Comics and cartoons Flashcards
Key features of comics
Exposition
Speech and thought bubbles
Mechanics
Artistic style
Emanata
Caricature
Humourous tone
Panel
Frame
Gutter
Bleed
Graphic weight
Caption
Speech bubble
Thought bubble
Emanata
Special effects
Multimodal
Newsworthy
Spatial mechanics
Temporal mechanics
Negative space
Juxtaposition
Symbolism
Satire
Punchline
Splash
Voice over
Foreground/midground/background
Purpose
satirical or political cartoons aim tosatirise, meaning to ridicule, lampoon or criticise a specifictarget. Comic strips may also poke fun, but tend to be gentler in the treatment of subject matter; their primary purpose is toentertain.
Structure
comics and cartoons are drawn in square boxes calledpanels, arranged in sequence and read in alinearfashion. The white space between the panels is calledgutters.
Exposition
text that tells the story is presented ascaptions.
Speech and thought bubbles
so you can read the internal and external dialogue of the characters.
Mechanics
spatial mechanicsis the use of space within each frame.Temporal mechanicsis the way time can be slowed down, speeded up or stopped.
Artistic style
comics are drawn purposefully and with intention. Are the pictures crisp, heavy, weighty, light, cartoony, realistic, bright, dark? Can you tell whether the artist used pencil, pen and ink, or brush? Words that describemoodandtonecan be useful when analysing style – and look out forsymbolicuses of colour.
Emanata
items such asdots, lines, exclamation marksoronomatopoeiathat depict action, emotion or sound.
Caricature
people and issues can besimplified, distortedorexaggeratedfor effect.
Humourous tone
look out forparody, ironyor evensarcasm, particularly in political cartoons.
Panel
the box or segment that contains the image and text. A page may be made up of several panels or a single panel.
Frame
the border that surrounds the panel. In some cases, there may be no frame around the panel.
Gutter
the space between the panels. The audience is invited to “read” between the lines of each panel.
Bleed
when an image goes beyond the borders of a page. A bleed may be used to emphasise a particular panel, the absence of a border often serving as a symbol.
Graphic weight
the heaviness or intensity of a line or block of shading for visual focus. The bolder the graphic weight, the greater the visual focus, making that element more salient in the scene.
