By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 2/14/2013
Tweet In this week’s PW Comics World, I interviewed Jeremy Short—creator of the study on comics comprehension referenced here—about that study and a general overview of current research on how comics affect learning and cognizance. My takeaway: we’ll be seeing more of this. Along the way I chatted with Scott McCloud, who feels that the [...]
By: Maryann Yin,
on 8/10/2012
TV writer Tim Heiderich and writer/illustrator Mike Rosen hope to raise $2,800 on Kickstarter for Misunderstanding Comics, a project responding to Scott McCloud‘s 1993 graphic novel, Understanding Comics. We’ve embedded a video about the project above–what do you think?
Here’s more about the project: “Join us as we turn a jaundiced eye toward all that is wrong with the ‘invisible art.’ Every innovative idea that still shuffles along past its much- deserved death, every awful web comic that still manages to rack up a million page views with recycled Star Wars jokes, the once great artists and writers who have become caricatures of their former selves, and the new talent ready to discover bold new ways to sell out. You won’t understand comics until you misunderstand them.”
Welcome to our Kickstarter Publishing Project of the Week, a feature exploring how authors and publishers are using the fundraising site to raise money for book projects. If you want to start your own project, check out How To Use Kickstarter to Fund Your Publishing Project.
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Add a Comment
By: Jason Boog,
on 3/7/2011
Google celebrated Will Eisner‘s March 6th birthday with a Google Doodle.
The image is embedded above, a logo combining Eisner’s famous hero, The Spirit, and the crowded New York City neighborhoods Eisner explored in later graphic novels. Comic artist Scott McCloud wrote on Google’s blog about how Eisner’s The Spirit newspaper comic influenced many artists, from Jack Kirby to Jules Feiffer.
eBookNewser has more: “Google celebrated the late Will Eisner’s birthday this weekend with a Google Doodle, dedicated to the legendary comic author. Artist Mike Dutton drew the above homage to Eisner, in which the ‘oo’s in Google have been replaced by the eyes of one of Eisner’s most famous characters named ‘The Spirit,’ aka Denny Colt, a crime fighting detective.”
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Add a Comment
By: Heidi MacDonald,
on 4/19/2011
Webcomics are moving forward with more experimentation on the infinite canvas of the browser, and taking new and unforeseen shapes. Here’s one by Stevan Živadinović called “Hobo Lobo” that’s a sidescroller/multi-plane retelling of the Pied Piper tale. Apparently this doesn’t work on Explorer (what does?) but it worked on my decrepit and senile computer, so…happy scrolling!
Link via Scott McCloud; there’s a further discussion of the state of experimental comics in the comment here.
By: John,
on 8/11/2011
Ben Towle writes on his site:
I’m currently teaching an Introduction to Sequential Art class for The Savannah College of Art and Design and the primary text for the class is Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics. There’s no denying the importance of this text and I gain new insights on comics every time I read it. I think, though, that it’s important to question and think critically about works likeUnderstanding Comics and not simply accept them as gospel because they’re presented to you as being The Text. To encourage such thinking among my students, whenever I teach a class that has McCloud’s book on the reading list, I always have my students also read Art Baxter and James Sturm’s 1998 response to the book: a short seven-page comic called A Response to Chapter Nine : Build a Beach Head, which ran in The Comics Journal #211 (April, 1999).
With James Sturm’s and Art Baxter’s permission, he has posted the full comic online, along with new thoughts by both creators.
By: John,
on 8/25/2011
Yes, I know. Kickstarter projects are popping up like pimples on a nervous teenager these days, and I know many of us are starting to feel the pinch of constantly being asked to donate to this project or that, particularly while the economy is tanking. Regardless, this one sounds pretty exciting and is very relevant to those of us who draw for a living:
We’re Dave Kellett & Fred Schroeder, creators of the comics documentary STRIPPED. This film is our love-letter to the art form: Bringing together 60 of the world’s best cartoonists into one extraordinary, feature-length documentary. The film sits down with creators to talk about how cartooning works, why it’s so loved, and how as artists they’re navigating this dicey period between print and digital options…when neither path works perfectly. We want this film to capture the extraordinary people behind the comics you love, to show how they work…and ask the question: “Where does the art form go from here?”
