Week 2: Understanding Comics

Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud provides a broad spectrum of information in a graphic format. McCloud makes several interesting points, most memorably breaking down the idea of people seeing themselves in cartoons.

As McCloud writes, the less specifically and less detailed that a face is drawn, the more it generally looks like any average person walking down the street. Because of this, we are more likely to recognize ourselves in the face that we see in a cartoon.

Although I think this is an interesting idea, I don't entirely agree with McCloud's point. From my own understanding, cartoon characters are relatable to us because they are simplified; however, my opinion differs in the reasoning for cartoons being simplified. From what I can remember as an ex-animation student, it's less so that people are more likely to see themselves in the image, and more because audiences, especially children, have pretty short attention spans and are more likely to have their attention captured by a simpler image.

Perhaps McCloud intended this to mean that we subconsciously see ourselves in a simpler image, but I'm still not completely convinced. I do think that McCloud makes good points in this work, but I feel that he overcomplicates in his way of explaining these points.

Comments

  1. Riley FarlowOctober 10, 2019 at 8:11 AM

    I agree with your view of McCloud's work, especially with how he seems to be over complicating his explanation. Your personal input from the perspective of an ex-animation student is very interesting and well said!

    ReplyDelete

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