8th Grade "Understanding Comics" Test Review
"Understanding Comics" Vocabulary - Spelman: Test Wednesday & Morehouse: Test NEXT Tuesday.
Comics: "Juxtaposed pictorial and other images in deliberate sequence, intended to convey information and/or to produce an aesthetic response in the viewer."
Sequence - a particular order in which related events, movements, or things follow each other.
Cartoon: “An approach to picture-making—a style…” (21) Often used by comic creators, often describes a single panel and is a less realistic approach to drawing a subject.
Icon: “Any image used to represent a person, place, thing or idea” (27).
Splash page: a full page drawing, often including the title and credits as the first page of a comic book
Narrative box: narrative boxes are used to convey information not easily understood through thought or speech bubbles and drawings
Pictorial Vocabulary: language (words), the picture plane (drawings/representations) and reality
Closure: “the phenomenon of observing the parts but perceiving the whole” (63).
Gutter: the space between the panels
Panel (frame): the space that acts as a sort of indicator that space and time is being divided
Panel-to-Panel Transitions:
1.Moment-to-moment: creates a clear visual from one second to the next; requires very little closure (a small movement such as closing eyes)
2. Action-to-action: similar to moment-to-moment but provides more closure of an event. Often ends with an action word…such as a batter hitting a baseball and seeing the word: “POW!”
3. Subject-to-subject: the movement between two or more different subjects while maintaining a scene or idea.
4. Scene-to-scene: can provide a way for authors to make a great leap in time; this requires much reader participation
5. Aspect-to-aspect: this transition bypasses time and shows the reader different aspects of a place, idea, or mood by helping readers focus on the surroundings
6. Non-sequitur: no logical relationship between two panels.
Mono-sensory Medium: “relies on ONLY ONE of the senses to convey a world of experience” (89)
Bleed: when a panel runs off the edge of the page
Motion Line: aka ‘zip ribbon’. Represent the paths of moving objects through space (111). Often done by streaking or blurring.