Our students need to develop skills in analyzing and constructing sequential narratives in visual form. One way to do this is by having students construct their own visual narratives using images from films. Initially, this involved printing out images from films and arranging them with blu-tack. However, using Comic Life software allows students to digitally arrange and annotate images within templates. This helps students learn to deconstruct trailers and other visual texts by analyzing things like editing, camera work, and narrative structure.

1. Sequential Narrative

2. Our students need a good grasp of visual storytelling
and the skills to deconstruct a sequential narrative.
They all, at GCSE and GCE, need to be able to analyse
a moving visual text and construct one of their own,
whether using storyboards or film.
One way of doing this is to get them to construct
their own visual narrative – if they have the skill to
construct it, then it will help them develop analytical
skills.
Or that’s the theory…

3. The first time I
attempted this, it
involved googling
images from a film,
downloading them,
putting them onto
Photoshop, then
laminating the
sheets and cutting
them out. We’d
have to make six or
seven sets to use in
groups.

4. The students would then choose suitable images
and arrange them in a narrative order with blu-tak
on sugar paper, using not only at camera angles
but also the content of the frames – the mise-en-
scène – to create atmosphere and give the story
more depth.
Ideally, the groups would
then present their work
to the rest of the class,
justifying their choices.

5. • The next step was to smarten this up and
screenshot images from a movie sequence and
create a template on Powerpoint. This cut out the
major drawback of the previous version – losing
the cards and faffing around with paper and blu-
tak.

6. • This worked, but (cue fanfare) Gawen
suggested a further improvement – using the
Comic Life software – accessible in Shared –
Media – Comic Life

7. The images are saved to
a file in the shared Media
area and are easily
accessible, The software
provides a series of
templates, but it’s
possible to create our
own which are better
suited to our purpose, so
the students can
annotate individual
shots.

8. The images can be dragged and dropped into
the template.
The text box could be filled with annotation
about editing, sound, camera movement –
depending on the text or the level of ability.
Depending on how sophisticated we want to
be, we could try to construct a sequence
according to Todorov’s narrative theory –
which would be a practical way for the
students to familiarise themselves with that
before applying it to their own productions.
The exercise can also be used while
studying trailers – in fact, using the snip
tool, students can literally pick apart
existing trailers or other texts and set
the task to other students, after looking
at examples of the way existing texts
are ordered and paced.

10. The finished work can be exported as a jpeg and posted directly on the student’s blog
or put on Powerpoint and converted to a Slideshare and then posted with notes about
existing texts.