4. The Scott Pilgrim comics – shading
One of the ways the Scott Pilgrim comics stand out is the way its drawn out. Bryan Lee O’Malley first used
black and white to make his comics like a manga style comic, however it’s drawn like a comic and not a
manga comic. The drawing is simple and not that heavily detailed compared to a manga or a mainstream
superhero comic and Bryan makes use of the dot paint brush to shade in spaces so it doesn’t look empty,
this is a great way to fill in space because it makes the
illusion of it being darker but in reality the base is the same colour as the un-
shaded in areas so you can easily see through the drawing without it interrupting or
covering anything. I think shading in is really important in drawings as it adds
character, defines the drawing, makes it less 2D and makes it more relatable to the
audience. Shading in backgrounds is also incredibly important and you have to
make sure it fits the background and not make it more eye-catching than the actual
primary drawing. In the panel on the left, the background isn’t a single block colour
but it’s small detailed lines that have a little bit of opacity so when you look at it your
brain doesn’t really focus on the background and focuses on the main drawing and
the speech bubbles at the top because the speech bubbles are a white single
colour which makes the lettering stand out and readable.
5. The Scott Pilgrim comics – colours
The Scott Pilgrim comics use colour code to identify different characters and what their personality and
interests are like. One of the characters that changes their colour scheme is Ramona Flowers, throughout
the comic series she changes her hair colour and even the colour of her clothes.
This represents the growing character development Ramona and Scott
are forming in their relationship until she finds out Scott’s been cheating
on her with Knives Chau in which Ramona then cuts her hair off and
changes the colour to it to represent the end of their relationship. I could
use this in my own comic to represent how time passes and character
development in my character’s timeline, whether they changed clothes,
colour scheme or look older, it’s important to let the audience know that
the character has developed and moved on to where they were before.
“Ramona’s hair is portrayed as a direct indicator of her view on the stability of her life. When she first starts
dating Scott, she changes her hair every few weeks and one can’t help but recognize there were times when
she dated and dumped one of her exes in about that time window.”
This helps the audience understand what are Ramona’s thoughts and feelings in her life without actually
saying it. She also changes her hair style too and went from her hair being shorter to her growing it out
more throughout Scott’s and Ramona’s relationship.
6. The Scott Pilgrim comics – character design
The character design in Scott Pilgrim is easily shown in how the characters are positioned, what they
wear, their appearance and what their facial expressions are. It’s important to show what the characters
are like so the audience can tell what their personality is going to be like when they’re introduced.
For example, for the character A, we see
that his facial expression is a smug
confident look which is the opposite to
character B on the left who appears
really shy. Character A’s clothes seem
casual but smart and the confidence is
also shown in the colour he wears which
makes him stand out more. The
positioning of character A makes him
appear confident and outgoing too but
makes him look sneaky too like you don’t
really know what to expect from him or to
trust him either. His hair is the opposite
of character B and you can see his face
properly. You can tell he looks after
himself.
A B
Character B however is the complete opposite.
His facial expressions look shy and introverted
which is the complete opposite from character
A. His face is drawn with small lines on his
cheek which could be that he’s blushing shyly.
His eyes are bigger and behind his eyes which
looks like he’s trying to hide himself from other
people. Character B’s clothes seem to blend in
with his hair and his personality, he doesn’t
want to grab people’s attention so he wears
natural bland colours. He also wears a brown
necklace which is associated with lazy skater
2007 fashion. In contrast with character A
wearing a shirt he wears a casual t-shirt so you
can tell he doesn’t really care about if he’s
dressing smart.
7. The Scott Pilgrim comics - humour
Another recognisable thing about the Scott Pilgrim comics is
how their dialogue is shown and how they interact with each
other through the whole storyline. The character’s dialogue fits
in well with their character personality. If a character is shown to
be tired or sad then obviously they’d say something related to
their mood. Dialogue depends on the character’s mood and how
they would say something in their way when they’re in a certain
mood. So in this example Scott is a slacker and a lot of people
don’t like him, he lives a chaotic life and only really thinks about
himself, this panel shows Scott finally getting a job but ignoring
what the other person said about his life. This is helpful to me
because I want my character to be an idiot. By using character
dialogue in Scott Pilgrim will inspire me to show how many
different ways a character will react to an idiot.
8. The Scott Pilgrim comics – humour PT2
Another example of this is type of reactions is
Kim Pine. Kim Pine can’t stand Scott which
shows how different characters can react
differently to certain people. It gives them more
depth to the types of relationships they can
have with different people. However
relationships can develop and change quickly
which makes the characters more realistic
rather than them having an NPC personality
which gives the reader less connection to the
character.
