The Colors and the Kids
Posted on August 03, 2005 by Ryan Germick
Last night concluded the fourth of four "Intro to Comic Book Making" classes taught by myself and 826NYC Intern extraordinare Freddie Bepler. We laughed (Brendan falling from his chair), we cried (a couple hours before the third class I had a root canal), and we made comics (Donut Boy, Utencil Boy, Double-O Rabbit, The Dreamers and a host of others were immortalized on paper).
There's a Cat Power song that goes "It must be the colors and the kids that keeps me alive...". I can't claim to carry around the kind of melancholy that makes that recording so striking, but I can say the students in this class made my last month's worth of Tuesdays mighty enjoyable—and there weren't even any colors involved as our comics were strictly black and white.
On the first day I announced that this would also be a comics/dance class and each student (and teacher) would have choreograph a short piece based on their favorite comic. This was, of course, to help us remember each other's names by means of shared embarrassment.
We then discussed some of comics basic symbols. Nils astounded us all by correctly identifying the connotations associated with the many different styles of dialogue balloon drawn on the dry erase marker board. (Though Freddie's heavily outlined bubble threw us all for a loop.) After an impromptu address on the difference between the concrete and the abstract, Nils came be to known as the Walking Dictionary.
By the end of the class all of the students had created a 6 panel comic about a fictionalized walk home from school. Poor Jason was abducted and probed by aliens.
Day two was all about characters. We collaborated to create a plump fellow with curly arms, clown hair, and a Japanese name that I can no longer recall. We then privately drew this strange man with a number of facial expressions and gestures. At the end of the exercise we had to guess what one another's drawings were attempting to emote.
During this class Brendan also proudly to demonstrated his mastery for drawing Baby Mario. This so impressed Miki that she dutifully studied his technique.
On the third day I came in late with a throbbing face and Freddie led a thoughtful discussion about conflict and plot. The students learned that economy didn't necessarily have to refer to money, but also could be a guiding principal when deciding how many panels of rocket-farting it would take to adequately portray a character scaling a canyon.
This class was the birth of students final projects: the first installment of their own comic book. Tevin set out with an ambitious story about five friends discussing their strangest dream. When I learned the first dream was about marrying a cheese doodle, I knew at least one student had what it takes to create great comics.
The final class continued the development of the students' thesis. Pie Boy was scaling a nuclear power plant. The Perfect Person was caught up in a scuffle. The dreamers continued dreaming and we all waited for "The Great Unfinished Com-". (The word comic is unfinished, get it?) Amazing stuff.
The students have a couple days to turn in their final drafts for publication. I'm sure it will be a best seller at 826NYC. I'm proud to have been a part of it.
Posted by Ryan Germick