×2 grid of four; a 1-panel is a single box.
- Speech bubble
- Where a character talks or thinks. Bubbles sit on top of the art as an editable layer, so the words stay crisp and you can move them anytime.
- Feed
- The homepage stream of the latest published strips from everyone.
Characters
- Character
- A reusable star with a locked look — a reference image plus a description — so it looks the same in every strip.
- Cast
- The characters starring in a strip. You pick the cast before you start writing.
- Official cast
- Our house characters — Puff, Biscuit, Pip, Marshmallow and Roscoe — that anyone can use for free.
Making a strip
- Premise
- The one-line idea behind the gag — e.g. “Puff tries to get in shape but the snacks win.” Optional; used if you let AI draft.
- Story board
- The free workspace where you write the text for each panel — the scene and what each character says. No art, no cost.
- Draft with AI
- A free button that fills your story board with a first-pass script from your premise.
- Surprise me
- A free button on the new-comic form that suggests a fresh title + premise to get you started.
- Generate art
- The step that turns your written story into drawn panels — keeping your characters on-model and your text intact. Uses your daily art allowance.
- Lettering editor
- Where you drag, resize and restyle the speech bubbles over the finished art.
- Import
- Upload a strip you made elsewhere — your own art or AI from another tool. Free.
- Draft vs Published
- A draft is private to you; publishing puts the strip on the public feed. You can unpublish anytime.
Sharing & community
- Storyline (text-only)
- A published strip that’s just the written script, with no art. Free to publish and share.
- Remix / “Use this storyline”
- Clone someone’s published storyline into your own draft, then make your own version.
- Like
- A heart. Tap it to show a strip some love — the most-liked strips rise into Popular.
Your account
- Handle
- Your @username — it’s your clean profile link, e.g. whimstrip.com/u/yourhandle.
- Profile
- Your public page showing your avatar, bio and published strips.
- Daily allowance
- Generating art uses a small daily limit. Writing, importing and publishing are always free.