(via STRIPPED: The Comics Documentary by Small Fish Studios — Kickstarter)
By: Becky,
on 11/16/2007
...to nominate your favorite Middle Grade/Young Adult Nonfiction book published in 2007. I know some of you are busy polishing the silverware and preparing the nut cups for Thanksgiving next week, but please consider taking a break to give the nod to your favorite book. Some titles still awaiting nomination: The Voyage of the Beetle: A Journey around the World with Charles Darwin and the
By: Mark G. Mitchell,
on 5/13/2008
Who is the creature lurking in the library in Erik’s comic strip? I think I know, and I’ve entered Erik’s contest, but I can’t share my guess with anyone. But I will say this much — it’s a character from a book we know. After all, the strip is Hex Libris, in which Kirby, the main character is charged with taking care of a ginormous enchanted library.
Ever read a novel that just comes to life before your eyes? Well you can expect Hex Libris to take that theme and … ramp it up a little for you.
The serial web comic by designer-writer Erik Kuntz of Austin, Texas began as a New Year’s resolution. So did his illustrator’s blog A Dog a Day that features Erik’s unstop able canine imagery — with a doggy bite of daily commentary. But that’s a subject for the next post.
Erik was thinking of the classic Nancy Drew stories of the 1950’s, mulling how they contrasted and compared with the Nancy Drew graphic novels that are being designed for today’s teens.
“I wondered, ‘What if there was a place where characters could wander out of their books?’ ” Erik says. ”‘And what would happen if the real Nancy Drew ran into the punky Manga style Nancy Drew?’”
Our hero Kirby meets them both as a result of his new archival responsibilities. And so it is inevitable that the trio and who knows who else (stay tuned…) join forces to solve a mystery, or two.
The story unfolds in semi-weekly panels that move us easily, cleanly and sweetly through time and space. We care about Kirby and Amy (a girl who likes him) and girl detective Connie Carter ( the “original” Nancy Drew) and even the little old lady (or is she a witch?) who leases Kirby the uptown apartment that somehow, magically contains a Library of Congress-like basilica within its tiny walls.
It’s an idea Erik hatched at last year’s Summer Arts Workshop at California State University. He studied comics and animation in the summer program. One of the teachers, Trina Robbins (a comic book writer and illustrator since the 1960s) encouraged him.
“As much as I love comic books, it’s the comic pages in the Sunday paper that I most enjoy and try to emulate here — their sequential nature and the art style and sense of humor — especially from the 40s to the 50s, where they could work bigger and there was more possibility,” he says.
Kuntz blends his pop knowledge with early 20th century literacy, opening his ”chapters” with such verbiage as “In which our hero acquires new lodgings and meets a mysterious young woman ….”
“It tells you what will happen without giving it away,” he explains. ”With a serial web strip, just like in the Sunday funny papers, you kind of need to have a stop every day. You want each page of the comic to be a beat Each one has to be a sort of mini cliff hanger. And each chapter must have its own arc. That’s the other thing I work with to get right.”
Erik begins by writing a synopsis of what’s going to happen in the chapter, without the dialogue.
Then he begins to sketch and figure out the panels and individual frames,” he says.
“I scanned [pencil on paper] sketches for the early strips, but now I’m working directly on the computer, starting with rough sketches in Corel Painter using my Wacom Cintiq tablet monitor,” he says. “I stay with Painter through the inking process, then I bring the whole thing into Illustrator to do the lettering. Once in a while, when I’m out and about with my sketchbook, I capture a pose I want to use and scan that in and mix it in with my computer sketches.
“To be more precise, I use Painter’s Mechanical Pencil brush set to a light blue color. When I ink I use a variety of Painter’s Ink Pen brushes, mostly the Smooth Round Pen one. For the next one, I’m going to experiment with the tools that more closely imitate traditional comics inking brushes: it’ll be looser and I am not certain whether I’ll like it.
“I’ll know in a day or two when I get to the inking. “
Here’s Erik’s ‘pencil rough’ for the March 13 panel of ‘Hex Libris” — except he’s done it digitally.
“They look a lot like my traditional sketches look, since I use a col-erase blue to do my roughs on paper,” he says.
“I’m most of the way done with this roughing, I have some poses to adjust, some faces to finish and I’ve got to fix the perspective on the backgrounds, which are currently just scribbled in. Oh, and I need a background in the final panel. Painter has a perspective grid, which is useful for simple 2-point perspective, so I’ll be using that to get the kitchen sorted properly.
