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four panels

2022-10-24

2 minute read

I'm working hard on making zines, 3 is such a large number when I'm accustomed to barely getting through one. The only way out is through. I've pivoted on the VR idea, it was time consuming and not really going anywhere funny. I'm re-doing one I made a while ago about bees, and expanding it. I tried in part to work on the chimpanzee one, but lacked reference images and at that time of night I was trying to not use my laptop.

India played pakistan in the stadium nearby last night, it was the noisiest event I've ever heard. Fans walking across the bridge were chanting and shouting the whole time.

comis

I listened to an interview with Kate Beaton on Make it Then Tell Everybody. She's up there with the cartoon greats in my opinion. Her new book, Ducks, has come out now and I'm thinking of either buying it or at least requesting it at the library. Talking to my brother yesterday we covered cartoons, I said I'd forgotten about my dream of drawing cartoons for money. I don't know what that would look like, and I don't think it would be full time, but if I could strike the balance half-half I'd be more than a happy man.

The question of format rings in my ears; Newspapers dictated the shape and style of gag cartoons for a long long time, and the results where pretty good - brevity, wit, consistency. Instagram has changed contemporary gag comics to fit within a repeating square, which isn't too bad a format. Often there's 4 squares and then a final "birds-eye-view" of all the squares tiled, which is similar to the kind of thing peanuts comics would do to fit into different size spaces. Four panels is a good number, it lets you setup with the first two panels, punchline on the third, and then secondary punchline on the fourth. (of course this isn't the only option).

I wonder if I could make a list of gag formats, I wonder if someone already has? Back to my point about instagram and newspapers - I think it'll change again, with self hosted platforms possibly playing a bigger part, and I think it will continue to favour the hand held device, and I think instagram's reading format did good things for it visually.

listening to

Outside - In by 5 against 4 - a collection of field recordings, another bandcamp purchase.

questions