Scott McCloud's Big Triangle and New Media Composition

Slide 1: Scott McCloud’s Big Triangle and New Media Composition North Dakota State Kevin Brooks University Computers and Writing, 2005, Stanford University

Slide 2: Big Triangle in its simplest form A visual heuristic for analyzing and generating visual/verbal communication

Slide 3: Words of praise from a comics scholars Joseph Witek calls the big triangle “ “a master map of the known visual-verbal universe, . . . a real contribution to the critical discourse” (60).

Slide 4: More praise from a comic scholar Understanding Comics provides and enacts a vocabulary of analysis that is engaging and highly useful, especially as applied to other graphic works. Where that vocabulary needs sharpening, in its application to the ways words mean, will be evident to engaged students. (221-22). George Dardess acknowledges both the useful material and the need for refinement.

Slide 5: McCloud’s place in visual rhetoric scholarship • Included as an exemplar of visual-verbal composition in – Visual Rhetoric in a Digital World (Ed. Carolyn Handa) – Picturing Texts (Eds. Faigley, George, Palchik, Selfe) • Acknowledged as recommended reading in – Eloquent Images (Eds. Hocks and Kendrick) – Words and Images (Ed. Nancy Allen)

Slide 6: Perhaps taught more than used in scholarship? • Susan Delagrange: “Visual Rhetoric and Documentary Form,” (Spring 2004). Ohio State, Mansfield. • Philip Nel’s “Image, Text, Ideology: Picture Books and Illustrated Texts,” (Fall 2003). Kansas State U. • Susan Romano, “Visual Rhetoric and Design,” (Fall 2003). U of New Mexico . • Karl Stolley, “Multimedia Writing,” (Fall 2004). Purdue University. • Punya Mishra, “Learning Technology Through Design,” (Fall 2002). Michigan State.

Slide 7: Alternative or supplement to: Visual Language Matrix CRAP: Non-Designers DB Robin Williams Kostelnick and Roberts

Slide 8: Potentially a good fit with. . . An activity network The rhetorical triangle Albert Rouzie, Center for Activity Theory and Developmental Research http://www.edu.helsinki.fi/activity/pages/chatanddwr/chat/ http://jupiter.phy.ohiou.edu/~rouzie/fall151/rhetriang.gif

Slide 9: From simple to complex: a relational database Although not visible here, McCloud also shows words McCloud draws and pictures a separate plane pushing each for words, and other around suggests words on the triangle: are also used a dynamic 1) realistically, relationship. 2) as icons, and 3) in abstract ways. Items do not have an absolute location on the big triangle, just a relational position: “more realistic than,” “more abstract than,” etc.

Slide 10: Rather than place words on their Big Triangle Modified own face of the triangle, words and images occupy the same space: sometimes working close Rather than locate “meaning” along the bottom, and “abstractness” along the top, we together (iconic words and make meaning out of abstract, images), sometimes far iconic, and realistic images Abstract meanings apart and words,but we tend to (realistic words and iconic think that the meaning images or abstract images we make from iconic with iconic language). or realistic images Abstract art (visual and verbal): is concrete and Non-representational, highly demanding specific, rather t) Lo than abstract ho w n( and tenuous. de Myth: narratives itio fin and images are fin iti archetypal: simple Realism as art de on in presentation, but rich in meaning. in images and gh (co Hi words: immediately ol) recognizable, but more than they appear. Clichés and icons are engaging and adaptable: Images and words strive for veracity “May the force be through labels, definitions, with you.” descriptions: scientistic discourse. Realistic images and Concrete meanings Visual icons and scientific prose verbal cliches

Slide 11: Context for my use of McCloud • “Visual Culture and Language” course, junior standing, a blend of history, theory, production. • Analysis and design assignments draw on the Big Triangle and McCloud’s other terms: closure, word- picture relations, use of time, color, and lines. • Exercises, along the lines of Madeleine Sorapure’s “Playing Manovich” used to introduce students to new media composition (or working with visual language). • Using the whole map exposes word-picture dynamics, sound picture dynamics, meaning-making dynamics, the difficulty of abstractness.

Slide 12: Assignment 1: Timelines Timelines specifically and Abstract meaning information graphics generally will illustrate the role of words to provide concreteness, One timeline with minimal text floated upwards; specificity, not just abstract, but unclear. X information in a way that images alone Explanatory text pushes meaning down and to the left hand corner. cannot. Y Z The history of Nintendo: Game icons but specific, informative text Medical images and a history of medical imaging Concrete meaning

Slide 14: Assignment 2: Photo Essays Abstract Meaning Limiting the words moves to the image off the bottom line: we begin to fill in more associations. Some students used words to Blurred, edited images, move their images toward poetic text. concreteness, others pushed their projects in the opposite direction. Realistic images, poetic, but concrete text (duo-specific). Concrete meaning

Slide 16: ‘Nothing is so beautiful as Spring..’ – Gerard Manley Hopkins

Slide 17: Assignment 3: Video without words Abstract Meaning Removing the words does not necessarily result The boiling and eating of an egg moved in abstractness: both up and down the triangle simultan- eously: the narrative sequence was students use music concrete, but the filming was abstract, and closure to oblique. create or ease demands upon the A video juxtaposing images of Chicago and Korea stayed close to the retinal plane; abstract viewer. to the extent that viewers can make their own associations with images. A string-puppet quest story resulted in an iconic film, concrete in its use of narrative structure. Concrete meaning

Slide 18: El Picadora, by Sarah Bremer The narrative becomes clear, but the style of representation remains abstract, and the music adds drama. QuickTimeﾪ and a This video is both H.263 decompressor are needed to see this picture. concrete and abstract simultaneously.