Erik has been a student of
I’ve done so much study over the last few years as to what makes a comic a comic as opposed to an illustrated story,” Erik says. ”It’s a constant struggle between what needs to be put in the picture and what needs to be said ‘out loud’ in words.”
For inspiration, Kuntz looks to the late “father of Manga” Osamu Tezuka (”Kimba the White Lion was my favorite show as a kid,” Kuntz says. “It was cartoony without being overly simple.”
He also draws from the late E.C. Seegar, the creator of Popeye and Thimble Theatre. “I like the older style of newspaper comics, where the adventure strips had a more realistic look.”
There are a huge number of ppl doing them now.
Early days, doing tremendously.
Most of them are very poor. You won’t get it if you weren’t out drinking the night before.
There are quite a few brilliant child-friendly comics.
Some people thew business model is web advertising, especially if you’re drawn to a certain one,.
Penny-Arcade.com..
If you don’t lnpw anything about video games you’;lbe mystified by the strip,
Advertising art.
Others are off advertising on their site, or sales of merchandize, T-shirts and print versions of ytheir work, and their artisitic expression and online portfolio.
I wouldn’t think that ppl doing the webcomics,
Aren’tmakiny money,
There is a stunning amount of good work out there, on the web, and a much
Web an ideal way for me to do a serial.
Web is an inexpensive way to put the work out there and much easier way to get it in front of somebody.
With the web and the social network everyone’s sharing things, pointg it tout toe each other, it’s a new milleu, an old art form anbut a different way of delivering it.
could do it free,
I think every artist that does children’s stuff, cartoony stuff.
Kids are more ., kids are reading comics on the web.
My web brouwser, opens all the comics I want to each in tabs. I don’t read them in the newspaper.
Traditional newspaper strips,
Calving and Hobbes being run again and again on the web. They syndicate.
Kidsa nolw reading Calvin and Hobbes on the web.,
Hald of them are newspaper strips and half are web only strips.
The interesting thing about comics is it could be a way to get ppl to your site,
Comic and the dog thing, anything they want to like and put elsewhere they can put ,
Imbedded my website address into the picture,
Then they canb
Its hard for everyone to say, content is not as sacred than it used to be.
url on the left, name and copyright infor
By: Jennie,
on 6/1/2009
By: jeff,
on 8/28/2009
We are quite proud of the fact that we offer personalized images inside of our custom kids books. It is extremely important to us that the children receiving our books see THEMSELVES inside, not just their name.
But how did our artists create characters that could be customized to become every child in America (and some very far away countries, too)? A fantastic book called “Making Comics” by Scott McCloud illuminates how, as a default, a reader envisions a character as him or herself. I’ll try to explain with my own horrible drawings.
Imagine a stick figure. We recognize it as an icon signifying a human. Any human. It could be you!
<— You.
You identify with the stickman. Feel his pain. But when we give him a monocle, top hat, and cane, it is no longer you (unless you are Mr. Peanut).
<— Some jerk.
So it is through each new detail that you begin to differentiate a character on a page as “not you”.
“Okay,” you say, “so you were too lazy to create all the different face shapes, noses, and brows to more accurately match each character to an individual child, so you went generic.”
Not quite. Have you ever seen this piece of art?
If not, I’ll relate how nearly everyone learns about it. The French script underneath the pipe says, “This is not a pipe.”
“Silly French Artist,” you say with a bit of disdain for all people who were berets, “of course it is. Look at it, it looks just like a pipe.”
“But can you smoke it?” asks some snooty art person who’s already in on the joke, to which you sheepishly hang your head, roll your eyes and admit, “Fine. It’s not a pipe. It’s a PAINTING of a pipe.” And then you wait anxiously for the moment you can look smart by explaining it to someone else.
Back to our “laziness”. We realize that anything we put on a page can only be a visual REPRESENTATION of any particular child. Photorealistic detail only underlines this fact, which is why it’s a lot easier to believe that this…
<— Jeff
is ME, and this…
<— Some jerk.
is just plain creepy.
I suggest everyone who has ANY interest at all in comics (funny papers count) to go out and buy or check out from the library “Making Comics” by Scott McCloud. It’ll change the way you see not just comics, but art itself! Check out his amazing lecture on Ted.com.
