After having more knowledge on comic books this semester, I decided to revise this week's blog post. I feel that now, after having more exposure to the medium, I am able to understand more the medium. Carl Bark definitely was the the inspiration to many of the comic (and animation) artists today.
I think the biggest precedent Carl left for this medium were his strong storytelling poses and his visual style. A lot of animation artists can definitely take inspiration from Carl, especially since his characters look so similar to the world Wal Dsiney would create anyways. But his drawings are perfect for what animators need to see: clear poses that are a quick read. For example, you can take out the words from the comic below and still understand what's going on very clearly.
TinTin is another comic book that follows this way of being very visual in its storytelling. Similar to Bark's work, TinTin has a dry humor to it that is still very apparent even if you don't read all of the words. You can see the direct evolution from comic strips to comic books, especially in the form of short gags like this:
Gags like that within TinTin are still very reminiscent of the comic strip era, yet I argue that the early comic books are an evolved version of this because now this gag correlates with an overarching story. I think that it can be argued that TinTin is even more evolved that Bark's work, since we see more experimentation with the panels and how they're laid out.
Ultimately, these comic books would sent the precedent for sequential storytelling and their influence has been so impactful on future comic artists and animation artists alike.
I had been meaning to read the Scott Pilgrim manga for a while and after we watched a bit of the movie in class, I finally forced myself to sit down and read it.
My first reactions are, Wow. What an awesome book! The movie basically is this entire book copied strictly to the T, even including locations everything happens to the dialogue of the comic. They capture the spirit of it perfectly.
Describing wallace's room in the comic book
Describing Wallace's room in the movie.
That's honestly about as close as you can get. Even though most of the credit goes to the original Manga for dreaming up the world and the story, you have to give major credit to the movie for maintaining the original intent of the comic and figuring out how to continue that fun and playfulness of the comic into a moving picture medium, which I think they did successfully. There are some characters that are so spot on (and even kind of look like the Manga version), such as Kim:
I think the added effects make Scott Pilgrim stand out, and I think it also makes it very appealing. Most people, at some point in their lives, have read a comic book and all of these tropes are so similar. It is also just so entertaining when you see these (often times, ridiculous) ideas brought into real life. Ridiculous, and AMAZING.
You just don't get much better than that.
I also really love the style of these comics. It's different from most Manga i've read and it's just a very playful style that allows for a lot of great expressions. It's a super quick read and really enjoyable -- though honestly, if you've watched the movie, you've already understood most of the comic!
Other than comic strips in the paper, the second form of comics I regularly read were webcomics. Nothing enriching; it was first just Mutts daily comic sent to my email, and then I found a comic that most teens find called Cyanide and Happiness back in my old deviantArt days.
This comic I love, mostly because the characters are just stick figures. It was something so simply that made really appreciate this type of raw (and often crude) humor. Since I liked Cyanide and Happiness so much, it only makes sense that the next webcomic that I would enjoy immensely would be Hyperbole and a Half:
Hyperbole and a Half is great, because it's not even told in traditional comic form. It's just some long blog posts split up with these crude little drawings the creator has made. This webcomic usually tells tales of her past in such a funny and comedic way. Most people see some aspect of themselves in her characters.
From this post, I decided to visit another webcomic I really like, called "Infinite Nap." I think this comic is a great example of what is really appealing about webcomics, which is that they're short little blurbs that are usually about real life. At least the webcomics I'm familiar with all seem to reflect someone talking about a personal experience or just how they feel that day. In this day and age, I think people are looking to feel more connected with each other; every online community has that feeling of being just that, a 'community', and I think people automatically look for a group of people where they all have shared experiences.
I felt that way when I read the comic Ducks Ducks Ducks. I really enjoy the loose nature of comics like these. They bring me back to the idea Scott McCloud brought up about how the simpler something is, the more someone can project their own details onto it and relate more. I think it also helps make the story feel like it's being told to you by a friend, rather than a random stranger on the internet.
Octapus Pie was another good comic and I liked how this one had more of a storyline that it followed thorugh each week, rather than the other webcomics which were either little gags or short stories. Each webcomic offers something new to the table and I don't believe they will die out anytime soon.
