Reading and Writing about Comics ala McCloud, Part 1

I checked out a comic by Daniel Goodbrey that displays a lot of "MS Paint"-style artistry. It's not that it's bad, but it looks "simple" and grainy. The colors are likewise very simplistic and often in primary hues (easily represented on a 256-color palette). Lines between shading and light are hard and unblended. The entire presentation is very reminiscent of Scott McCloud's pyramid of iconic abstraction, reality, and language (51). Each edge of the triangle represents one of those features, though a comic is not necessarily bounded in one area or another and can change as freely as the artist wishes. Goodbrey's comics are consistently abstract enough to be considered somewhere in the middle of the pyramid, leaning more towards the language border. Goodbrey frequently illustrates commentary from pop culture to abstract ideas about animals and people.

The comic follows a format. There are always 4 frames: the first is the title frame that introduces the topic of the next three. In this particular example, it presents the oxymoron of "recognizing the nondescript." That is, something that shouldn't be describable because of its too common features. The second through fourth frames demonstrate the qualities that a nondescript person has, including "normal" behavior and "typical" clothing. I love the irony of the description.

The frames serve to make one important point or punchline. Using the six transitional descriptions of Scott McCloud, this comic falls into one of three. The unchanging art in the three non-title frames could be considered a part of McCloud's "Moment-to-Moment" transition, in which each frame is a brief moment captured in time, and then slowly drawn out over several frames, much like a motion picture or flip-book animation.

I also feel that this comic has a place in McCloud's "Action-to-Action" category since the panels switch between no action and a sudden or implied action. The particular comic I linked doesn't represent this as well as this one does.

I also include the possibility of "Subject-to-Subject" transition because of the level of reader involvement. "The next type takes us from Subject-to-Subject while staying withing a scene or idea. Note the degree of reader involvement necessary to render these transitions meaningful" (McCloud 71). The action here takes place outside the panel, but there is implied action that the reader is encouraged to imagine happening. The poop joke here is especially powerful in evoking a response from the reader.