Understanding Comics

by: Scott McCloud

     There is one idea in particular that I enjoyed thinking about while reading this book, Scott's description of the space he calls "The Pictorial Vocabulary." This space is viewed as a triangle with each corner representing one of three aspects of a comic. Lower left being the Reality extreme where we would see much more photo-realistic comic imagery and to the far right more of a Language area with letters and some icons to the other extreme. Finally at the top would be the picture plane where the most abstract ideas in the form of visual art would reside, their extreme being the pinnacle of the triangle.

     I had never thought about being able to group every piece of art ever in quite such an understandable way. It made sense how you could basically carve out a little section of real estate for every artist that ever existed on this triangle  simply by delineating what their particular style was according to these three governing corners of the pictorial vocabulary triangle

The Arrival 

by Shaun Tan

To specifically say how a book like "The Arrival" can tell a story with no type is an explanation in iconography. The beautiful use of continuity in this book is brought to us by repetitive use of familiar objects
( or objects that become familiar throughout reading the book). Also the way an idea is related from image to image makes it very easy to follow along. At times it seemed as if I was looking at frames of a film reel in that the image that I looked at next almost nothing had changed except maybe a glass moving a few inches, or a cloud formation was just a bit different from the previous. Tan makes great use of the family photo to keep everything tied together from beginning to end as well.

Also his composition of each image makes great use of being able to lead the readers eye exactly where he wants it to go to move the narrative along from one image to the next. His use of all of the different types of composition make for a very easy read. It all seems effortless while "reading" this story, but to know that Tan spent four years working on this shows to me the level of planning and contemplation of how to convey this story without words really was.

I enjoyed reading this graphic narrative, and I do not feel that words would even be able to explain this story well. It runs together so seamlessly all due to the strong narrative that is easily relate-able for almost anyone who sees this book. As it went along, I came to the conclusion that this book would be more apply be called "The Journey" because that what it felt like, Tans' use of the idea of continuity glued together with master narrative made an impact on my understanding of narrative in a deep way and I appreciate the opportunity to have it brought to my attention.