I kept postponing making this blog post since I was having a really hard time getting into this genre. The first time, I read just the script for Watchmen on the course syllabus and could not get myself interested in the story at all. I found the comic online and started reading that, but for some reason, I just couldn't get into it. I wanted to get into it, but I just couldn't. I can definitely see the appeal behind it; I think that it is such an interesting idea to have a superhero that is the total opposite of a superhero that is well liked, or a superhero that even likes the people he's saving. In the first few pages of Watchman, we see Rorschach call the humans around him 'human cockroaches' and watch him as he breaks an innocent man's fingers just to learn information: he's definitely your friendly neighborhood Clark Kent. This idea in itself is really intriguing, which is why I'm not surprised why so many are drawn to it. Watchman on a whole deals with more adult topics and it shows the darker side to superhero/masked vigilantes/humans in general, and I think this element makes it more appealing to adults.
For me, I think Watchman was a little too grungy for me. I'll also be honest and say that stories which require a lot of dialogue and less relying on the visuals are not as appealing to me. Especially at this point in my life, where I'm an exhausted college student looking for something to take my mind off things. It is for this reason that I also didn't like Preacher as much, but felt more drawn to Hellboy. I think Hellboy was also more appealing to me because the characters are completely different than anything I've ever seen before; whereas Preacher and Watchman are mostly just humans, Hellboy's new designs made it more interesting and I felt that the tone of it could get a lot more light-hearted than the other comics:
I think the art style also contributed; Preacher and Watchman are much more detailed than Hellboy and aren't as much of a quick read, whereas here there are very clear visuals with only one or two items as the main focus. To me, it's comics like Hellboy that keep the action that made the first generation superheros famous, that I find more fun to follow and can relate to more.
Were there any prominent symbols and how were they used?
In this comic, I noticed that they brought up the idea of the Church and liquor and usually compared the two in some sort of way, or there was trouble happening near liquor or involving liquor. In the beginning in the bar, that's where the preacher started delivering his 'truth's, and you can see a liquor bottle on the ground. The reason the preacher starts on his whole rant is because of the watered down beer. It is also right outside the bar where Tulip first sees the man she's supposed to kill. There's also the idea of innocence; in the beginning, the Preacher delivers the 'truth' to everyone, which infuriates the public so they beat him up. Then, the public claims their innocence in the whole ordeal. Tulip kind of loses her 'innocence' at shooting the man.
Is there an aspect to the story where you were able to make a personal connection?
I'm not really sure if there's any aspect I personally related to since the characters and their situation is so different from any I have ever been in. However, there are some feelings that are the same between the comic and myself; I relate to the Preacher in the beginning with the frustration of hearing everybody claim their innocence yet hearing all of their secrets, as most people in any given situation will usually try to act like they had nothing to do with it. I also relate to Tulip and how she decides to ignore all warnings and drive into the explosion; I am of a similar mindset where part of me is curious but most of me would be worried for anyone there, and I believe I would probably do something similar.
If you were to adapt this story to another medium, what changes would you make and why?
I could see this as a TV show, similar to the format of Lost or Supernatural. I think the biggest change I would make would be to not have the wings on the ruler of Heaven. It's a tiny change in the grand scheme of things, and this change would be rooted in practical VFX money reasons and also the fact that I think it would be harder for people to be intimidated by someone with wings. Because it's a symbol that we're not used to seeing on people in everyday human life, it would cause the show to lose its sense of being within a realistic reality. In comics, people are more used to the unexpected, and when the details are just enough for you to imagine the rest, you can imagine it. With a format like TV though, it would have to look so accurate and there's not much room for mistakes.
I had heard good reviews of This One Summer from my friend Anna Craig, who has a personal copy, yet never got around to reading it. I stopped by the library today and was so absorbed in the book I read it in one sitting! It seemed to utilize everything I loved about comics; the visual sounds, stunning imagery, and just honest storytelling. The way the two girls interact is so similar to the way I acted with my friends when I was younger, even down to the awkward pauses which you could just feel within the writing. The entire story dealt with the different complicated themes that women of each age go through: from the pubescent worries and trials of your first crush to your teenage exploration of your sexuality (and what the consequences may be) and to an older woman dealing with a miscarriage and what that means for her family. I think that's why the story was so gripping; there were so many different relatable themes going on at once that you wanted to know the stories to, even though the story only really focuses on the interactions of these two friends.
