P7: Integrate the scripted character with the storyline to create the final product
Comic with no speech bubbles.
Comic Book by damian golik on Scribd
M3: You must manipulate the visual appeal of the comic to clarify meaning
self-evaluation
When it comes to following the brief I believe I followed it well ticking all the boxes I needed to tick. As for the script it was mostly left unchanged except for minor fixes such as the flow of a sentence or grammar mistakes. On the other hand the part that saw the most change was my storyboard I followed it for the most part but I changed the perspectives of some shots and they were clearly more detailed as the storyboard was only a rough idea on how the graphic novel would look like. An example of this would be the first view of mount Fuji in the storyboard it was clear that Mana was still located in the car as we could see the framework of the car where as in the final piece it was a clear shot, I think that was the better choice, the rest of the changes were mostly aesthetic ones since I had more space to work with than on the storyboard.
My target audience was originally planned to be 9-18 years old but after imputing my script into the flesch readability test it turned out to be a score of 72.2 which translate it to being fairly easy to read. But it’s not ideal for the audience for which I have originally planned for, it would be more suited to an audience of 12+ and that makes sense as that age is when a lot of children start to get more interested in comic books/graphic novels.
If I was to change anything In my graphic novel “Hidden Power” it would have to be the lack of detail in some of the drawings as my lack of experience in drawing was very limiting factor as I could not execute some of the scenes as well as I envisioned them, an example of this would be pages 7 and 8 which I feel look a bit too empty for a bar like restaurant and I would add various accessories such as dishes more people to make it seem like an actual restaurant. Another thing I would change is the consistency of my drawings as Ryu’s figure changed multiple times sometimes his muscles being more visible and others almost non existent which could be annoying from the perspective of the reader
Audience Feedback:
These are the questions I asked my audience about my graphic novel.
When it comes to following the brief I believe I followed it well ticking all the boxes I needed to tick. As for the script it was mostly left unchanged except for minor fixes such as the flow of a sentence or grammar mistakes. On the other hand the part that saw the most change was my storyboard I followed it for the most part but I changed the perspectives of some shots and they were clearly more detailed as the storyboard was only a rough idea on how the graphic novel would look like. An example of this would be the first view of mount Fuji in the storyboard it was clear that Mana was still located in the car as we could see the framework of the car where as in the final piece it was a clear shot, I think that was the better choice, the rest of the changes were mostly aesthetic ones since I had more space to work with than on the storyboard.
My target audience was originally planned to be 9-18 years old but after imputing my script into the flesch readability test it turned out to be a score of 72.2 which translate it to being fairly easy to read. But it’s not ideal for the audience for which I have originally planned for, it would be more suited to an audience of 12+ and that makes sense as that age is when a lot of children start to get more interested in comic books/graphic novels.
If I was to change anything In my graphic novel “Hidden Power” it would have to be the lack of detail in some of the drawings as my lack of experience in drawing was very limiting factor as I could not execute some of the scenes as well as I envisioned them, an example of this would be pages 7 and 8 which I feel look a bit too empty for a bar like restaurant and I would add various accessories such as dishes more people to make it seem like an actual restaurant. Another thing I would change is the consistency of my drawings as Ryu’s figure changed multiple times sometimes his muscles being more visible and others almost non existent which could be annoying from the perspective of the reader
Audience Feedback:
These are the questions I asked my audience about my graphic novel.
- Do you think the art style is suitable for the target audience?
- Does the narrative plot make sense and is enjoyable?
- Would you be interested in reading “Hidden power” if it was published in store or online?
- Are there any changes you would make to the panels either art wise or script wise?
- The majority of my audience agreed that the art style is suitable for the target audience, one person mentioned that because the comic was very colourful it would be more appeal to my initial target audience of 9-18.
- Part of the audience liked the simplicity of the story of Mana becoming a hero while others wanted there to be more interesting plot points but they still found it enjoyable, some also mentioned the drawing of mount fuji with the city in the foreground was the highlight of the graphic novel.
- The answers here were mixed as some people enjoy the comic like visual of it and said they would be interested and take a look at the graphic novel while others said it is not the type of art style they enjoy so they would most likely gloss over it.
- As for the changes that people suggested they included scanning the drawings in so that the quality would be better and no reflection from the lighting, another point was to avoid colouring all the text boxes and just colour the text instead as it clashes too much with the background drawings.
