Author Archives: David
Final Reflection
The article my group and I were required to analyze was The 10,000 Hour Rule from the book The Outliers by Malcom Gladwell. Personally, while our group met for the first time, I, having searched for various comiccal softwares, suggested that we use a simple software called, Comic Life 3. Since everyone probably had vastly distinctive ideas about labeling out the structures and the plot of the comic, I thought it would be a good idea to set one specific style of structure and plotline on Comic Life that everyone can refer to while working on the project. However, as a group, we faced one of our greatest hardship using this particular program: although the program did a great job in organizing the overall structure of the comic, the program did not provide any support for creating certain effects or images that we wanted to embed within the panels. Therefore, I proposed that we draw the actual comical images of the story and simply embed the images into the panels in the software. As I was in charge of the opening of the comic, I had to draw model images for the main characters (Gladwell and his cat) and the setting. In the end, everyone in the group put in about an equal amount of participation in drawing the comic.
My favorite comical presentation from the other groups was, “Is Google Making Us Stupid.” I thought that the portrayal of the content was well shown. The comic, overall, was very easy to follow, and the sophisticated comical representations of the plotline were intriguing to me because my group and I promoted a simple style of drawings. This group, contrastingly, used two different online-based programs for the project. The group, instead of drawing the plotline, utilized a software, Bitstrips, which already comprimises of multiple choices of comic representations and background settings. It was astounding that the group, with this program, drew out the depictions they wanted to display and altogether organized them on Comic Life 3. In consequence, the group promoted the overall neatness and quality of the images.
This final group project overall relates to other projects we had in the semester because it forced me to use all the graphic skills and techniques I learned. In the midst of working on the project, I sought out for ways I can incorporate both “close reading” technique and “distant reading” technique for the audience. Also, the final project made us go back to graphic novels, Maus, Fun Home, and Vietnamerica to get an inspiration about the way we can organize the comic. In consequence, the project took much longer than my group and I had expected. This project overall was very helpful in helping us review and organize all the materials we had learned during the semester. By far, this project was the most interesting assignment for me personally because it helped me cooperate with my group.
Final Reflection!
For the project, I took up the role of looking up pictures and coming up with ideas for the text that was going to be inserted to the panels. For the most part, I found myself looking up pictures that tied in to our project’s main argument, which turned out to be challenging because of the difficulty in finding appropriate pictures. The skills that I brought to the project, I think, were to make it easier to go through the project as a group and ensure that all the pages were connected by suggesting ways to go about reviewing the pages together. For the project, I also tried to make the photos on the page match to what the text was saying by using different filters to convey senses of time and emotions. The way I approached this project was to come up with an agreement with all my group members to make a comic story line that we all agreed on. This was a challenge at first because we saw ourselves running out of ideas early in the book and sometimes our storyline wasn’t cohesive and seemed contradictory.
Another group’s project “The Almighty Google” used bitstrips, which allowed them to freely change the expressions of the characters and also their body movements, which provided for a more fluid comic. To overcome the monotony of using the same characters and background, the group used zooming in and specially-shaped speech bubbles to create different emphases on their topic. By looking at the group’s project, I saw that btistrips was a pretty effective tool at making the comic more fluid, instead of more jumpy between pictures. Using bitstrips is very useful, it seems, to create comics where consistency in characters is important.
I find that this project combines the ideas that we saw in Understanding Comics, about panels, colors and text boxes, since we were forced to incorporate these ideas to make a comic ourselves, which made us look for different ways of expressing an idea on a particular page. This project combined the idea behind close reading in Maus, visually representing an argument in Fun Home and tying them all together like we did with in Vietnamerica. From making the comic, I learned that making a comic requires a lot of effort artistically and also requires a lot of organization to fit words in with your panels that make sense. I also learned that there are many aspects of a comic that can be changed; there’s plenty of freedom to express your style and ideas.
Follow this –> link<– to see the project!
Final reflective assignment
Due: Monday, May 5 at 11:59pm
Now that you’ve showed the class your group projects and seen all of your classmates’ projects, I want you to do a final bit of reflection before the semester’s work comes to an end. I want you to write a post to your blog that includes the following (not necessarily in order–best if you do this in the form of full paragraphs and not just as a list):
- A link to your group’s comic project.
- A visual piece of that comic project that serves as the featured image for your post.
- A paragraph of text in which you consider what role(s) you played within the group as you completed that project. This paragraph should not so much be a justification of what you did, but more an analysis of what skills you brought to the project and how you approached the task.
- A consideration of one of the other group’s comic project (which should include a link to the project and at least a few sentences with what you find interesting about it or what you learned from the way that group approached the task).
- And, finally, some discussion about how this final project relates to the other work you’ve done this semester. What did you learn from making the comic? How did it fit within the span of the other assignments?
Between now and Wednesday of next week, I will go back through all of your sites and re-read all of your projects as I compile final grades. You should also make sure that all of your major assignments are complete, easily found via your main page, that all the parts are there, and that they look the way you want them to. Let me know if you have any questions.
Link for class today
Here’s the document you’ll need for class today.
Vietnamerica analysis: Complete
Here’s the link to check out my analysis of Vietnamerica as a bildungsroman!
As you finish your essays for Thursday…
You should have your essay finished and posted as a file on your site before class on Thursday. Before noon on Thursday, you need to email to me the most interesting paragraph from your essay. You can interpret “most interesting” however you think most appropriate. Just decide on your most interesting paragraph and email it to me before noon this Thursday.
This week
As I said in class last week, we are finished with formal reading assignments for this class and will spend our time in the rest of our meetings with studio time working on the final projects. Your Vietnamerica essays are due on Thursday, so you should have a solid draft by the time we have class tomorrow afternoon. If questions arise while you work on the essay, we can discuss those tomrrow.
Your reading assignment for tomorrow is just to make certain that you have very carefully read and thought about the essay that you will be working on for the group projects. You should each make your own reverse outline for the article that your group will be turning into a comic. If you identify the places where the article makes major shifts, then you can map out what kind of shifts occur–what does it shift from and to what? Come to class with an understanding of what you see as the major pieces of the article–be able to identify and describe the article’s major claims, subordinate claims, and what evidence is used to support claims.
Bildungsroman and Vietnamerica
Is Vietnamerica a Bildungsroman
A bildungsroman is a coming of age story. In Vietnamerica, GB writes about his parents, and their history. Since they escaped Vietnam, his parents have traveled back and forth between the two countries. On one of the trips back over, they take GB and he learns about his roots. He meets his family in Vietnam for the first time and experiences a difference side of life. His New York life is nothing to the busy style of life Saigon. Throughout the text, I do not see character growth in GB. Most of the changes in character in the story are seen in his parents, who adapted to the living style of the time. In this way, Vietnamerica can be called a bildungsroman by the way that his parents grow up in the story. His mom flourishes with beauty in her teen years, and has many men interested in her, which triggers her consciousness about what is actually going on, and how its meaning changed at this point in her life. This is one example of how Vietnamerica can be considered a bildungsroman.
Draw Your Professor
It is with a great deal of trepidation that I share with you a website that I’ve just now discovered, called “Draw Your Professor.” Maybe it’s just my own idiosyncratic set of interests, but drawing your professors seems like it would be way more fun than rating them.