The greatest thing about this story that it is a gripping story dealing with mostly all women dealing with real women problems talking about actual things women and girls talk about and it is written by women! It is rare to find a stories that are so relateable to how women actually think; stories that treat us as complex characters, and I truly feel that this is probably the best piece i've read in this class so far. From an animation standpoint, I naturally pick up on acting and dialogue. For me, I love the acting in this bit right here:
It's something where they're both completing an action, and not just spitting out dialogue. And the whole wringing out your hair is such a part of honest acting and you are even more intrigued with the story when the other character swims away. I really love moments like this because there is so much subtext within it, and of course it's drawn and portrayed beautifully.
I really liked Chris Ware's work. I felt that it was simple and elegant, a sort of mordern way of reading comics. I enjoyed his storytelling, with how he would often incorporate words in more of a graphic design piece with his comics. With newer comics, each works to reinvent itself, and I feel that with Chris Ware's work specifically, he is working on reinventing himself through the format of how his comics are packaged and viewed:
I feel that his clean and isometric style speaks a lot to the modernization of the medium and I really enjoyed his work.
Additionally, I feel that authors and artists keep getting more and more creative the merging of text and images. This is especially true with Aesterious Polyps, another comic that features a very streamlined style. In my opinion, this comic departs so much from the 'traditional' comic form we have seen previously and I would personally define it I really enjoyed that this author didn't feel limited by the panel and thought, in the most literal sense, out of the box. I think this comic does SO many things well; it uses the color palettes to help differentiate between Aesterios and everyone else as well as a different color palette for each flashback. Additionally, when Aesterios and his wife Hana are in an argument and they are seeing less and less of each other's sides, he plays around with giving them opposing colors as well as different styles of drawing them to emphasize the differences in how they think.
This is so effective and part of me is very curious to see what this would look like in an animated format, because I think this is such a cool way to tell stories visually. I actually wasn't sure whether I would like this comic when I first started it, but I loved the muted color palette and the art style so I kept reading it. Now, after finishing it, I'm glad I read it all the way through, because I feel that the way this story is told is in such a new and innovative way. Even with how the comic ends (which I won't post for no spoilers) is something I would have never expected but it seemed to fit the tragic story well.
I never got into Manga as a child, but many of my friends grew up on Inuasha, Naruto, or Dragon Ball Z. I knew that this was a popular art style and tried to mimic the style (without watching any of the shows or reading any of it), but for some reason I was never drawn to learn more about the styles. I was excited to start reading it and try my hand at getting back into them since I feel that it is so important for an artist (and storyteller) to be well versed in all forms of visual storytelling. The first Manga I decided to try was Battle Angelita, Last Order. It was an interesting read... and I definitely had to reread it again in order to fully understand it. What surprised me most about it, right off the bat, is that Manga isn't afraid to go violent or approach these crazy premises; in Manga, they somehow just work. Granted, you could say that the superhero comics were violent and have far fetched premises, but this Manga showed their faces with bloody bandages and half robot humans... it was a lot to take in at first. I had trouble originally reading it since I was unsure if it was read left to right or right to left or top to down. I finally figured out that it was read top to bottom but the text was read right to left, presumably because of the way it was translated. But I felt the story was very complicated; which the half-asleep Carla that first read it couldn't follow any of the storylines. But I think this complexity is what also makes it compelling, since you aren't dealing with your typical storylines. I mean where else do you read about half robot children?
Even though Battle Angelita, Last Order didn't seem to be my cup of tea, I decided to read a little bit of Astro Boy and see how everything started. Suddenly, robot-human crossovers don't seem so crazy of a premise. After scrolling through some more Manga's, I realized that this robot-human theme was a very popular concept. To me, what's interesting is that the closest American-originated idea (that I can think of at the moment) that comes close to humans and robots (excluding movies about AI) is Transformers. Clearly though, all types of audiences respond to ideas like this, as shown by Americanized versions of these concepts such as Pacific Rim. After reading these Manga's, you can also witness bits where American comics have taken bits of their artistic style or visual style for their own comic work.
After this little taste into Manga, I got hooked. I decided to also read Ranma Book 1 by Takahashi, which is a complex premise that you wouldn't see usually within an american comic. I think the premise alone (a boy changing into a girl based on the temperature of water thrown on him) intrigued me so much that I felt drawn to finish the first book in one sitting! Honestly, where else do you find things like that? In this Manga specifically, I liked how the expressions for me were super exaggerated and how the designs simplified depending on the situation the main character was in. It was an effective way to show that emotion for that quick read and it was funniest parts of the manga for me.
