Making Comic Books: Part Two

 On the road to an understanding

of the structured thinking that goes into making a

comic book page read well.

I took the image above from my paper files,

it is a page from a Marvel Previews magazine

and I believe that it was a cover to

Avengers Classics #4.

It is also a classic example of a well 

designed comic book page 

that has been laid out to guide a readers

eyes through the panels in an enticing manner.

In the hand drawn diagram below, I am

trying to illuminate the way in which

the artist is augmenting the reading experience

in an almost subliminal way.

 

In an aside, it has always seemed to me, that this

aspect of constructing a comic book page, has a

lot in common with stage magic and sleight of hand

card magic.

That led me to wonder about one the masters of

comic book construction, Jim Steranko.

Steranko was an accomplished practitioner

of sleight of hand magic, he even wrote a book about how to do it.

I have often wondered if it was the Steranko's

familiarity with subtly controlling an

 observer's eyes, which, in magic,

is used so that we see only what the magician 

wants us to see and in comic books is used to direct the eye in a similar way, was what attracted  him to the medium in the first place.

I am convinced that it is part of what quickly propelled him

into the top tier of comic book artists of his day.

It didn't hurt that he had an eye for design,

 that was second to none, either.

Below is another page from my torn-out-of-Previews-pile and I cannot recall who the artist was or what the project was called.  If anyone knows, let me know and I will add the

appropriate credits.

Once again, below, in my tracing paper overlay,

I try to impart some of the "tricks" that a

cartoonist can use to direct the reader in a subtle way.

There are no concrete rules to this endeavour and

there are as many different approaches as there are artists

BUT the general principles are sound and they will

enhance the pleasure of a reader's experience.

It comes down to the basic fact that anyone,

with sufficient ability, could draw a comic book

and many have.  That being said,

then what is it that makes us, as readers,

prefer one person's work over another?

I like to think that it is the 

General Principals of Panel & Page Structure

that I have attempted to show here.

There are adjuncts to this theory too.

How to make the last panel on a facing page

cause the reader to turn the page, almost without

being aware of doing it.

I will address that issue and others next time.