Comics

Questions:

1. When were the comics created?
2. What is a comic?
3. What does this mean? The teacher will draw some symbolia and balloons on the blackboard.
4. Can you name me a famous comic character played on TV?
   

Comic is a medium that uses both visual (non-verbal) and verbal language to tell us a story.

History_________________________________________________

• The history of comics has followed different paths in different parts of the world. It can be traced back to early precursors such as Egyptian hieroglyphs o paintings or the Trajan's Column (dedicated in 110 AD) in Rome.
• Through the 17th and 18th centuries, prints began to tackle aspects of political and social life, and also started to satirize and caricature.
• In 1845, the satirical drawings, which regularly appeared in newspapers and magazines, gained a name: cartoons. The newspaper comics served as further entertainment for mass readership. 
• In the 20th century, comics became an autonomous art media oround the world. 

Tomb of Narkaht, 15th century b. C.

Trajan's Column 

A page by Rodolphe Töpffer, 19th century

Publication formats                                                                       

      Comic Book is like a magazine that tells a long story (Batman, Superman, Mortadelo y Filemón, etc.) or a series of different stories and authors (TBO).

      Comic Strip generally refers to daily and Sunday newspaper publications. Many comic strips have been collected into comic books.

Text______________________________________________________________________

     Captions are boxes containing a variety of text elements, including scene-setting, description, timing, etc.

     Speech Ballon, also known as speech buble, contains the dialogue and comes from a specific speaker's mouth. They vary in size and shape. The shape of the ballon indicates the type of dialogue contained. 

• Speech ballons are more elliptical. They are used for the dialogue between the characters.
• Thought ballons are more cloud-like and connected to the owner by the series of dots or small bubles.
• Screaming, or anger ballons, tend to be spiky.
• Whispers ballons are usually represented by broken lines.
• Square boxes are used to represent dialogue spoken by robots or computers.

Comics Terminology                                                                    

    1. Motion Lines, also known as speed lines, are lines that are used to represent movement. Like in some picture if a person or other mobile thing is moving the motion lines will follow behind it.

    2. Symbolia. Is the iconic representation used in comics and cartooning. For example:

• the light bulb above a character's head to indicate an idea,
• the indication of sleep by a line of ZZZZZ or by a saw cutting a log,
• hearts to express love or lightning for hate, etc.

    3. Sound effects. Onomatopoeia. They are enviromental sounds presented without ballons, in bold or 3D text in upper case. Sometimes they have exclamations points. This is a method of drawing attention to text, it often highlights onomatopeia and reinforces the impact of words such as Bang or Wow.