To me, one of the most interesting aspects of animation, comics, and graphic novels is the different styles they can take on. Today in class, we saw a clip from a film I watched last year, called The Triplets of Belleville by Sylvain Chomet. Chomet is known for his exaggerated characters that really push how far they can go, but also has a wonderful sense of storytelling. The characters are each unique and have their own distinct personalities and character designs. All of it works together to make a complete message for the audience. For example, The Triplets of Belleville is dialogue-free. Which is amazing, considering it's a full-length feature film. In America, it is rarer to see those types of films. The only other film that rivals that status is Wall-E, but that also still restrains to the cute, classic appealing characters. Chomet's style has a sense of charm, though it is also at times slightly disturbing, it is something that really pushes the animation industry. I mean, just look at how far he can push something like the Simpsons:
In Europe, since differently accepted styles and genres are more readily accepted, you have a little more leway to create interesting designs such as this. In Europe, the Triplets of Belleville did very well and was critically acclaimed, yet in America not too many people have ever even heard of it. Yet it is because artists like Chomet have the freedom to create these unique design that the medium continues to grow and evolve, and we see more of a variety of work and styles.
Additionally this week, I also read some Moebius. As he is a well-known name in the illustrator industry, I thought his ink work to be particularly interesting. While he's a master at composition, I found his use of color to also be quite interesting as well. Though most of his work is shaded solely through the ink, he isn't afraid to use bold colors such as pruple or blue to give an added sense of depth and mood in his work. At times though, I did feel the wealth of detail to be overwhelming and at times hard to focus your eye.
Talking about stereotyping and generalizations of a culture can be such a controversial topic that most people avoid talking about it at all. But I definitely feel that these harmful stereotypes hurt the cultures and people they exaggerate and I do not feel that they are necessary in creating these types of character designs.
Most of these stereotypes arose in a type that was centuries ago, yet they are the shorthand people still refer to. Unfortunately, most of it has now become unconscious and people now are too worried about 'rocking the boat' or believe that this is the way things should be, since it has always been that way. I believe that the biggest reason people use these stereotypes when creating games, animation, or comics is because they think its easier. And to some extent, it can be-- when you're creating a game and you need a reason for the main character to go save his costar, you make her a damsel in distress. If you're going to create a mexican character, the first thing you think of is to add a pancho and a sombrero. Yet these aren't accurate portrayals of these people, and it hurts the people who you generalize. Even when main characters are of an ethnic raced, they're a white-washed version of that race, so there's no mainstream view of how you represent these characters. Looking back on my favorite childhood films, if you actually question many of the motives of our favorite disney princesses, you'll find that many of them don't have much more to them than just 'being in trouble'.
I think that it is important for people to see that these stereotypes are happening but often times it is hard to have a normal conversation about it, because it makes people feel awkward. Most people don't like being told that they're privileged. It's a topic that makes them feel uncomfortable because it is something that they usually didn't even realize was happening, and everybody wants to believe that their own situation was the hardest to overcome. Nobody likes to admit that their own situation was easier, or that they were awarded chances that someone else never even knew about.
I think I have been affected by stereotypical representations, and almost to a strange extent. I am a mexican-american woman, though I don't look like your typical mexican. "Typical" meaning what is shown in mainstream media. I do not wear a pancho, sombrero, or ride a donkey and my skin is as light as paper -- yet seeing a mexican seen in a comic or movie as nothing more than the funny sidekick (usually portrayed as dumb, too), this affects me. Double that with being a mexican woman, where they're only ever portrayed as a maid, it not only affects your personal self confidence, but how others treat you. These stereotypes and generalizations are read in comic books and people see them as truths; they think that all mexicans are immigrants who lived poor lives, all women are dumb and shallow, and etc. A good example of this is even the Spongebob episode where they keep making jokes about squirrels and people believe it's true and treat Sandy like she's an idiot (when we all know she's the smartest character on that show). I think it takes more research to create a character with that background but it's not impossible; stereotyping is lazy and its only perpetuating an archetype that doesn't exist and isn't true.
I thought Maus was a very powerful read. The story was so complex, with many layers to it, but I felt it was a very important read and a super important piece in the history of comics.
