PAGE 6!
Continuing off Page 5 story beat, we’re still hanging with Cally and Sears at the mall. I’ve talked about the “Sit-Com Rule” of storytelling, two people talking and one person joins, while the other recedes to the background– and here you see us playing around with it.
Like a lot of you, I’m sure, as soon as you give me a “rule,” I’m instantly looking for ways to break it. But to that, I should probably qualify “breaking” a rule: When it comes to storytelling/structure/etc, “break” is probably the wrong word– a more apt term is “push.”
In Page 6’s instance, we’re pushing the rule by not having Conrad appear in the scene (appearing in another location), and Sears is hovering in the background– returning at the close of the scene. That inherently breaks the Sit-Com Rule, because Cally returns to the conversation with Sears, but her return to that conversation gives us a good moment for our “button” gag in the last panel.
(Button gag’s being that last little “zing” joke that you see in a lot of comedy film trailers– y’know, after the title of the movie comes up, that last little 2 to 5 second “zinger” or tagline)
Speaking of the Button gag, it was one I went back and forth on– I aim for Spy6teen to be an “All-Ages” book, and obviously “Putting Out” skews more into “Young Adult” territory– (not to say that we have explicit scenes in the near future or anything, but a lot of folks get touchy when it comes to even mentioning Teen sexuality)– Ultimately, I left it in for a few reasons– The biggest of which is because I thought it was funny.
But more than that, it is honest to the character(s) and the world that they exist in. Alyssia, as a cheerleader with a grudge, would naturally go with the lowest blow that she could possibly think of: her weapon of choice would be gossip– and she’d know the sharpest blade to cut with.
I realize for some that with this (and a few other beats coming up this issue) that we move from being All-Ages to Young Adult territory– but I’m ok with that, because I don’t have to worry about overly censoring our characters and the situations they have to deal with…
Some folks might take issue with ANY talk of sexuality in a comic book– but ultimately, the story is about a sixteen year old (with super-spy trappings,) and I hate to break it as news: but sexuality is something that EVERY sixteen year old deals with on a daily basis– c’mon, you were sixteen, you know!
I think most of our readership is fine with all this, but I felt like I kinda needed to put that out there as a qualification. (ha…I said “put out” again…)
PROCESS
So it’s another “Talky” page, but again DJ saves the day with his stellar “acting.” Drezz, in our comments section from last week’s page, mentioned the dynamic movement in a not-so-terribly exciting page– Which I think he nails on the head.
One of the challenges of long-form (particularly web-based) comic storytelling is that there’s usually more “Characters talking” than there are Action sequences. That’s actually true of storytelling in general: Think of the most action packed movie you’ve ever seen: Now go back and watch it and count the number of dialogue scenes to action sequences– If you find an exception to that rule, and it’s your favorite movie, then you might have bad taste in movies.
Like in films, the focus and weight of the scene is left up to the actors– and acting is really what DJ is showcasing on this page. It’s funny, in Film you’re taught that acting is all in the eyes– because film is a close up medium– we’re usually focused on an actor’s face. But on stage, it’s the body– you have to use BIG GESTURES to communicate visually to the person sitting in the last row–
Comics become a hybrid of the two, because you can put your “camera” anywhere, but you don’t have the benefit of motion. DJ has to figure out the optimal body-language moment to capture. For example, in Panel 3 (arguably our “anchor” panel of the page) he goes big with Cally– but it works because Panel 3 is sandwiched between two other subdued body language panels (Conrad in 2 and Cally/Sears in 4).
Also really funny, (and another DJ beat,) notice how Cally hands Sears her bags to hold while she’s on the phone– not something I wrote, but it’s likely that once DJ got to this page, he realized that Cally was still holding her shopping bag and needed to get rid of it for Panel 3– it got a good chuckle out of me!
COLORS
DJ and I were in the middle of our first podcast (more on this in a minute) when he opened up our Dropbox to check out Lisa’s colors for the page– so we got to experience seeing it together– DJ nailed it best: It’s like getting a present!
I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m always amazed at how much more detail I become aware of once Lisa is finished with a page– Particularly in regards to background details, such as in Panel 3.
On the flip of that, it’s worth noting that on our non-background panels, Lisa subtlety changes the palette between panels 1 and 2, to denote a change in location– Again, it’s subtle, but her choice to not blast panel 2 with a red background maintains the continuity and flow of the page.
To the Lisa fans (and I know you’re out there!) we’ll hopefully have some Live-Videos coming up in the near future– keep an eye out on our Twitter/Facebook for the announcements!
LETTERS
I’ll admit that I was a bit worried about this page in terms of word-bulk– particularly in the case of Panel 3, where DJ had laid in as much background work as he did, and we were faced with a particularly big block of text.
It’s part of the nature of lettering: ultimately, Balloons are going to cover artwork– it happens to the best of us.
Luckily Brant managed to minimize the “damage” to the panel with really effective placement of his balloons in Panel 3. It isn’t like you’re missing a TON of stuff behind the text, but it always sucks when anything is covered up.
On the plus side, I believe in our upcoming digital edition, you’ll be able to toggle the various production layers on and off– so that might be a problem of the past!
(and actually, I’m suddenly thinking of the potential narrative ideas that technology could provide: Hidden story clues in various “levels” of the story?)
Well, tangent aside, I know a lot of you guys out there make comics, any great horror stories with lettering and backgrounds?
PODCAST!
Ok, as I mentioned above, DJ and I recorded the first ever Spy6teen podcast yesterday– we’ll have it up for you guys in this week’s blog entry. We’re still figuring out what our format is going to be, so it’s definitely rough around the edges, but I’m still excited for you guys to hear it and give some feedback! So make sure you check out Thursday’s Blog@16.
I’ll have a longer winded explanation of the podcasts then!
We’re still rocking away on our Top Web Comics campaign, so if you could take a second to drop us a vote, it’d really mean a lot!
(just click the link and vote! No signup required!)
Also, if you happened to catch last week’s blog entry, you might have seen the debut of our “Donate” button– naturally, you’re under no obligation to it, but if you happen to have a few quarters and are so inclined, our tip jar is now open!
Ok, that’s it for today’s page, we’ll seeya back on Thursday for err, Podcast@16?