Old version
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Final version
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Evaluation of difference:
I'm happy with how the changes I did look because I scanned the images in they look a lot more vibrant and clear making the overall appeal of the graphic novel much better and I also feel like giving up on the idea of coloured text bubbles was a good idea as they look more professional now and the small line leading to the person who is saying the dialogue is not as think now which makes it look more neat, it does not take as much of the comic panels which is a added benefit.
I'm happy with how the changes I did look because I scanned the images in they look a lot more vibrant and clear making the overall appeal of the graphic novel much better and I also feel like giving up on the idea of coloured text bubbles was a good idea as they look more professional now and the small line leading to the person who is saying the dialogue is not as think now which makes it look more neat, it does not take as much of the comic panels which is a added benefit.
D2: Justify how the visual style of the final product follows the conventions of graphic novels or comics within its genre
Consideration of images used
The Hidden power graphic novel that I made was drawn completely by hand using reference images of accuracy for example when drawing the Tokyo landscape, I did this as that is one of the conventions of graphic novels and comic books although this convention is changing as graphic novels are becoming more prevalent. But I feel that the hand-drawn images have their own charm that works really well with younger audiences and even some of the older audience. As for the speech bubbles I choose to not draw them in as I feel it could ruin the appeal as my handwriting is not the best so I decided to add it in post using comic life.
A source of inspiration for my drawing style for this graphic novel was Deadpool vs Thanos but also manga I have read in the past such as hunter x hunter and dragon ball as they have a very expressional faces which I tried to interpret into my own story at the more key moments, I did this because that type of detail is what readers like at important moments in the story and to recreate the impact it has on a viewer whether it be a sad or angry emotion.
The overall style I have used was created during my practising and initial designing of my character and envisioning how he would look and all the other cast, I think it turned out well as it is a simple style which is suited for my young target audience but it is also detailed enough and expressional to catch the eye of the other end of my target audience.
Panel layout
My panel layout conforms to the conventions by using larger panels for important scenes while using smaller panels for the less important scenes, my choice of panels also includes a range of different layouts including some that have overlaying panels such as one in Deadpool VS Thanos. My panels also conform to conventions of panels in graphic novels as they leave enough space for any text that will be needed.
Story flow
The first issue of my graphic novel Hidden Powers follows the conventions of a graphic novel story as it continues Todorov’s narrative a beginning, middle and end but graphic novels include a extra part that comes with the end which could be called a cliffhanger or a teaser since it entices the reader to want and buy the next issue to find out what happens next in the story and I do this by having Ryu accept training Mana this leaves the reader wondering what type of training Mana will have to go through while slowly developing the main character as well as the supporting side characters.
Font size and style
I chose a font called Lint McCree Intl BB because after researching other fonts I found
this one to be the most appealing to me, and it was also readable and it did not take away from my drawing style as it was not overbearing as well as being very similar to the conventional text I’ve seen in the comics and graphic novels I researched only difference is the amount of colour I used in the box.
colouring of characters and environment
The colouring I chose wasn’t very conventional in terms of the colours themselves as I used colouring pencils to liven up my graphic novel as I did not have access to the same industry equipment that is used for conventional comic books and graphic novels such as Deadpool vs Thanos. The thing my choice of colours has in common with conventional superhero comics and graphic novels is that I use a lot of bright colours in my character designs to give the audience on what type of person they might be such as white being associated with good and purity were as black is associated with evil and corruption.
The colouring of my character designs for Mana and Ryu have the aspects I mentioned in the paragraph above they both have a very similar designs that include white and dark blue/purple showing that they are good characters were as Leiko has a full black gi (fighting outfit) with only stripes of orange and purple suggesting he might be evil in some way.
Use of speech, thought bubble and box placement
For my speech, thought bubble and box placement I kept them consistent across the story since they are the basis for the graphic novel and help the readers escape to the fictional world of the hero, it needs to be kept the same, since if I were to use different ones it would take away from the narrative and the professionality of it. Most graphic novels keep a consistent colour and font for their text and bubbles with the box placement mattering a bit less since that can always be changed, I chose to stick to the plain black and white since I feel it works with the drawing style I have picked. I was partly inspired by Deadpool vs Thanos as marvel is a well-known publisher of superhero comic books as well as other less know graphic novels where they use white speech bubbles for the characters with black text.