One thing that I appreciated with Maus is the overlap of the father's story with the dynamic between the father and son thrown in. The style that it was written in made you feel like you could've been talking to the father itself, and it also provided some context as to where the character was now and how they grew after this experience. I feel like this also provides the ethos for the audience, as we feel like we are in the room listening to the story, asking Vladek to rewind, go back, or talk more about a certain subject. Maus story details the harsh conditions that the father had to go through during the war and everything he had to face as a Jewish person.
I believe that the reason this is so successful is for how important this work is in retelling the events that happened. Additionally, the characters are portrayed as simple mice or other animals, which I believe helps others see the condition as more than just one group of people or another; readers can identify the core of what was happening and because of the simplistic character designs, they are able to put themselves in the place of characters. The character choices as animals also softens the blow of the information; Maus is a heavy story, and the author is aware of this. By using animals, the audience is just focused on the conflicts between the different groups of people, not the specific group; it also help shed light on the fact that people were only seen as this group of people at that time, and not as individuals themselves.
Additionally, through the simplistic character designs, audiences are easily able to project themselves onto the characters and are able to truly feel the complexities of what is happening. I felt like this piece was very similar to Barefoot Gen in terms of how powerful the content was. Because they are so visual, it creates a longer, lasting impact to people rather than just detailing numbers of how many were injured or died. This gives a slight visualization to the pain and suffering of a generation. It is hard not to empathize or imagine what the main character is going through after you see such powerful images such as this:
I think Maus is great at detailing how people are changed from their experiences. You see Art's father act just like Art and receive the same responses, especially when Vladek says that the stew is very tasty and his grandmother says it is not because of the limited supplies. It is very reminiscent to Art saying the dinner Mala had prepared was great, and Vladek commenting about its faults. Later, you see that it is really just an affect of how much he misses Anja, and you really feel for him. The first book ends with Art calling his father a murderer, and after just reading about how he went to Auschwitz, it's a deeply moving account. You're able to understand both sides, and you really feel the pain that they're going through.
It's in Volume 2 that you see more of what Art is going through, and see how he's been dealing with the pain that was passed down to him.
The comic was only a form for him to get these stories out. He talks on how hard it was for Maus to have success, because now people are expecting more from him, and they're expecting answers he doesn't have. He brings up an important point about his story-- it wasn't necessarily the best that survived. It was just random luck. I think that brings even more perspective to the story, because you really understand that in order to survive Auschwitz, you can to be cunning and resourceful.
I think Maus was a very powerful read, and it's not hard to imagine why it was so widespread. The affect it has upon the reader is tremendous, and the personal story makes you feel for everyone involved.
The underground comics were super interesting for me to read and I think they really represent what was going through the 60's, as people were exploring the idea of sexuality and different drug usage. You can see all of that shown in these comics, and the styles range from Crumb's realistic style to the more simplistic styles to even some styles that bordered on surrealism. With the underground comics, anything went.
Since the underground comics didn't worry about getting censored, I found that they could get intensely personal. The creators were simply looking to get their story out there, so I felt like the comics connected with the reader more. There was no false pretense in trying to please a mass audience, it was just a form of self expression. The underground comic movement would help broaden people's ideas of comics and what could be done with them, as they were the grounds for a lot of experimentation. I feel like the underground comics also would've contributed to idea of graphic novels which had just started; while Eisner had talked about a personal story, the underground comics ran with this idea, and went even more personal. The comics would talk about the creator's first time discovering experimenting with drugs or their sexuality, and it was a way to share information with others and share their own experiences. Another thing that separated the underground comics from everyone else was the fact that most of them were meant for adults only. Because of the age restriction, I feel like the underground comics also broke ground in establishing that the comic book was an art form that didn't have to be limited to just jokes. It broke down a lot of the assumptions people had about how comics had to look and allowed people to be more creative with what they could do and what stories they could tell.
The first thing I liked about Will Eisner's Contract with God was how the rainy effect he applied on his drawings was also applied on the opening text. I think that's what ultimately separates this from a comic book. I had never read a graphic novel, so I wasn't sure what to expect (even from an earlier version). But I felt that the way some words were bolded or bigger or in different fonts helped you feel out the inflection of the words and I felt like it made it all the more powerful. I felt that with the graphic novel vs just the Spirit comics, the words were designed as part of the composition instead of an afterthought. This is a technique Craig Thompson also employs as well. Though both artists have extremely different styles, they always incorporate the text to have the best emphasis for the message they're trying to get across.