…
By: Mark G. Mitchell,
on 10/14/2009
Illustrators and comic book creators hunkered down two weekends ago to produce original comic book content. They did this in cities all over the world. It was Twenty Four Hour Comics Day – an annual happening launched some years ago by cartoonist and teacher Scott McCloud, the author of Understanding Comics. (You can read the rules at that link.) This year the event was sponsored by Bawls, one of those caffeinated energy drinks.
In Austin they conclaved at a store, Dragon’s Lair Comics and Fantasy, where lots of tables had been set up for the artists. There were all kinds of things going on in the store that rainy night — people were putting models together, browsing the shelves, visiting their friends.
I wasn’t a participant. Only curious. Plus a pal, cartoonist and writer Erik Kuntz, part of our enchanted SCBWI tribe, was doing the marathon again this year. Erik is the author-artist of Hex Libris, a witty, kid-friendly webcomic with wonderful characters.
Erik's laptop with a panel from his new comic --work in progress.
I don’t do comics much anymore but they were important to me growing up. I read them and drew them.
My own formidable classical education came from reading Classics Illustrated comic books — as many as I could get my hands on. (They were a whole lot better than CliffsNotes.)
(L. to R.) Bonn Adame, Erik Kuntz, Justin Rogers and Jeremy Guyton create at their table during 24 Hour Comics Day in Austin, Texas recently.
Another SCBWI and Inklings Group pal, illustrator Martin Thomas is a professional colorist of comics.
Mary Sullivan, supremely talented illustrator for Highlights and many other magazines and books and part of our Austin clan — has illustrated a beautiful and funny children’s comic book. She draws in comic panels for her own amusement.
Austin SCBWI illustration chair Christy Stallop does great black and white comic strip panel style illustrations
A panel of sketches for "Action Packed Gorillas", a new web comic being developed by Erik Kuntz. The dialogue balloons always come first. (Note: The character featured here is a chimp, not a gorilla.)
My stepson Glenn remains a connoisseur- collector of graphic novels. School librarians are increasingly making room for graphic novels on their shelves. Scholastic Books wants to whip up its own graphic novel brand.
For years the “comic book look” has been finding its way into wildly popular “chapter books ” for upper elementary and middle grades. w. Dav Pilkey is one example. The Zack Proton series by Austin author Brian Anderson (of our SCBWI Mafia family) with illustrator Doug Holgate is another.
Kads and Matt. Matt has the webcomic http://ayellowworld.com
The Toon Books are comics for toddlers and children just begining to learn to read.
Disney bought Marvel.
By the way, Matt’s blog has a good recap of his experience of the 24 Hour Comics Day here.
Artist-writer Meghan Regis and technical consultant Jeremy Zunker (an engineering student.) Meghan is the creator of the comic series "Yours Truly" published in "The Paisano", the weekly newspaper of the University of Texas at San Antonio. The main main character in the strip is a young woman who lives on the moon. So seriously, that's why Meghan needs a technical consultant around her when she's working. "Because there are a lot of technical terms that are used in the dialogue," Zunker explained.So
And Yes. Women really do participate in 24 Hour Comics Day. In addition to Meghan (above) there was Kad (who will let me know when she has her website up) and Melanie Moore working on her strip “Sacred Junk” with Amy Middleton (not shown.)
Meghan Regis with her panels.
The teamwork of Jason Poland and Austin Havican ( below) can be seen here and here.
Colored comic panels (watercolor washes) on the comic strip "The Ortolan" created by a collaborative team, Jason Poland, and Austin Havican, whose hands you see here. They described their work as deceptively simple child-like and simply but "definitely not child-friendly." See more of their work at www.robbieandbobby.com. S
Erik Kuntz laughs at one of his digital cartoons as he draws on a Wacom tablet while Justin Rogers works with traditional comic artist materials -- paper, pencil, eraser, pen, triangle, T-square, etc. (In the background with beard is comics writer Tony Franklin. )
As you see, there were fun moments and lots of hard work– or should I say heart work? I guess they go together — being done by a lot of people in that comic book store.
Erik is suggesting that we get together next year for something a little less intense than a They Shoot Horses Don’t They? draw-a-thon.