Slide 19: Open Project: From formalism to rhetoric Abstract Meaning Students apply their knowledge of the Big Triangle, word-picture relationships, closure, use of time, and use of El Picadora 2: Time running lines to a project they backwards a la Memento propose and execute. Machinima: a la Red versus Blue A student organization website Concrete meaning

Slide 20: “Cool Heuristics” and New Media Compositions • McClould’s triangle is not a grid or a system, but a relational database, a tool for analysis and design. • The ambiguities can be productive: engage students in making meanings, thinking relationally. • “Hot” heuristics (Visual Language Matrix) are for the professionals and the textbooks. • The big triangle can function as a stand-alone heuristic.

Slide 21: Works Cited Allen, Nancy ed. Working with Words and Images: New Steps in an Old Dance. Westport: Ablex, 2002. Faigley, Lester, Diana George, Anna Palchik, and Cynthia Selfe. Picturing Texts. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 2004. Handa, Carolyn ed. Visual Rhetoric in a Digital World: A Critical Sourcebook. Beford/St. Martin’s: Boston/New York, 2004. Hocks, Mary and Michelle R. Kendrick. Eloquent Images: Word and Image in the Age of New Media. Cambridge MA, MIT Press, 2003. Kostelnick, Charles and David D. Roberts. Designing Visual Language: Strategies for Professional Communicators. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 1998. McCloud, Scott. Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art. 1993. NY: HarperCollins, 1994. Sorapure, Madeleine. “Five Principles of New Media: Or, Playing Lev Manovich,” Kairos 8, 2 (Winter 2004). Williams, Robin. The Non-Designer’s Design Book: Design and Typographic Principles for the Visual Novice. Berkeley: Peachpit Press, 1994.

Slide 22: Image Credits Title slide, Big Triangle: http://www.scottmccloud.com/inventions/triangle/triangle.html 1st slide: from Understanding Comics 2nd slide: Joseph Witek’s Comics as History book cover from http://www.forbesbookclub.com 3rd slide: No Portrait Available. From the Robert Myers Collection: http://www.fotohistorie.no/index.php?l=W 7th slide: left hand image, a page from Robin William’s The Non-Designers Design Book. 7th slide, right hand image, a page from Kostelnick and Roberts Designing Visual Language. 8th slide: left-hand image, the rhetorical triangle, Albert Rouzie. http://jupiter.phy.ohiou.edu/~rouzie/fall151/rhetriang.gif 8th slide, right hand image, an activity network, Center for Activity Theory and Developmental Research http://www.edu.helsinki.fi/activity/pages/chatanddwr/chat/ 9th slide: from Understanding Comics, (52-53). 10th slide: Images on the triangle, top to bottom: John Cage composition, from an Electronic Museum of Lingua-Acoustic Space: GLUKHOMANIA.RU. http://ncca.smufsa.nu/pr_sonorus.php3?lang=eng&t=0&p=10 Ansel Adams photograph, Lenin Imports, http://www.leninimports.com/ansel_adams.html Venus di Milo image found at http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/~abonanos/MilosAlbum/aphrodite.jpg by Alceste Bonanos Smiley face Scientific Photography and Applied Imaging book cover. http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?A=details&Q=&is=REG&O=productlist&sku=264174 Slide 13, David Kanenwisher, Visual Culture and Language class, Spring 2005. Slide 14, Nick Bruhn, Visual Culture and Language class, Spring 2005. Slide 15, Ji Hae Sing, Visual Culture and Language class, Spring 2005. Slide 17, Sarah Bremer, Visual Culture and Language class, Spring 2005.

Slide 23: Courses Cited • Susan Delagrange: “Visual Rhetoric and Documentary Form,” (Spring 2004). Ohio State, Mansfield. http://english.mansfield.ohio- state.edu/writing/569files/569schedule.htm • Philip Nel’s “Image, Text, Ideology: Picture Books and Illustrated Texts,” (Fall 2003). Kansas State U. http://www.ksu.edu/english/nelp/childlit/830.html • Susan Romano, “Visual Rhetoric and Design,” (Fall 2003). U of New Mexico . http://www.unm.edu/~sromano/pw/policy.htm • Karl Stolley, “Multimedia Writing,” (Fall 2004). Purdue University. http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~stolley/2004/courses/instructors/bibliography.htm • Punya Mishra, “Learning Technology Through Design,” (Fall 2002). Michigan State. http://punya.educ.msu.edu/PunyaWeb/courses/fall02/index.asp