10. Team Fortress 2 game – character design
The team fortress 2 comics originate from an online game with the same name and what Team
Fortress 2 does really well is the character design for its characters. It’s important that the characters
have recognisable silhouettes and are easily identifiable to the audience. Each Team Fortress 2
character has its own little quirks, and you can easily tell what kind of character they’re going to
be. The shape language also plays into character design by making silhouettes recognizable, even
partially obscured. With distinct character silhouettes, you get instant readability.
11. Team Fortress 2 game – character design pt2
For example, every character on here looks very different to each other and have certain items that
let you identify the type of character they would be.
These two characters are the total opposite to each other, the character on the right seems to be excited and
ready to fight, he’s small and skinny which shows that he’s probably a swift character and really quick. You
can tell that he would be a really annoying character to play as. However the character on the left has more
of a relaxed serious look on his face and is a heavier taller build, the type of weapon he’s holding is a heavy
machine gun so you can tell that in the game he’d be more of a slower powerful character.
12. Team Fortress 2 game – character design pt3
However, character design can change overtime and the silhouettes can change, but in this example the
basics of the character have been the same which shows that if it's a good character from the start there's no
point of changing it around. Personality and clothing can be changed but if it's a character that's designed for a
purpose (so in this case the character is an offence character and must move around quickly) then they'll keep
their basic design but play around with it. With this character which is an offence type character, the person
who designed it looked at more athletic people which involve in running so the character has a slender athletic
build. The clothing did evolve into a more military style character which adds into the theme of the game which
is a player versus
Player first person shooter game. Some of the
clothing was kept from its original design such as the
headset which evolved into a small earpiece and into
a headset again but keeping it one ear sided. The
hands are mostly the same and look big and
lanky but the final one has bandages and they
decided to keep the cap on since they thought it was
a good idea.
13. Team Fortress 2 comics - Panelling
Panelling in the team fortress 2 comics are really unique as the comics are online which means you can
navigate through the comic by pressing on the spacebar or clicking your left on your mouse. This allows the
panels to show up and disappear when they need to make more space or follow through the story. The
panels in this scene are out of fame to the previous panel that's shown in the back. The 3 main panels in the
front show the main reaction in their conversation with Miss Pauline's reaction being in the centre of the page
and she's seen to have a negative reaction. This helps me to understand what the main tone of the page is
supposed to be as this page is supposed to be that the man in the robot costume is an idiot.
14. Panelling can also show
how the comic should
flow though the page.
You can use many
different designs of
panels to let the
audience know how
important a panel is
supposed to be or how
fast the pace is
supposed to be. The 2
quick short panels with
the diagonal line
separating them is
supposed to be quick
and trying to show 2
things at once. The
reader is supposed to
look at them quickly as if
that if it was a scene in a
film it's going to show the
other scene quickly.
The big panel at the end
shows a lot of the scene
and feels like a big
reveal to the next scene.
The bigger the panel is
the more important it is,
and the bigger the panel
it is the more detail and
action it's going to have.
The panel at the end
shows the man about to
reveal something in the
next page. This makes
the reader anticipate
what's coming and
usually with a big reveal
or a main event the next
page is just going to be a
full page of the main
event.
16. Making Comics - Scott McCloud - Emotions
The Scott McCloud comics showed me a lot of things and one of the things that helped me was how to draw
facial expressions. Facial expressions are important for character design because it gives the characters life. It
makes the reader know what emotions the character is supposed to be feeling. It's important to add feelings in
the characters as it allows the reader to connect better with the characters. Facial expression designs can go
from being really detailed to really simple, and because
My art style will be quite simple so then I
wouldn't have to make it as detailed. Scott
McCloud shows the different intensities of
certain emotions over some time this allows
the reader to show how intense something has
affected the character. I can also add these
emotion intensities when the character is
slowly realised how much a certain thing has
affected them and putting them on panels next
to each other so the reader can slowly see the
quick passage of time and how quickly an
emotion can easily take over the character.
17. Making Comics - Scott McCloud - Detail
The difference between mine and Scott's art style in
this page is that his faces are more detailed
compared to the art style I'll be using so I'll have to
translate detailed emotions to a more simple design
but it gives the same emotion. Scott uses a lot of
cross hatching to shade in the facial expressions so it
gives it a more detailed look however he also uses a
lot of basic lines to display the foundation of the
emotion and I could use that in my comic since
crosshatching isn't in my art style. My art style would
involve more thick black lines drawn by the vector
tool, so my art looks less pixilated and give it a
more smooth look .
