Ideas for Final Module

While I'm still not totally sure on the narrative, I've pretty much decided on what my visual style will be. I developed a style for one of the first games that I made for Game Development I that I really enjoyed and am thinking of employing some of the enemy characters that I designed:


Not sure if I'm going to color them like the ones shown here just because of time constraints, but I will definitely keep the inking style consistent.

For the narrative, I think I might go for some kind of birth story - weird creature is born and the reader watches its first few stages in a life completely different than our human lives, but with metaphorical representations for the things we experience. Just have to think of some "problems" for said creature to encounter that will help the narrative develop.

Just realized this never uploaded :(

So I tried to upload the video I made for Mod 4 - part 2, about a million times to blogger, but it kept on failing. Here's a link to where I finally ended up posting it on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdCuplxaOG0

Stealers Wheel is pretty sweet

Above is the animatic I made based on the infamous section of the script from Reservoir Dogs in which Mr. Blonde cuts off the cops ear. Good stuff.

Limpets lounge luxuriously in lieu of logic

For Module 4 Part 3, we had to write a story with a basic linear narrative using the following picture:










Here's what I ended up writing:

Barnacles munched at his underside as Boat continued to rock in the ocean. It seemed like at any point the ocean creatures might finally break through him he had been sitting there for so long. Day after day the simple wooden boat screamed at his tormentors, “Try as you might, you will never break my spirit!!” Yet they continued to mindlessly gorge themselves on what seemed to be the only available meal. Boat had long given up pulling and tearing at his anchor; no matter the swell of the wave he encountered, he could not break free. Even as he tried to rest it was not the frigid sea air nor the murky waters that kept his mind alert, but the possibility that those who had made him anchor here would never return to free him.

Boat awoke with a start when he felt himself being sucked deeper into the waters. His thoughts raced, “Have they finally found a way to sink me? Was my struggle until this moment all for naught?” until he realized he had stopped descending into the water, but instead felt a heavy weight within his hull. The hoofed beast began to bray, seemingly as perplexed with its new predicament as Boat. “Sea creature, remove yourself from my stern,” cried Boat, “no matter how many more limpets and mussels inch up my hull, I will not give in!” The creature, oblivious to Boat's cries, attempted to make as little motion as possible for fear of its small platform giving into the water below. Boat's cries of resistance echoed until nightfall as he felt his newly exposed sides begin to corrode.

The layer of once fresh, dazzling white paint on Boat was finally overcome by crustaceans to the same degree that his belly had been overwhelmed long ago. Upon finding that he could cajole the creature into returning to the sea as much as he could remove the monsters from his underside, Boat had concluded that the creature was perhaps not aligned with the sea. It in fact looked to be in pretty terrible condition; tending to sleep all day, its skin yellowed and seeming to protrude in every direction. The stench alone drew other animals that Boat thought he would never view again; great flying birds and even the tiniest insects that seemed to materialize from the rolling horizon were drawn to the presence of the hoofed beast.

Though the presence of other creatures was comforting at first, Boat became more concerned with their increasing numbers. With each wave of beasts that came to experience the sleeping creature, more began to roost on the boat, calling it their new home. “I thought once that you were my allies, fair creatures, but now do you shove me deeper as well? What is it about the thing resting on my bow that draws so many? Creatures of the sky, begone, lest we both drown with my strange cargo,” but no matter how much the boat pleaded, more and more came. Boat's hull was rotting, full of the salty water and monsters that had been eating at him for so long. As one more great Frigate descended to join its comrades, bits of water began to edge in over the sides of Boat. “HELP,” cried Boat as he felt the icy waters begin to fill his insides, “DEAR GOD GET OFF OF ME, SOMEONE HELP!” Neither the birds roosting and chatting within him nor the sleeping beast seemed to notice his pleas until Boat was so covered in ocean that they no longer had a place to sit. Boat's world darkened as he descended, his spirit broken, all while the creatures floating above watched indifferently.

Reading Response to Jim Steranko's Narrative Theory

I wrote my response in outline form so that, rather than trying to compile my thoughts after concluding the reading, I could dictate my thoughts as I thought them.

• Point on page 2 that “Literature requires only a visual sense to read the text, which in itself is antivisual.” Disagree – in some ways literature offers the most freedom in terms of visuals because they are created wholly by the reader. This makes it a more intellectually challenging experience because, unlike film, the reader must create their own imagery. This is similar to the gutter effect in comics

• Like his discussion on extrinsic perception – intrinsic perception is fairly easy but creating imagery that subtly implies a variety of things (like the bank robbers growing notoriety through newspapers proclaiming his higher bounty) is much harder

• Ludicrous amount of name dropping

• Steranko talks about “beginning a ruthless deconstruction” of the plot points that he has created, “hoping to eliminate weaknesses, finding other ways to tell the story, and discovering new new narrative configurations.” How does this affect the original story that the comic was trying to tell? Is he taking too much artistic liberty just so that he can tell his own visual story?

• Discussion of shots and viewpoints was generally informative

• Character lighting – made me think of Batman: The Dark Knight. Spoilers: I loved how they kept Harvey Dent's face hidden – you could only barely see how horribly deformed it was, letting your imagination make the unknown far more hideous than the cheesy-looking CG that they ultimately revealed. Had they maintained this mysterious, unnerving character lighting, I think the film would have been much more successful in portraying Dent's change of character.

• Not sure what to think on his discussion of listening to music while working – I've heard some professionals say that it distracts your mind too much and that you will see a significant improvement in your work once you stop listening to music, while others claim that it helps them focus on their work and, as Steranko suggests, focus on a specific atmosphere or time period. Personally, I prefer not to listen to music because I end up just focusing on the songs I like.

• Not sure how helpful his panel by panel discussion was, particularly because of how he organized the the comic way before the started discussing each panel. I had to keep flashing back and forth between the panel and the text, making it hard to gain anything from the writing.