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PICTORIAL PROBLEMS 2007/08 - CID 3010 B
Tom Hart
hutchowen@gmail.com
718.687.7434
http://www.tomhart.net/teaching/svaclass/
Mondays, 12:00 noon – 2:50 pm

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course description
semester 1 homeworkse, etc
semester 2
grading / rules / aphorisms

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

THIS IS YOUR MOST IMPORTANT CLASS THIS YEAR!
DO NOT blow it off. If you like storytelling and drawing, and want to learn more about it then work hard and you will get what you want.

Emphasizing the thinking and problem solving that is inherent in creation a work of sequential art, as well as the crafting of storytelling technique and the discipline, intelligence, rigor, and kick-ass passion it takes to complete a serious and dedicated project, this class examines the possibilities of creating work from given parameters. We'll begin by expanding our toolbox of ideas and strategies. We'll explore the poles of drama and poetry , encouraging the practice of both towards the goal of the gradual development of a long piece of work based upon the third year Illustration/Cartooning theme, KINGS AND QUEENS.

The class will examine the mechanics and tools of all types of storytelling from theater to film to radio to opera. Exercises will focus on organic generation of narrative and imagery and will integrate non-traditional systems of story generating as well as traditional cartooning techniques with the goal of developing the narrative and imaginative and visual reflexes. We will work to examine the visual storyteller's "toolbox" and refine our craft over the course of the year.

A wide spectrum of comics will be shown. The understanding of what tools and techniques are available to the sequential artist is the ultimate goal.

Mamet, David; On Directing Film
Volger, Christopher; The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Storytellers and Screenwriters
Eisner, Will; Comics and Sequential Art
McCloud, Scott; Understanding Comics
Janson, Klaus: The DC Guide to Pencilling Comics

GRADING:
You will be graded on:

QUALITY OF WORK
QUALITY OF EFFORT
PARTICIPATION IN CLASS
IMPROVEMENT AND UNDERSTANDING

If you don’t finish your assignments, you damage your grade and bring the class down. Please finish your work.
HOWEVER, SHOWING UP FOR CLASS WITH NO WORK IS BETTER THAN SKIPPING CLASS BECAUSE YOU DIDN’T FINISH YOUR HOMEWORK. SHOW UP FOR CLASS!!!!!!!!!!

RULES OF ENGAGEMENT!

4 Absences is a failure. Exceptions due to lost limbs, trauma only.
3 absences is a grade lower.
NO COMPUTER LETTERING, NO EXCEPTIONS. LEARN HOW TO LETTER! LETTERING IS NOT HANDWRITING, IT IS DRAWING!!!! (I will allow computer lettering in some circumstances in our final final project after our major large scale, two semester project is complete.)
The goal of this class is COMMUNICATION. CLEARLY first, and interestingly, second.
The theme of this class (and your Cultural Survey class for all third year students) is LOCATION AS CHARACTER You MUST work within this theme according to Tom Woodruff’s and my instructions. Failure to do so will result in grade deflation

Why a theme?
The second year gave you the principles of cartooning. You explored materials, techniques and storytelling.
THIS YEAR IS DESIGNED TO CHALLENGE YOU TO THINK IN NEW WAYS ABOUT YOUR PROCCESES, IN A WAY SIMILAR TO HOW THE COMMERCIAL WORLD WILL. IT IS DESIGNED TO STRETCH YOUR SKILLS, AND ADD TO YOUR STORE OF KNOWLEDGE (THAT’S WHAT CULTURAL SURVEY CLASS IS FOR) SO THAT YOU WALK OUT OF THIS YEAR WITH MORE IN YOUR BAG OF UNDERSTANDING AND POSSIBILITIES THAN YOU ENTERED WITH. That’s why you are in school.
The fourth year is your year to integrate what you have learned into a vision you can finalize and present to the world in a portfolio.

