BFAComics
Start a visual storytelling practice at the leading undergraduate comics program on the West Coast.
Overview
Create emotionally compelling comic art
Silver Sprocket–published comics at CCA’s pop-up comics fest.
Rich narrative concepts, dynamic visual approaches
Comics is a visual literary medium that has a deep history, specific craft demands, and exciting new possibilities as the industry grows. CCA’s BFA in Comics is a STEM-designated program, focusing on narrative development, relationships between text and image, and visual storytelling to push the practice to new heights.
The curriculum includes training in narrative concepts and character development, illustration and design, critical scholarship, and professional practice. You’ll become a practitioner who merges these multidisciplinary powers to make comics that only you could create.
Draw from a community with publishing power
Comics culture continues to flourish in San Francisco, and CCA is home to a well-established graduate program in Comics. Our faculty are immersed in the scene, from helping launch the first San Francisco Comics Fest to leading entire publishing imprints dedicated to cartoonists of color and queer storytellers. Our alumni have contributed important works to the collective dialogue, including Maia Kobabe’s Gender Queer: A Memoir and Alex Combs’s forthcoming Trans History: A Graphic Novel. In short, we’re changing the types of stories told across the medium.
As the only undergraduate program like it on the West Coast, CCA’s BFA in Comics prepares you to enter the professional comics industry. You’ll become immersed in a curriculum that engages with the ethical, historical, and social dimensions of the world beyond the college, helping you develop a critical capacity and a singular artistic practice. View an anthology of comics at CCA.
Studios & Shops
Time and space for storytelling
Comics Tools & Techniques with Kim Bennett
Located on our growing San Francisco campus, BFA Comics students have access to studio and classroom spaces that encourage open-ended exploration and expansive storytelling, whether on a tablet or risograph. As a Comics student, you’ll also have opportunities to get hands-on with other mediums that extend and deepen your individual comics practice in preparation for a capstone thesis project in your senior year.
Three students work on comics in the computer lab.
Interdisciplinary making informs our practice
- Unique summer programming and Wacom workstations shared with with MFA Comics cohorts
- Annual collegewide student events, shows, and publications
- Large bed scanners and portable drawing tables shared with Writing and Literature students
- A high-end input/output lab to scan and print at self-use stations in the Digital Fine Arts Studio
- Graphic Design and Illustration spaces with specialized printing machines, such as risograph and book-binding equipment
- Computer labs and media services, with laptops, drawing tablets, cameras, software suites, and much more
Recent Comics in the City speakers
- J.H. Williams III (Promethea and Sandman: Overture)
- Nicole J. Georges (Fetch)
- Mariko Tamaki (This One Summer)
- MariNaomi (Dragon’s Breath and Other True Stories)
- Raina Telgemeier (Smile, Drama)
- Mike Mignola (Hellboy)
- Gene Luen Yang (Dragon Hoops)
- Gilbert Hernandez (Love and Rockets)
- Steenz (Heart of the City)
Faculty
Acclaimed cartoonists, graphic novelists, and writers
Comics faculty have significant professional industry experience and are at the forefront of the creative and intellectual discourse of this vital and emerging storytelling medium. The comics field is inherently multidisciplinary, and the program’s curriculum thrives through collaboration with faculty from a range of adjacent disciplines across the college, including writing, animation, and illustration. With an all-star faculty as your guide, you’ll have unique opportunities to explore different dimensions of your personal comics practice.
Mel Gillman, Chair of Comics
Mel Gillman, chair of BFA Comics and MFA Comics, is a graphic novelist and colored pencil artist who specializes in queer and trans fiction and nonfiction. They are the author of several graphic novels, including As the Crow Flies (Iron Circus Comics, 2017), Stage Dreams (Lerner/Graphic Universe, 2019), and most recently, Other Ever Afters (Random House Graphic, 2022).
Their work has won numerous awards, including a Society of Illustrators Gold Medal, an Excellence in Graphic Literature Award, and a Stonewall Honor Award from the American Library Association. Currently, they are working on two original horror graphic novels, as well as a series of educational zines about urban foraging in the U.S.
Curriculum
We think with our hands
Conceptual, technical, and critical practice
The BFA Comics offers a practice-based curriculum that includes digital and analog tools, drawing and illustration, narrative and storytelling, graphic and publication design, comics history and theory, and professional and portfolio development. You’ll gain extensive technical experience with multigenre storytelling and develop a digital skillset grounded in industry-standard software suites. View sample course descriptions.
Investigate ideas through every dimension
Before diving into their chosen major, every undergraduate participates in the First Year Experience. You’ll explore a wide range of materials and tools over the course of two semesters, supplemented by foundational courses in art history, critical studies, and writing. Faculty from different disciplines guide studio projects, group critiques, and theoretical discussions, setting you up for success.
BFA Comics
Core Studio
- Drawing 1
- 3.0 units
- 2D, 3D, and 4D
- 9.0 units
Comics Major Requirements
- Foundations in Comics & Visual Storytelling
- 3.0 units
- Comics Studio: Tools and Techniques
- 3.0 units
- Comics Studio: Drawing for Comics
- 3.0 units
- Comics Studio: Digital Tools
- 3.0 units
- Comics Workshop: Writing for Comics I
- 3.0 units
- Comics Workshop: Writing for Comics II
- 3.0 units
- Comics Workshop: Memoir, Non-Fiction, & Journalism
- 3.0 units
- Comics Perspectives
- 3.0 units
- Comics Publication: Print & Digital
- 3.0 units
- Applied Comics
- 3.0 units
- Comics Critique
- 3.0 units
- Professional Practice
- 3.0 units
- Senior Project: Thesis
- 6.0 units
Additional Studio Requirements
- Upper Division Interdisciplinary Studio
- 3.0 units
- Critical Ethnic Studies Studio (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Studio Electives
- 12.0 units
Humanities & Sciences Requirements
- Writing 1
- 3.0 units
- Writing 2
- 3.0 units
- Introduction to the Arts
- 3.0 units
- Introduction to the Modern Arts
- 3.0 units
- Foundations in Critical Studies
- 3.0 units
- Media History: Comics
- 3.0 units
- Critical Ethnic Studies Seminar (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Literary and Performing Arts Studies (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Philosophy and Critical Theory (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Social Science/History (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Science/Math (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- History of Art and Visual Culture (2000 level)
- 3.0 units
- Humanities and Sciences Electives (2000 or 3000 level, at least 6 units must be 3000 level)
- 12.0 units
Total 120.0 units
Careers
Join the next generation of comics artists
Students graduate from BFA Comics with strong visual storytelling portfolios that demonstrate the technical and conceptual skills required to thrive in an evolving media culture. Alumni can create professional-quality comics in a variety of genres, for a variety of audiences, and are dextrous in text, image, and visual storytelling—a combination that ensures they’re ready to contribute to the discipline and chart successful careers in a burgeoning creative industry.
Potential careers in comic art
- Cartoonist
- Comics journalist
- Storyboard artist
- Concept artist for video games
- Concept artist for animation
- Writer
- Editor
- Publisher
- Educator
News & Events
What’s happening in our community?
How to Apply
Create comics that excite you and your audience
Comic art as a discipline continues to evolve. We look for students who are excited about the transformative power of visual storytelling on communities, as well as individual lives. Ideal applicants are open to learning interdisciplinary practices to enhance their ideas, and eager to experiment with the craft. CCA Comics students—immersed in the rich potential of the medium in a city renowned for its creative powers—will gain skills to shape the world of comics and visual storytelling for years to come.
Find your creative community at CCA
