One of the artists I've been looking at  for inspiration for my Clerks comic is Charles Burns, Artist and Writer of Black Hole.

(Source: http://pantheonbooks.tumblr.com/post/22814168102/from-black-hole-by-charles-burns)

I like the way that Burns uses a lot of black in his work to show tone and shadow but also to bring out the white in his work. While the reason that Burns uses this effect is to add a sinister hopeless sort of tone of despair I think that I could make this way of shading work in my drawings if I use it in a subtler way and have it as less of an overwhelming presence in the background. While I'll probably do the speech in a similar way to Burns I think I'll set the panels up in less of a rigid way and have them more loose like they often are in The Sandman comics by Neil Gaiman.