Craig Thompson's example
Eisner's example
Both of these are illustrated in such a way that you feel the words rather than read them; it changes the way you read these words out loud or in your head, and that I feel is crucial to the Graphic Novel's success.
Specifically with A Contract With God, I thought the most powerful pages were right when Rachele died, and we see the sequences of the main character shouting against a white background to only receive a black background window in response. After hearing the backstory of Eisner's life, you realize why this is even more touching, because you can feel the soul of what is being stated. It established the tone for the anguish and really illustrated the fact that he felt left out or in the dark.
I related to these panels so well because I feel like everyone has had that moment in their life where they feel like shouting at life itself and you don't know why you're the one being treated unfairly. It's a primal feeling that everyone has, and I feel like the first image above especially, with the dramatic shadows and the lines dripping down from the letters, you feel that. The letters are almost crossed out, causing you to want to read the line with more of a texture. You can see the pain in the characters expression and you are able to empathize with him easily, and I think that's something Eisner touches upon that everyone can relate to.
My experience with comic books is pretty limited. I really think they're beautiful, but I never got into them as a child. So for me, reading the Captain America comic book was so much fun. The biggest surprise for me was how wordy some of the comics became. I expected it to be more visual, bordering along the lines of The Arrival by Shaun Tan. I can see the big appeal in them, because as I kept reading through the comic I thought "Okay, just this one chapter," and then something else would happen. Something the Captain America comics are great at is upping the stakes-- just when you think things are bad for Captain America, there's another level, or the bad guy got away, or there's someone trapped on a ship. Because of that element, every page is a cliffhanger of sorts, and it's hard to put down! I feel like great movies are like this, where they layer on more and more information, so that way the audience is always interested and is always kept guessing (even though we always know Captain America will win at the end).
I also read Mary Marvel to see the difference between a female superhero and a male superhero and how their comics may differ. While Captain America was layering one thing over another, Mary Marvel's comic was a lot more singular focused-- there was one problem, and it was catching the bad guy. It didn't have the same page-to-page gripping feeling that Captain America had. Another thing that I thought was interesting was how these comic books portray the characters attitudes, keeping everything very specific, down to how they hit. For example, look at the difference between Captain America hitting someone and Mary Marvel hitting someone. Her slap seems congruent with the era it was written in, and part of me wonders if this choice was made to feminize this comic and appeal more to the women demographic.
Captain America with a really hard punch, flipping his opponent over
Mary Marvel's hand slap
I was pleased to find out though that later in the same magazine with Mary Marvel was a good quality punch by a lady though:
I loved looking at Carl Bark's work. Bark's style was what I felt most familiar with, since I grew up watching the Disney films. It was very cool to see that his drawing style is what influenced the ages to come; all of his drawings were so full of life and exaggerated that I felt as if I could trace a lot of Disney's master's styles through Carl Barks. I feel like if you look at some of Carl Bark's drawings in Carl Barks and the Art of the Comic Book, you can even see some drawings where it looks like Glen Keane could've pulled some of his influences.
I enjoyed how his comics were always very playful, and utilized the extremes; for example, Donald will do whatever is necessary to get what he wants, no matter the cost. This creates a character that the audience will love based on the sole fact that they are over the top. I found Bark's comics to be extremely different from Tintin in more ways than just the style. Story wise, Tintin focused a lot of the panels on the journey; there would be a lot of mini problems that would happen along the way, and often were believable problems. It also played more with word gags, where as Bark's comic was a lot more visual and each problem (and solution) was pushed to the extreme. I personally liked the content of Bark's more, as it was more playful and you knew that the worst was going to happen, whereas TinTin played it very safe at times.
I can probably credit the Sunday comics in the Chicago tribune as my first introduction to art. I was obsessed with them. Every Sunday when I went to my grandparents' house, my grandma would hand me the comic pages that she saved from the week and I would read through them, cutting out my favorites. By the age of 10, I had libraries of scrapbooks and folders with my favorite comic strips. These included: Zits, Peanuts, Sherman's Lagoon, Mutts, For Better or for Worse, Baby Blues, and Calvin and Hobbes, amongst many others.
When I was reading Krazy Kat, I realized how similar it was to the Mutts comic that I had grown up loving.
