1. DGMD S-72 Graphic Storytelling: Comic Book Art and Narrative
#2: Cinematography
Intro to Comic Layout: Closure and the Senses
In-class Prompt #1.
Steps for developing a story in pictures.
Photoshop for Editing Scanned Drawings

2. Intro to Cinematography
What is cinematography? What tools does it offer us as visual storytellers?

3. Intro to Cinematography
Cinematography is a visual language of framing, angles, and edits which allow us, as visual directors, to manage the informational and emotional experience of our audience.

4. Intro to Cinematography
CAMERA FRAMING is about information. By controlling how much the user sees, we help them focus on a specific place, person, or action:
Wide = where we are
Medium = who is there
Close = what they are doing

5. Intro to Cinematography
CAMERA ANGLES is about power relationships, affecting how we feel about the subject. Note the language of these angles, and how an emotional experience is embedded in the phrasing:
Looking-Down shot = they are less powerful, in trouble
Eye-to-Eye shot = we are at their level, we are them.
Looking-Up shot = they are powerful, we are in awe of them

6. Intro to Cinematography
EDITING is about juxtaposing images to progress a story. Each important story beat should ideally be presented in multiple shots.
An exercise: The shot below shows a person entering a room, all in a single wide, eye-to-eye shot. This is essentially a poster. It creates no drama, no anticipation, no sense of importance in the min of the audience. How could we break this into multiple shots to build drama into this character’s entrance?

7. Intro to Cinematography
EDITING: Consider another exercise, this one taken from David Mamet’s On Directing Film: imagine a stream through a dense wood, where a deer is drinking. The observer steps on a branch, and the deer raises its head. In three shots, we can communicate a sense of alertness.
With a partner, design these three shots.

8. Intro to Cinematography
Why are we discussing film cinematography in a comics class? Because most comic layouts borrow from the same language. The panels of a comic establish a sense of place with a wide shot, connect us to a character with a medium shot, and help us focus on an action with a close shot. Just as in film, the angle can make us feel awe or pity for a character, or create identification with an eye-level shot.

9. Intro to Cinematography
So if the same cinematic language is used by both film and comics, how are they different?

10. Intro to Cinematography
Consider these two examples (see site links) to discuss cinematography, pacing, and how we read the pages as a whole: Brave Chef Brianna An Abridged History of a Moon

11. Comics Layout: Closure
In Understanding Comics McCloud discusses the concept of closure in media and every day life, and how comics use the power of the gutter between panels to make audiences an equal partner in the comics experience.

12. Comics Layout: Closure
Consider these two panels. What happened?

13. Comics Layout: Closure
McCloud suggests that YOU did it.
What does this mean for you as a comics creator?

14. Comics Layout: Closure Types
We create closure in the mind of the audience by juxtaposing panels: put any two frames side by side and we get an effect in the meaning-making machine of the human brain. Let’s try to create categories. Think about the films you have seen and the comics you have read. What images could we juxtapose?

15. Comics Layout: Closure Types
McCloud offers six types of Closure, with multiple examples of each. He then looks at every transition in multiple books, counts the type of closure in each, and charts the result. Most American comics fall in types 2-4, where action lies. Try to include all types this semester!

16. Comics Layout: Closure Types
In Closure type #5, Aspect to Aspect, we see a series of images meant to convey a place through multiple snapshots.
See this example from McCloud.
What do you experience in each panel?
What do you experience between the panels?

17. In-Class Prompt #1
Each class we have multiple exercises to explore the concepts, an optional Jam Comic, and a Prompt. The Prompts are time limited, just 15 minutes plus the break.
TODAY’S PROMPT:
“In 6 Panels, Do Something to a Bunny”

18. Panel Design
Consider this set of 22 useful shots based on Wally Wood, to enliven your comics panels, particularly to make space for dialogue:

19. Steps for Developing a Story in Pictures 1
Write a story. Read it aloud, look for rhythm in the language. Short sentences, occasional longer ones. A few sentences can easily be a page of a comic, so for this class keep the text to about a paragraph or two.
Reorganize the text as a list of story Beats. NOTE: if you intend to include text in your final page, consider making lines as short and pithy as you can.
Thumbnail sketch each story Beat in a Panel, finding reference as needed, in any order you choose.
Revise your sketches for alternative framing and angles, and consider which “posters” can be broken into two or three panels to more potently share that moment, or provide a sense of place (Aspect-to-Aspect).
Organize the resulting panels into a quick, sketchy layout on at least one Page (try to keep it under 3 pages). You may use the supplied page templates or design your own. Include word bubbles, if needed.
Draw a final version, leaving space for the bubbles ala Wally Wood.
Scan and process your page in Photoshop, add word bubbles on a separate layer.
Save and Export pages as PNGs.