18. Making comics - Scott McCloud -
Character Design
Experimenting with different art styles is important for me
because it allows me to see if the type of art style works well
with the tone of the thing I'm making (comics, characters,
graphics, etc.). The different art styles can also impact
character design and the whole tone of the project. With this
project I'm making a superhero comic, so my art style doesn't
have to be incredibly detailed or realistic. The way art style
can impact character design is if it's a realistic drawing then
my character would have to be realistic but if it's more
cartoon-like then I can make my character appear more
flexible with exaggerated poses and expressions. However,
art style can also impact character design by limiting its detail.
More detail means more things but because my art style is
going to be vector with thick black lines and block colours
then I'm going to have to think about a character that I can
easily add detail while also being faith to my art style.
19. Making comics - Scott McCloud - panels and storyline
In a comic, most panel's art style doesn't have to be a fixed angle. With different angles in panels, you can show
a lot more of the character, setting or action that’s currently happening in that panel. A comic panel is basically
like a camera angle and if it's the same camera angle throughout the film it'll get really boring and generic. With
different angles it would allow me to experiment poses, with the character. The different angles can also depend
on the character's feelings or the action that's going on. If the character is feeling a negative feeling like
sadness, then I could make an overhead shot to make the character seem small and more vulnerable. If the
character is empowering the over character, then I can draw them in an under head shot to make them appear
stronger and taller.
20. Making comics - Scott McCloud - panels and storyline pt2
However, it is important to not experiment with different angles too much since its unnecessary distraction to
the reader and makes it hard to read. With that I could maybe experiment with different angles if it's relevant
to the story so if the character is feeling dizzy or faint, I can mess around with different angles, so it give the
reader a more detailed look on how the character is currently seeing the world. I could also make it hard to
read but only if it's relevant to the plot like if the character is feeling dizzy or if they're drugged and can't
understand what's going on around them.
21. Audience Research
For my audience research I decided to
look up specific audiences that are
mostly into comics so I can get better
information to what the audience actually
want. For this I used reddit to look up
different groups such as r/comics and
r/comicbooks and posted my survey on
there.
22. Most of the people who answered it are 35+ and above so my idea would have to appeal to a more
mature audience, however the second most answered are 18-24. But knowing comic books and the
reddit website I don’t think I’m expecting this audience to want something really dark and grounded like
batman.
23. Most of the people who answered this are male. I’m not surprised that most of them are male
since most comic books have a big male fanbase. I’d have to think carefully on how to
appeal to a male audience but most of the time, this specific male audience who use reddit
are very right wing and tend to get offended if the author adds a character that isn’t white,
male, cis and straight. Luckily I don’t care and I’ll write whatever characters I want.
24. Most people read comics at least a few times a week which means that I’d probably have to
make something that grabs people so they don’t easily move on to a different comic.
Obviously comic fans would be able to recognise if a comic is good or bad so I’d also have to
make something original and make it good too.
25. Most of them read superhero which is perfect for me as I’m making a superhero
comic. I can easily appeal to this audience because most new superheroes have the
same powers as a lot of famous marvel/dc superheroes and my idea seems original
so hopefully they’ll like my idea.
26. For this question I wanted a more
specific answer on what people wanted
so I decided to ask them if they could
make a comic what genre(s) would it
be? This helps me because it gets to
know my audience a bit more.
Because a genre could have anything
in it, it could be light or it could be dark.
So I wanted to go deeper from the
previous answer.
27. For this question I did the same as
before and wanted to get deeper into
the audience. I wanted to know
exactly what they’re looking for and
most of them had the same type of
answer, a superhero fighting villains
and going through different
adventures. Some of them also want
a more grounded relatable character
which I can easily do. Mystery and
phycological is also a theme going on
in this survey so maybe I can add
elements of suspense in my comic
book.
28. However, with this answer I
should’ve been more specific on
my question because my goal
was to compare my idea with
different opinions and ideas and
see how well they match and if I
can improve things around.
29. Luckily, most people who answered this question are interested to read my
comic, I did try and write it very specific so people would understand the
character. A few people seem to be neutral about it though so I’d have to try and
convince people to read my comic. Only 1 person said not interested but people
have different tastes in comic books and might want something more horror
related.
30. Bibliography
• Samuel G Whitesell. (2016). HAIR AND DREAMS: THE SYMBOLS AND THEMES OF SCOTT
PILGRIM. Available:
https://samwhitesell.wordpress.cohttps://samwhitesell.wordpress.com/2016/01/21/64/m
/2016/01/21/64/. Last accessed 4/3/2022.
• Scott McCloud (2006). Making Comics. New York: HarperCollins. P46-47.
• Scott McCloud (2006). Making Comics. New York: HarperCollins. P84.
• Team Fortress 2 (2012). The Shadow Boxers. anon: Valve. P7.
• Team Fortress 2 (2012). The Shadow Boxers. anon: Valve. p9.