No parts of Epic stories, unless it is a self contained whole unit in itself. TO GET TO THE EPIC, YOU MUST CONCENTRATE ON THE MOMENT. THIS IS AN AXIOM OF REAL LIFE, NOT JUST THIRD YEAR CARTOONING.
REFERENCE! You will be required to use all sorts of reference, including visual and literary. The best website for myth stuff is http://www.pantheon.org/ Other reference materials will be discussed and should be examined on your own. GET USED TO USING THE LIBRARY AND THE PICTURE COLLECTIONS!

GLOSSARY

SYNOPSIS – Refers to paragraph or two of text that describes the action to be depicted on the page. A reader should not need a synopsis to understand what is going on in your pages however.

THUMBNAILS – This refers to initial drawings of complete pages in reduced format, to think through ideas of how to compose a page and tell a story. Do thumbnails for this class in your sketchbook or on 8 1/2 x 11 paper.

ROUGHS – Refers to larger sketched versions of page before penciling. Still searching for solutions and storytelling ideas/composition ideas, etc. Some people use “thumbnails” and “roughs” interchangeably. Roughs for this class are on 8 1/2 x 11 paper. (You can rough on your final boards if you like, though I don’t recommend it.)

LOOSE PENCILS- Somewhere in between roughs and tight pencils (see below.)

TIGHT PENCILS- Refers to full-size, on Bristol board penciled version of your page.

INKS – Refers to finished work, with lettering, of above page.

STORY – Usually refers to whatever your final work is. I prefer “PIECE” to describe the work you hand in. “Story” to me, describes the underlying narrative “arc” that is the raw material you are working with in your piece.
o For instance, you may be telling the story of a man’s life, birth to death, but your piece is only 10 panels long. Thus you make lots of choices in how to work with your “story”, having created a piece of work from it.

SOME APHORISMS TO KEEP IN MIND:

FINISHING IS BETTER THAN ABORTING A LESS THAN PERFECT PROJECT
o You always learn more by completing a project, rather than failing to finish something because it is less than perfect.

DON’T LET THE PERFECT GET IN THE WAY OF THE GOOD.
o If you get caught up on making something perfect, you may fail to realize it is working well enough.

STRIVE FOR EXCELLENCE ANYWAY
o Strive for perfect, settle for good, and move on.

LEARN TO DRAW BY DRAWING.
o Bernie Wrightson, who created Swamp Thing used to say that you could become a good artist only after you’ve drawn 1000 pages (or a stack of pages as tall as you- I forget which.)

COPYING OTHER DRAWINGS IN YOUR SKETCHBOOK OR IN YOUR PRACTICING TIME IS GOOD. COPYING TECHNIQUES ON YOUR FINAL PAGES IS ESSENTIAL.
o Learn to LOOK at professional artwork for techniques, solutions, thoughts and decisions beneath the surface. Copying other work will help do this. You can then implement similar solutions or thinking in your own work later. Style emerges when you make informed decisions.

CONCENTRATE ON THE MOMENT, AND THE EPIC WILL UNFOLD.
o I am only interested in your epic story if the individual passages are good and complete. This is true of any reader. No unfinished sections of large stories will be allowed. You will be forced to find a way to complete the story (this can always be done, by thinking of story in new ways.)

Semester 1 homework, exercises, etc

Week 1, Sept 10, 2007

What we did:

1 page comic - autobio, mythic, big moment. (1 hour). Critiqued same. Powerpoint about biography comics. (CLICK HERE FOR THAT)

HOMEWORK

ENORMOUS BIO PIC!

18 INCHES X 24 INCHES

Click here to read this page larger

IMPORTANT- DRAW BIG:AT LEAST 18X24. YOU CAN DO THIS ON SKETCH PAPER OR EVEN NEWSPRINT IF NECESSARY, JUST MAKE IT CLEAR.

Look at the attached comic by David Heatley, from McSweeny's #13.

MODEL: It's a complex PORTRAIT of a character, using only small details: small events, small stories, little dramatic changes and character details. The aggregation (the bringing together) of all these small units creates a larger, more complex, more psychologically interesting portrait than a single narrative might.

