Submission Guidelines

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What we accept

We welcome two types of contribution:

  • Comic strips — up to 4 pages of original artwork supplied print-ready to our page spec. All artwork must be supplied at 300dpi in CMYK colour. £20 per page, up to £80 for a 4-page strip.
  • Written stories — up to 650 words, submitted as a clean document. We handle all layout and design. If you'd like to supply your own illustrations to accompany your story, we welcome these too — all artwork must be supplied at 300dpi in CMYK colour. £50 per story.

Artwork spec

  • Bleed area: 154 × 216mm
  • Page size: 148 × 210mm
  • Live/artwork area: 136 × 198mm — keep all important content inside this boundary
  • Resolution: 300dpi
  • Colour mode: CMYK

Download our comic page layout templates — The folder includes 3×3, 4×4 and 5×5 grid templates, a safe zone template, and a combined file with all grids together — all with bleed areas built in.

Our audience

The Beyond Comic is for curious kids aged 5–12. All contributions should be fun, imaginative, and age-appropriate.

Tone of voice

This is the tone of voice for The Beyond.

The short version

We want irreverent fun, not gentle lessons. Think classic British "naughty kid" comic strips for the mischief and energy, and modern, well-crafted anthology comics for the confidence not to over-explain. We're not trying to teach kids anything. We're trying to make them laugh, maybe wince a bit, and turn the page.

What we mean by "irreverent"

  • Mischief is the point, not a problem to solve. A character causing chaos doesn't need to learn to stop by the end. The classic "menace" character never reforms — that's the whole joke, forever.
  • Authority is a bit ridiculous. Whoever's in charge — teacher, parent, boss, headmaster type, whatever form that takes in your world — can be an obstacle, a straight man, or the butt of the joke. Gently mocked, never wise.
  • Consequences can happen, but keep them light. A telling-off, a bucket of water, a squashed cake — fine. Nothing cruel, nothing that actually hurts anyone (physically or socially), nothing humiliating.
  • Let the joke land and move on. No narrator voice explaining what it all means. Trust the reader.

What tends to creep in (and what to cut)

If a strip is coming out "twee" or "messagy," it's usually one of these:

  • A character learns to share/be kind/say sorry in the final panel
  • Someone says the theme out loud ("I guess friendship really is the most important thing!")
  • The conflict resolves too neatly — everyone hugs it out
  • The mischief gets punished so hard, or moralised so heavily, there's no fun left in it

Cutting the last panel where the lesson gets stated is very often the fix. If the strip still works and is still funny without it, that panel wasn't doing anything except slowing it down.

The ceiling (so it stays right for 5–12s)

  • Mischief, not cruelty — pranks that wind up whoever's in charge are great; nothing that's actually mean to another character.
  • Bodily-function humour is fine in moderation (we're not above a fart or a bogey) — just not the whole strip.
  • Nothing too scary, humiliating, or genuinely upsetting — a bit of spooky/creepy fun is fine.

The vibe we're going for

  • The naughty-kid comic tradition — the energy, the mischief, the physical comedy, the total lack of a stated moral. The joke is the destination, not a lesson dressed up as a joke.
  • Modern craft-first anthology comics — proof you can be funny and irreverent and well made; never talking down to kids or over-explaining, even when a story has real heart.

Any questions on tone, just ask — happy to look at a rough or a script before you commit to final art.