Week 3: Little Nemo and more

This week I had the pleasure of reading some Little Nemo comics, by Winsor Mckay, focus around a boy, and his adventures in slumberland. Mckay's art style really makes the world of slumberland what it is. I was first exposed to Winsor Mckay’s work when I first watched Gertie the dinosaur years ago. I am still impressed that this simple cartoon has paved the way for many forms of entertainment that we know and love today. His work has inspired many people in the entertainment industry throughout history. While one would think the adventures in slumberland would be a collection of happy adventures by this little child, Little Nemo consisted of a lot of underlying theme at times dark, violent, and surreal. This instantly reminded me of Walt Disney and his methods of story telling. They both used a medium that was aimed for children but by adding more mature themes allowed them to be universally enjoyed by everyone.

In addition to Little Nemo I also read some Peanuts comics. I enjoyed them a lot. I grew up watching Peanuts animations as a kid but never really had the opportunity to read them in comic strip form. One thing that continues to amaze me about the Peanuts is that they’re still relevant even today. Blue Sky is getting ready to release a new Peanuts movie this winter, and from the looks of it seems to be pity good. One thing I like a lot about peanuts is that there is a whole cast of different characters with different personalities. Charlie brown, for example is constantly fighting a lose battle with low self-esteem and always seems to have the worst of luck. I noticed a big part of the gags in each peanut strip are about playing one character’s personality against another. Which makes the strip so relatable. I think the reliability of the strip is one reason why it has stood the test of time and is still relevant today.

Week2: Understanding Comics

I really enjoyed Scott Mcloud’s “Understanding Comics.” The book was both fun to read and informative. It was truly a fascinating look into the production of comics that I have never tough of before. I always enjoy learning bout other art forms that I’m not too familiar with, You never know what insights you might pick up that can possibly relate you your own art. Wile I didn’t think I new that much about comics, it turned out I knew a lot more than I tough.

Constantly working with film and animation, comics a very similar to story boards, which is a process we do before we go into production of a film. I was glad to see that I was somewhat familiar with some concepts that McCloud touched on. McCloud touched on how simplifying a drawing from its realistic origin amplifies its core meaning. In animation, story board, and visual development we are always thinking of this. Typically, the stories we tell are usually exaggerated in someway or another, so Eliminating details actually allows us to focus on the important ones, and therefore pushing the clarity of the essential meaning of a story in a way realism can never do.

Comic 

Big Hero 6

Story boards 

Big Hero 6

Overall I thought the book had a ton of insight in to things I never even considered before, that related to my studies as a computer animator, and makes me rethink the depth of storytelling that is possible in chronological picture-making.

Week1: The Graphic Novel

The Arrival by Shaun Tan is a beautiful graphic novel. It is a perfect example of storytelling. it communicates everything entirely through visual symbols and gestures that anyone from any culture can relate to. It is about A man who leaves his wife and child in seeking better prospects in an unknown country. He eventually finds himself being exposed to whole new world foreign ideas.

I found it extremely fascinating trying to decipher the story that the artist was trying to tell, and understand the experience that the man had moving to the new country. I think telling this story in a graphic novel format was very smart. Choosing the graphic novel format related directly to subject matter and concepts found in the graphic novel. Reading this book I felt like I had a deeper connection with the main character. I had a similar experience, I was seeing things I have never seen before and I think this format added an extra layer to the storytelling. We truly understood his confusion and feeling of being out of place. A lot of it was up for interpretation

I truly enjoyed this reading because of the format, typically I have a hard time sympathizing with character in traditional readings because there is a disconnect, between the words and images. Being a visual learner I was able to understand his emotions a lot better.