Narrative perspective
Through utilising of my speech and narration boxes I have shown clearly the perspective of Hidden Power which is Mana’s perspective the main character. I wanted to tell it from Mana’s perspective as he is the main character and also I want the audience to be able to relate to the character on some level as well as see him go on his journey and be able to see him grow. I wrote the narration in a way where we know as much as mana knows that way the audience can be shocked about this when Mana is shocked. This is a conventional method in graphic novels as this way major plot reveals can happen and be a surprise to the audience.
The Hidden power graphic novel that I made was drawn completely by hand using reference images of accuracy for example when drawing the Tokyo landscape, I did this as that is one of the conventions of graphic novels and comic books although this convention is changing as graphic novels are becoming more prevalent. But I feel that the hand-drawn images have their own charm that works really well with younger audiences and even some of the older audience. As for the speech bubbles I choose to not draw them in as I feel it could ruin the appeal as my handwriting is not the best so I decided to add it in post using comic life.
A source of inspiration for my drawing style for this graphic novel was Deadpool vs Thanos but also manga I have read in the past such as hunter x hunter and dragon ball as they have a very expressional faces which I tried to interpret into my own story at the more key moments, I did this because that type of detail is what readers like at important moments in the story and to recreate the impact it has on a viewer whether it be a sad or angry emotion.
The overall style I have used was created during my practising and initial designing of my character and envisioning how he would look and all the other cast, I think it turned out well as it is a simple style which is suited for my young target audience but it is also detailed enough and expressional to catch the eye of the other end of my target audience.
Panel layout
My panel layout conforms to the conventions by using larger panels for important scenes while using smaller panels for the less important scenes, my choice of panels also includes a range of different layouts including some that have overlaying panels such as one in Deadpool VS Thanos. My panels also conform to conventions of panels in graphic novels as they leave enough space for any text that will be needed.
Story flow
The first issue of my graphic novel Hidden Powers follows the conventions of a graphic novel story as it continues Todorov’s narrative a beginning, middle and end but graphic novels include a extra part that comes with the end which could be called a cliffhanger or a teaser since it entices the reader to want and buy the next issue to find out what happens next in the story and I do this by having Ryu accept training Mana this leaves the reader wondering what type of training Mana will have to go through while slowly developing the main character as well as the supporting side characters.
Font size and style
I chose a font called Lint McCree Intl BB because after researching other fonts I found
this one to be the most appealing to me, and it was also readable and it did not take away from my drawing style as it was not overbearing as well as being very similar to the conventional text I’ve seen in the comics and graphic novels I researched only difference is the amount of colour I used in the box.
colouring of characters and environment
The colouring I chose wasn’t very conventional in terms of the colours themselves as I used colouring pencils to liven up my graphic novel as I did not have access to the same industry equipment that is used for conventional comic books and graphic novels such as Deadpool vs Thanos. The thing my choice of colours has in common with conventional superhero comics and graphic novels is that I use a lot of bright colours in my character designs to give the audience on what type of person they might be such as white being associated with good and purity were as black is associated with evil and corruption.
The colouring of my character designs for Mana and Ryu have the aspects I mentioned in the paragraph above they both have a very similar designs that include white and dark blue/purple showing that they are good characters were as Leiko has a full black gi (fighting outfit) with only stripes of orange and purple suggesting he might be evil in some way.
Use of speech, thought bubble and box placement
For my speech, thought bubble and box placement I kept them consistent across the story since they are the basis for the graphic novel and help the readers escape to the fictional world of the hero, it needs to be kept the same, since if I were to use different ones it would take away from the narrative and the professionality of it. Most graphic novels keep a consistent colour and font for their text and bubbles with the box placement mattering a bit less since that can always be changed, I chose to stick to the plain black and white since I feel it works with the drawing style I have picked. I was partly inspired by Deadpool vs Thanos as marvel is a well-known publisher of superhero comic books as well as other less know graphic novels where they use white speech bubbles for the characters with black text.
Narrative perspective
Through utilising of my speech and narration boxes I have shown clearly the perspective of Hidden Power which is Mana’s perspective the main character. I wanted to tell it from Mana’s perspective as he is the main character and also I want the audience to be able to relate to the character on some level as well as see him go on his journey and be able to see him grow. I wrote the narration in a way where we know as much as mana knows that way the audience can be shocked about this when Mana is shocked. This is a conventional method in graphic novels as this way major plot reveals can happen and be a surprise to the audience.