Thoughts on the Comix readings

I had never put too much thought into the components of comic-making, so I certainly learned a fair amount from the readings. The first place that I could see myself needing a lot of improvement is in the spacing between panels. For instance, in the comic I had drawn about thinking the plumber was coming to rob me, the panels all bleed together and it's hard to read the piece sequentially. If I had put some space between the different elements, it would have been much easier to read as a narrative.

Another component of the reading was being more conscious of text. The way we write words completely changes how our viewers read them. One can imagine the obvious differences that a comic artist might make in writing "BAM" vs. "whimper". The color that artists use in text completely transforms how entertaining the comics are to read.

The readings compared comics to movies, a concept I had not previously conceived. In one example, point of view changes are made from frame to frame in a Manga comic. Much like a movie, these angle changes add interest and excitement to comics. It's really important to be aware of what space you are putting the viewer in, and how you change that space from panel to panel.

COMIX

COMIX

Preserve

Travel

Neighborhood Project

These were really rough, I spent a lot more time doing numerous digital drafts which I uploaded in the past.

A city is only as good as it's citizens, and a neighborhood is only as good as it's neighbors. As much as we try to make to make our facades look pretty, what really matters is the people living inside the walls. 

Being a Wisconsinite, I really wanted to exemplify how every morning I can expect to look outside and see something different. The collage inside the frame is made purely of photos I took out my window in the past month. They were taken in different weather conditions and are of various subjects.

RiverWest is a fantastic neighborhood. It's never quite bustling, nor is it ever quite dead. It's hard to go more than a couple blocks without seeing anyone, even in the dead of the night. It's also an extremely diverse location, consisting of people from many different walks of life. The houses are all Polish flats on my block, so I wanted to hint at the uniformity while still expressing the diversity. 

Waiting