OUR PROJECT: Using a figure from the graph, create a one page piece on large 18 x 24 paper. Use Heatley's page 1 layout exactly. This includes:

• A large single portrait

• A single panel strip

• A two panel strip or story

• A three panel strip or story

• A six panel story

• Two 8 panel stories

• A 15 panel story

Unique titles above each story.

WEEK 2

Sept 17 - had long critique!
Homework Due Sept 24

Finishes for above project.

WEEK 3 Sept 24

In class- critiqued the finished projects- good job everyone.

PRESENTATIONS and handouts: Mythic cycles, mythic journeys.
We looked at STREET CODE by Jack Kirby and SCREW STYLE by Y Tsuge.

Homework Due Oct 1

Make, in rough pencils on bristol- two 15-18 panel stories emphasizing the mythic MOMENTS and EVENTS of a chosen subject. Use the same subject for each story, but you can pick a new one from last week.

See the sva class homepage for a link to street code.

Week 4 Oct 1

Homework Due Oct 8

Bring in complete pencils for one of these versions in a radically different FORM.

Ramp it up!

Take the first draft of the best story discussed in class today and change it. RAMP IT UP.

Radically change the FORM to make it STRIKING on the page. Use David Lasky's comics as a model.

Some possibilities:

• Tell it like some of the great masters who made come alive on the page: George Herriman, Winsor McCay, Jack Kirby, Chester Gould.

• Tell it like a maze

• Tell it using giant, beautiful images

• Tell it in diagrams.

• Tell it using 100 little panels all minutely composed.

• Tell it silently, or with pictograms,

• Tell it with tons of beautiful typography.

• Tell it in collage

• Create a new way to navigate the page and show us how to do that.

• Go further into comics and fine art history for models: Thomas Nast, Durer, Dore, Russian posters, Japanese woodblock prints, etc.

A good rule is that if it looks DIFFERENT from 10 feet away, you're onto something.

This week is about challenging ourselves FORMALLY. Now that we know some things about how to make comics, can we do it in a super unique way that reflects the content in some way?

Bring in loose pencils for critique We will work to finish this comic over coming weeks.

Week 5 - Oct 7

We worked in class.

For next week: Finish this assignment !

Week 6 - Oct 14 -

Due Oct 21

3 page assignment: STRESS

This comic is to be 3 at least pages and at least 18 panels total. Use more pages if you don't get to 18 panels.

Your story should have a main character, either fictional or real. The story you create is to focus on their STRESS.

Some examples:

Jack Kirby's Street Code isn't a bad example, especially the last couple of pages, where Kirby is obsessing before rubbing his knuckles into the hunchback's back (for luck.) The whole story is about his change of feeling regarding "The Street Code."

Chris Ware's Quimby the Mouse page is a pretty good example. His Potato story is even better.

Screw Style by Tsuge is a pretty good example, as is the Flies on the Ceiling by Jaime Hernandez.

Lots of Tezuka sequences from Phoenix or from Ode to Kirihito work.

The entire boxing story by Mahler (to be shown in class.)

It's ok if this story is an excerpt of a larger idea or storyline.

Due Oct 22: full loose pencils. Text and characters readable. Prepare to change in the ensuing weeks.

Due Oct 29: Full tight pencils, first page inked, plus a few ideas about a subject for the large-scale thesis project.

Due Nov 5: Final inks, further developed thoughts on large-thesis

Due Nov 12: First outlines and sketches for thesis project.

Week 7 - Oct 21-

Critiqued the "stress" comic in two groups.

Week 8 - Oct 28

We worked in class and discussed our thesis projects. Homework: finish this "stress" comic for next week.

Week 9 - Nov 5

Beginning the Thesis Project

One of the goals of the theme-based project is to encourage students to use reference, and to add to their store of cultural understanding. This is why we pick a source for our project outside of our own imagination. We must all submit proposals to Tom Woodruff before the semester's end, and I will be the final arbiter of what is permitted.

