Illustration and Visual Narrative Final Task: Comic cover and animation

 11 June 2024-

NABIL JULIUS DORN (0370978)

Illustration and Visual Narrative | Bachelor of Design in Creative Media | Taylor's University
Final Task

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Jump links:

1. Lectures

2. Instructions

3. Final Task

4. Reflections

LECTURES

Week 11:

Central theme

This talks about the main idea or underlying meaning. Often its the storytellers personal opinion on the subject matter. There are two main parts to the central theme

• Major theme: The idea that is intertwined and repeated throughout the whole narrative
• Minor theme: The idea that appears more subtly and doesn't necessarily repeat in the narrative

Conflict

The conflict is what normally drives the story. It creates tension and builds suspense to keep the audience engaged.

Characters

A story usually includes a number of characters serving different roles in the narrative.

These can be categorized into two roles

• Protagonist: The main character. They usually have a clear goal or conflict to overcome
• Antagonist: This character is the one that opposes the protagonist, trying to cause conflict.

Acts timeline/structure

The timeline of a narrative can be viewed and broken down into 4 parts

• Setup: Introduction of the world setting up the scene in which the protagonist exists.
• Rising tension: A series of obstacles the protagonist must overcome
• Conflict: The point of highest tension
• Resolution: The resolution of conflict

Fig 1.1 Acts structure

Week 12:

Mr Hafiz wanted us to dissect the story we chose for our final task using the Acts structure (Fig 1.1). We were required to highlight the part we want to visualize and illustrate. It needed to be broken down into the intro, rising tension, conflict/climax and resolution. Mr Hafiz then introduced the characteristic of sequential art, an art form to convey a story.

If the images were presented individually, the viewer would think the two images have no correlation. However when both images were presented at the same time, next to each other, the viewer would piece it together and form a scene.

There are a few common transitions:

• Moment to moment
• Action to action
• subject to subject
• Scene to scene
• Aspect to aspect

Fig 1.2 Types of transitions

INSTRUCTIONS

FINAL TASK

Week 11

Idea development

For this final task, we were given a list of short stories by Edgar Allan Poe. We needed to select one short story, highlight one specific part of the story that we would like to illustrate and ultimately animate.

• Comic cover page
• Animated one page intro
• Parallax (to create depth)
• Secondary action
• Animated background

We then needed to apply the act structure (fig 1.1) in the comic strip with at least 3 panels for the comic.

This is the part of the story ive chosen to illustrate and animate.

" The Tell-Tale Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe

The lines in this paragraph captures a moment of high tension and suspense, illustrating the narrator's meticulous, creepy actions and old man's fear.

Here are the illustration and animation ideas:

Panel 1: The Lantern opening

• Illustration: Show the narrator's head slowly and cutiously entering the room. Focus on the dark lantern illuminating his face.
• Animation: Animate the narrator's hand trembling as it enters the dark room.

Panel 2: The Old man's reaction

• Illustration: Illustrate the old man's sudden movement in bed, with a frightened or startled expression.
• Animation: Show the old man sitting up and looking around the room, with an animated "whos there?" text bubble.

Panel 3: The Narrator's stillness

• Illustration: Depict the narrator frozen in place, with an exaggerated, almost mechanical stillness.
• Animation: Animate a clock or timer to emphasize the passage of the hour as the narrator remains motionless.

Panel 4: The Old man listening

• Illustration: Show the old mans ears perked up and a listening posture, with a subtle sound wave or visual representation of his heightened senses.
• Animation: Animate the sound waves and the old mans ears perking up.

Sketches (Comic Cover Page)

sketch 1

Sketch 2

I decided to digitize sketch 1 as I liked the composition and layout a lot more.

I then began to digitize the cover page following the sketch. The art style and theme I wanted to follow was called the "Noir" illustration style.

Here are some of my references I found on Pinterest:

Reference 1

Reference 2

Reference 3

Digitization (Comic Cover Page)

Digitized comic cover page

After digitizing the cover page, I began to sketch the storyline and layout of the comic strip.

Below are my references and sketches:

Sketch of storyline

Reference for layout

Reference for layout

After finding a reference, I began digitizing the comic strip for the chosen paragraph.

Below are my drafts.

Draft 1

I realized that some frames would look better without a border and made it overlap the other frames. I then made a second draft which would also be my final digitization.

Final draft

I then began separating the different elements to start animating the different frames.

Frame 1

In frame 1, I separated the pupil and eyelid as I wanted to animated the pupil moving left to right, scanning the room before entering. I also animated the person blinking.

Frame 2

In this frame, I animated the hand swinging the lantern and seemingly hitting his leg. 

Frame 3

In Frame 3, I animated the text bubble which says "WHOS THERE?".

Frame 4

In this frame, I animated the hour, minute and second arms of the clock to show that time is passing.

Frame 5

In the last frame, I animated the pupils of the person in bed, remaining wide eyed, unblinking and aware. I also subtly animated the ears perking up and down as if trying to listen to movement and sounds coming from within the room. This is also highlighted by the white lines above his head.

Here are the animated results:

First frame

Second frame

Third frame

Last frame

Animated Comic

FEEDBACK

Week 14:

Mr Hafiz mentioned that the comic cover and comic strip was nice. He also wanted to see my references for the art style and my sketches. Then told me to proceed.

REFLECTION

Choosing Edgar Allan Poe's " The Tell-Tale HEart for this project, allowed me to delve into the intense atmosphere and psychological depth, making it an excellent fit for visualizing into an animated comic strip. 

Working on this project has also given me creative freedom in both choosing the part of the story i'd like to animate, and also challenging myself to illustrate and animate the chosen part. Although this was a good thing, the lack of direction initially was also a challenge as it felt daunting to start this project.

As the I began sketching and making drafts, while also asking for feedback from my peers, the process became easier to follow. This was also aided when selecting a pivotal paragraph that encapsulates the narrator's madness and the suspense in the story.

For the art style, I felt it was only fitting that the illustration employed a high-contrast black and white art style, reminiscent of noir. It effectively conveyed the stark emotions and dramatic moments in the paragraph,

Animating the comic strip required meticulous attention to detail while also maintaining simplicity. This was done through subtle animations of pivotal parts in the comic strip.

Through this project, I learnt how to translate complex emotions and psychological states into visual elements, enhancing my skills in both storytelling and animation.