He’s calling it the “geriatric version of 24 Hour Comics Day.” I can’t say that I’m in favor of the name. It sounds, you know, a little ageist — and hits a little close. But the idea intrigues. Instead of laboring over pages of comic panels, we could be blitzing through picture book thumbnails and storyboards, or maybe even a dummy.
A children’s book illustrators lockdown. Check back with us in September next year to read our rules.
I don’t want to go without mentioning that I saw the movie Seraphine recently, about an early 20th century painter most of us have never heard of – Seraphine Louis or Seraphine de Senlis.
Seraphine offers an unblinking look at the dilemma of art vs. reality that confronts all artists and would-be-artists sooner or later in their lives.
It’s being promoted as a fictionalized portrait of Seraphine and also of the kindly German art collector who discovered her. But I felt its spirit to be honest. My friend and I were both moved. I recommend that you see it, then give me your thoughts on it. Leave a comment and I’ll share another of mine.
* * * * *
By: John,
on 10/24/2010
“Do you know that WHAT you put in your panels is potentially far more interesting than how well you DRAW it?”
- Scott McCloud
My 9-year-old son had some exciting news for me this week. He was ecstatic that the school library just got in a copy of Doug TenNapel’s BAD ISLAND. He already told me that he plans to check it out on his next book exchange day.
He loves, loves, LOVES TenNapel’s work.
And you know what? He’s never once called them “comics.” But BOOKS or NOVELS. He tells me how much he loves “Doug TenNapel books” all the time.
Kids read what they like, and I don’t think kids see much segregation between “graphic novels” and “regular books.” Why should we?
Er, that would be THE SCULPTOR, not THE SCULTOR.
Thom P. your comment just made my day. Thanks, I needed that.
Awesome. You keep makin’ them and my kid will surely be readin’ ‘em. :)
I am surprised it has taken as long as it has for comics to be used as educational tools. GN’s, comics, even books that mix prose and art (Wimpy Kid books) are what the kids are reading. Like marketing, you need to meet your audience where they are. It makes sense that if you want kids to let them read what they like.
Knowing that people learn differently, some are visual learners, some are audible learners, some are kinesthetic learners, good educators will teach using these various methods to reach more students. It makes sense to use the same approach by using different types of reading material to reach more students. Some will prefer prose and some will prefer a GN, but it will expose students to a much larger pool of works to chose from and explore.
If it encourages them to read, imagine and explore the arts I am all for it.
What’s really cool about this moment is that we have an entire comics-minded educators who are now decision makers within their districts. These folks have taken it upon themselves to incorporate comics into their teaching strategies. Also to their benefit is the fact that we have so much more really qualified stuff for them to work with. In addition to the increased number of titles you also need to figure in the traditional publishers who understand the formula that each book needs in order to be accepted into the classroom. Its really not enough for a book to just be good. It must also have reading comprehension levels attached, proper cataloging information such as subject matter, and genre detail. They also have grade and age levels attached. Most traditional comics publishers dont understand how critical these elements are so you have First Second, Scholastic, Abrams, Lerner and Capstone who are stepping in and dominating the educational space. And….they are doing it with really exciting stuff! Congrats to Scott for the gig with First Second! I am really looking forward to the next book.
MAUS is part of our high school’s 9th grade curriculum, and I am curious to see what comes next. I know AMERICAN-BORN CHINESE is used with some of the low-level lit courses, and some teachers use some graphic/ comic short stories such as Paul Chadwick’s VAGABOND and some Joe Sacco.
It’s always nice to have people who will continually “beat” the drum for comics, but I don’t really understand the push for comics to be looked at as “a teaching tool.” I remember when people were talking about comics being, “the gateway to getting kids to read.” That’s all fine and good, but at the same time it strikes me as trying to justify comic books while still treating them like a bastard son. Comic books are nothing less than the greatest advance in human communication and story telling. They are more flexible, and full of potential, they break down thought, time and space, better than any limited human language, movie, book, or painting. It cannot be understood through deconstruction and there is no unified theory. Comics justify themselves. I’m far more interested to see what The Sculptor is. If we really feel we understand comics, we should be using that knowledge to push the boundaries of storytelling to heights so new and great, that people will be motivated to look into them, on their own. In fact, that’s what I’m going to go do, right now. ;o)