20. Steps for Developing a Story in Pictures 2
Most of what would be described in other narrative forms can be told just with pictures in a comic. Look for text you can shorten, or cut! Note this example from Will Eisner’s “Comics and Sequential Art”:

21. Steps for Developing a Story in Pictures 3
A STORY: “Regret” When I was 22 I took a small, helpless life. I was a high school English teacher, living with other teachers. One of them owned a bird. I did not like living with the bird’s owner. He boasted about making his elementary school students cry, seeming to think he had successfully “reached them.” When he did not like what his mom said on the phone he would bang the receiver against a table, again and again, and then resume the discussion. When my family or friends visited and were leaving, he would tell them to “Drive fast and take chances.” The other thing he would say was “The only things no one better mess with is my brother, my truck, or my bird”. Still, it was my first apartment. I had not found it on my own. I did not know how to find another. A couple months before the end of school I was considering living with him for another year. My breakfast most mornings was a hard boiled egg. Grading a hundred English papers a night meant I slept little. This is not an excuse. I rushed out of the house one morning, the pot still on the stove, on the fire. My other housemate found it, and turned it off. I thanked him and forgot about it. My only warning. Then I did it again, and this time I was the last to leave. So the pot burned. My housemates returned first that day. They found the kitchen filled with smoke. Upstairs the bird was dead. Teflon, overheated, is deadly to birds, at any dose, I learned. That night I tried to apologize, but he was not ready. We never spoke again.

22. Steps for Developing a Story in Pictures 4
THE SAME STORY, REVISED FOR BREVITY: “Regret” When I was 22 I took a small, helpless life. I was a high school English teacher, living with other teachers. One of them owned a bird. I did not like living with the bird’s owner. He boasted about making his elementary school students cry. When he did not like what his mom said on the phone he would bang the receiver against a table, again and again. I said nothing. One morning I rushed out and forgot a hard-boiled egg cooking on the stove. The pot burned. My housemates found the kitchen filled with smoke. Upstairs the bird was dead. Overheated Teflon, I learned, is deadly to birds. I have never been able to make amends.

23. Steps for Developing a Story in Pictures 5
ORDER AS A LIST: “Regret”
When I was 22 I took a small, helpless life.
I was a high school English teacher, living with other teachers.
One of them owned a bird.
I did not like living with the bird’s owner.
He boasted about making his elementary school students cry.
When he did not like what his mom said on the phone he would bang the receiver against a table, again and again.
I said nothing.
One morning I rushed out and forgot a hard-boiled egg cooking on the stove.
The pot burned.
My housemates found the kitchen filled with smoke.
Upstairs the bird was dead.
Overheated Teflon, I learned, is deadly to birds.
I have never been able to make amends.
13 Beats. Next we start to draft the shots.

24. Intro Photoshop for Processing & Layout 1
If you are already comfortable drawing in Photoshop or another digital tool, feel free to create your comics digitally. If you would rather draw on paper this week, please follow the following steps:
Draw your full, revised page/s. Darker lines (either heavy pencil or ink) will scan better. You can draw on any paper, but consider larger paper so you can get the thinner lines when shrinking down.
Scan!: The school labs have large-format scanners for larger pages.
CREATE A NEW PSD FILE: Open Photoshop, File/New, set to 8 x 10.5, 300ppi (1/2 a standard printer page).
PROCESS YOUR SCANS: Open your scanned page/s and copy them into your PSD ([Cmd]+[a], [Cmd]+[c], [Cmd]+[v]).
Scale to fit ([Cmd]+[t], hold down [Shift] to drag uniformly).
If it is just ink (no paint): Duplicate the layer ([Cmd]+[j]), set upper layer Blending Mode to Multiply and collapse (select both layers, RightClick and merge layers).
Use Image> Adjustments> Levels to set darks to black and lights to white.

25. Intro Photoshop for Processing & Layout 2
USE STROKE FOR MAKING PANELS: On a new layer, use the Rectangular or Polygonal Lasso selection mask (marquee) tool to draw our panel shapes, and fill in which white using the paint bucket. Doubleclick the layer to choose the Stroke effect. Set it to width 5 and “inside.” Alternatively, use a provided template.
ADD TEXT (optional): If there is text in your page, add a new layer and add bubbles. You can use the provided bubbles template or make your own with white fills and black stroke. Add your text in the layer above.
ORGANIZE : Each comic page should have its own Folder in the Layer Manager, and each Folder and Layer should be named. Save your work file!: YourName_hw#.psd
EXPORT AS PDFs and PNGs: Hide all folders (click eyeball icons) and make visible each folder your want to export. File/Save As each as a .PNG (upload format). Then File/Save As each as a .PDF (printing format): YourName_hw#_page1.png, etc.

26. Homework #2: (Im)Personal Narrative
Reread your personal story from HW01, and organize it as a list of story Beats. If you intend to include text in your final page, consider voice: is it you speaking, or an omniscient narrator, establishing distance? Cut language down to lines as short and pithy as you can.
Thumbnail sketch each story Beat in a Panel, finding reference as needed, in any order you choose.
Revise your sketches for alternative framing and angles, and consider which “posters” can be broken into two or three panels to more potently share that moment, or provide a sense of place (Aspect-to-Aspect).
Organize the resulting panels into a quick, sketchy layout on at least one Page (try to keep it under 3 pages). You may use the supplied page templates or design your own. Include word bubbles, if needed.
Draw a final version, leaving space for the bubbles ala Wally Wood.
Scan and process your page in Photoshop, add word bubbles on a separate layer.
Submit to Piazza as HW02 at least an hour before class!

27. Learn More About Cinematography
Learn more about film editing!
Here are a couple of inspiring sources:
David Mamet’s “On Directing Film” is a fantastic discussion of visual narrative by one of the great 20th century American storytellers in theater and film.
The web series “Every Frame Painting” is an exciting exploration of editing a wide variety of film genres, styles, and techniques from many directors.