This project will be sixteen (16) pages in length, and must include a title. If you want, I recommend one of the 16 pages be a title page. Pages must be completed in ink, or in an otherwise print-ready medium.

Due for next week, 11-12-07:

Conceive of two separate 16-page potential projects about your subject (yes: two!) and complete the following question for each :

1 Please write a one-sentence synopsis of your idea.

2. Explain the reasoning behind using this angle and degree of focus. What do you expect the reader to understand or experience as a result of this particular piece? Your two answers should be different.

In addition,

3. Complete two complete page-by-page outlines, one for each.

The reason for two separate outlines is to push ourselves to think through our idea fully before committing to it.

Type these answers and outlines on regular paper, and bring a photocopy of everything to class to hand in.

4. Lastly, bring in at least ONE reference book you plan on using and at least 5 reference photos (including places and other relevant materials, not just photos of your main subject...) either in book form or print-outs.

Prepare to work in class as I conduct personal discussions.

Regarding your subjects:

In most cases I would argue to not be overly broad. We fought for the first few weeks of class to think in smaller, more intense chunks, and I would recommend going that route. 16 pages isn't a lot, and to try and do a story about the birth, career and death of a subject will probably result in a thin, boring story.

Instead, focus on those key moments in a life. Moments when something is

• Discovered

• Decided

• Deepened

• Changed

• Transferred

• Etc.

These are mythic moments in a personal story. Consider them as you create your outlines and project ideas.

Here is a run-down of what you guys have proposed, followed by my notes.

Chris Feguiere- Phoolan Devi, the "Bandit Queen"

Aim for complexity. Consider the larger Indian culture if you can. See the movie but also look at her autobiography in book form since she disputes much of the movie (and sued the filmmakers.) Seems there are many parts of the story to focus on. Her particular path is long, and you can probably include a few and provide contrast between them.

Nicole Virella- Elizabeth Báthory of Hungary.

I don't know much about her. She's a great subject (the rumors that she bathed in the blood of her enemies) but you will have to take care to not make it a dopey violent empty piece. Where is the humanity or complexity in this story? I'm sure there is some.

Ashley Supreme- Michael Jordan.

This seems fine. I personally don't know much about michael jordan, but there must be some issues that are worth exploring. Think about personal, commercial and financial issues as well as the sports. Think about that above list.

Greg Fenton - Lucille Ball

Ok, greg, what's the focus. Don't be too broad. But cover

Stephan pellnat- Boss Tweed/Tammany Hall

Yeah this is good. Some other new york books you might want to check out:

Jacob rius: how the other half lives

Luc sante: low life

Joseph byron: photographs of new york interiors

Annette witheredge: new york then and now

There are bound to be lots of books about the specifics of tammany hall. Don't forget as a cartoonist, to weave thomas nast in there. I also sent you a link to lots of old NYC photos.

Mike Bowers- charles schulz

Sounds good. The guy made a million dollars a month in the 60s and had a huge licensing empire. I'm not sure how to spin the story exactly. Try not to be too abstract. He was an abstract guy (he didn't do much except his strip) who made visible his interior world via his cartoons. You may want to play with his style at time, breaking it into your own. Think about story or philosophical specifics.

Other issues to think about: god and religion. There is the "gospel according to peanuts" book worth looking at. Obviously read the biography and see the new documentary. What if you introduce a biographer character trying to write about schulz?

Nick Sumida-john waters or harvey milk

Ok, I say go for JW. But spin it LARGE. Emphasize his largeness of personality, of excess in artistic choices, in his love of trash. His transformation with more mainstream success. His love of art and his own forays into photography, etc.

Brendan Colgan- groucho marx, kim il sung, and william gaines,

I think you should do Kim Il Sung. Let's discuss.

Rob Paolucci- miyamoto musashi, 1600's samurai.

Just be sure to consider the deeper psychology of the subject and the piece. Don't just make it about the action, or the duels, or the bad-assness of him (that will come out in your drawings anyway.) Can you help us get inside him?