Krazy Kat
Mutts
The simplistic character designs were what originally tipped me off, as I have always loved Patrick McDonnell's designs for Mooch and Earl, but I never realized how similar it was to Krazy Kat. Both comics feature a pair of unlikely friends (Cat & Mouse vs Cat & Dog) and just simple little gimmics that happen between them. I think that is what draws me to comic strips. They're generally very simple and a very quick read, and I love the very simplistic ones where it's just a small, funny action happening. As I was reading through the Krazy Kat comics, I read one that reminded me of a comic I've seen before; sure enough, I think Patrick McDonnell was doing a shout out!
The Krazy Kat comic
The Mutt's Shoutout
The eomic strips I tend to enjoy most are the ones that deal with everyday situations. Even Nemo in Slumberland is a great example, because the audience can completely relate to having a crazy dream and falling out of bed as of a result of something happening in the dream. Or, at least, I totally can. I believe the success of a lot of these comics are relateability; we love comics like Krazy Kat and Mutts for their simplicity, the same way we love the characters of Peanuts. With Peanuts, Schulz generally takes a common situation and puts a crazy personality one of one the kids within it, paired with funny visual gags. I enjoy that comic strips are just snippets of conversation that we get to see, when really there is so much more going on that the author hasn't let up on. For example, it wasn't until this class that I realized McDonnell was doing a shout out to a previous comic strip; I always just thought it was a cute little remark.
Because comic strips work on a shorter panel basis, they are more simplified, succinct stories and are often just a snippet of what could really be happening in the comic world.
I have never read Understanding Comics before, but I have heard a lot about it from my roommate who read it a ton as a kid. There was on topic in there that I really found interesting as soon as I read it, and I wanted to elaborate more on it.
Scott McCloud talked about our mental image of ourselves and our abilities to relate to cartoons so well (p. 31-36); when we think of ourselves, we only have a vague idea of how our own face is looking like, a simplified idea. Therefore, when we see really realistic depictions of faces, we see it as someone else, but simplified cartoons we see as ourselves. I also believe that we project thoughts, feelings, and emotions onto simplified characters, depending on the context of where they're presented combined with our own thoughts and feelings. This is why animated movies have a way of really touching audience's hearts in a way that live action sometimes can't. This might be because I'm super enthusiastic about animation in general, but when an animated film such as Frozen becomes the 5th highest grossing film ever (reaching around $1.219 billion in the box office), you realize there has to be more to it. The reasoning can be that both children and adults alike can look at overly simplified characters and see themselves within them. Because this is true with comics, I believe this is only intensified in animation, since now we have motion to go off of.
The first example that popped into my mind when I read about this is a character from the most recent Disney film, Big Hero 6.
Baymax is a robot, and he doesn't have a mouth or eyebrows, just two black dots for eyes. He has a voice, but it doesn't have much inflection within it-- so technically, we shouldn't be able to get any emotive clues from him other than some slight variances in his posture. Yet, throughout the film, you're able to feel how Baymax is feeling.
Here, Baymax is "happy", which we read from the half circles of his eyes. This fortifies the idea of Scott McCloud's icon; two half circles are read here as happy eyes, simply because humans are just always looking to put a face on things. You even image that line across his face as a little smile. The scene I feel Baymax is the most powerful (Spoiler if you haven't seen the film) is where Baymax and Hiro have to be separated.
Spoiler to anyone who hasn't seen the film, don't watch the clip below!
I personally love this scene, and I cried both times I saw it in the theater (and, if I'm going to be honest, I teared up rewatching the clip). I read a quote once (but unfortunately couldn't find it to link it... if I do, i'll post it), but the creaters of Baymax talked about how since his design was so simple, the audience projected whatever feeling and emotion he needed on him; he ended up becoming whatever the audience needed him to be. It's such a beautiful thing with how simplified Baymax is; there's a couple of shots in the scene above where I'm not even sure if anything is animated on Baymax, yet they're so emotional. We feel Baymax's sacrifice, yet he doesn't even blink in these moments, thus supporting Scott McCloud's point. Scott McCloud says, "If who I am matters less, then maybe what I say will matter more." Since most of the target audience is for kids, this works well in their favor in reinforcing good morals, which is what the earliest cartoons aimed to do.
Another example in which we are able to do something like this is with the movie Wall-E.
Reading the script for this movie is pretty funny, considering that the only words these characters speak for most of the film is "Wall-E" and "Eva". But even though they don't have most characteristics of faces, we project their movements to mean things -- the tilt of their eyes, the way their eyes are focused, etc.
Another example of CG that fortifies this point is the term uncanny valley. This is when a CG character looks too realistic, thus giving the audience a creepy feeling. Good examples of these are Tintin and Polar Express. Though the characters look realistic, the effect is creepy; in the animation world, we understand tend to caricature moreso because you will never achieve perfect movement or design with realistic looking figures. Simply, humans know how humans look like too much. That is why we're more willing to believe how an animated character is feeling moreso than a weird hybrid. Simplified characters are easy to create believable motion with, and as Tabia stated in class, give you more room to stray away from strict human rules.
I'll wrap this post up since I could probably go on for ages about it, but I thought it was super interesting to read a bit more of the reasoning behind a lot of my favorite comics (Peanuts, Mutts, Calvin and Hobbes, Zits) are pretty caricatured, thus causing the viewer (like me) to be able to relate to it better.
1. The woman has just won the battle over the man, winning the basket of eggs. She is showing his power to the chicken, letting him know who is the new master.
2. A father comes to watch over his dying daughter, forced there by the chicken master.
3. The rooster people put to death the previous maiden as the next one undresses to become their slave.
4. The rooster people discover that another one of the women they have laying around is sick and also needs to be put into the earth.
5. The roosters have killed the women, causing the chicken people extreme joy.
6. The man leaves his wife, as the rooster king is watching over him. He's trying to shield his wife from harm?
7. The women go to the rooster man upset, wondering how and when they're husbands will come back from war
8. The women hide from the rooster man, who senses they are there because she dropped her candle in haste.
9. The men have come home and found that their wives are skeletons, while the rooster king watches on.
10. The roostermen are stealing away the women, shoving them onto a train or taking them back to their camp.
11. One of the women mourns over her husband who has been turned into a roosterman as the other roosterman prepare to kill them both.
12. Ever ruthless, the rooster king commands that the men whip the woman for the wrongdoing's she's committed.
13. The rooster now has overtaken the woman, causing a war between her and the other women.
14. They hang the woman as an example for all the other woman for what it means if you disobey the rooster king.
I had never read Shaun Tan's "The Arrival" before today, but I ended up loving the story and found myself surprised at how easily I understood what was happening and how fluid it felt.
In Computer Animation, we talk a lot about the structure of stories and how to stage a story properly so that it reads in a clear, visual way to the viewer. I found that many of the techniques that we use when storyboarding a short film were also evident in this comic. For example, Shaun Tan used a variety of shot choices; he showed close up's of the characters so we could read their expressions, but also included long spreads and full illustrations so we could see where they were. I felt this helped ground the story, because you knew where everything was happening, and also gave it a sense of scale. This was also especially helpful to keep the viewer interested, as there was a variety of things to look at. Additionally, many compositions were from the point of view of the main character. Because of this, we were able to see where the character was looking and experience how he was seeing the world. Since this was a completely new world, I felt that this technique was crucial in illustrating the grandeur feeling of this new society, as well as show you the main character's confusion from not being able to understand any of it. An aspect of this comic that I really loved was the element of repetition and the way Shaun Tan structured some images to feel like glimpses of memories. This was especially helpful for the scenes where the main character was looking for a job and also when he first arrived to the new land. Through these little glimpses, you understood what the process felt like rather than having to see every single step of it. For some parts however, such as the factory scene, it was better to have all of the panels showing the sorting of the figurines because it let the viewer feel how mundane the job was. Shaun Tan also did a great job at illustrating the characters' faces. As humans, we understand what's happening with one another through our expressions. One of Shaun Tan's strengths in this narrative is his ability to emote his characters so realistically, giving them every slight nuance to let you know what they're truly thinking. You could tell exactly how a character was feeling so you were able to connect with the story; your mind was able to fill in the gaps when the story didn't explicitly show you what was happening.
I felt that this story was very powerful in the fact that it not only showed you what happened with the character, but it also didn't show you everything, giving the viewer room to invent. One of the best parts in the story was when it showed the transition through the seasons, all through illustrations of the flower. This story is a great example of how you can so clearly illustrate what's happening without words and I really enjoyed it!
