week6

Gary Li Sotha Sok Mackenzie Ellis

Culture between offline and online comic is vastly dissimilar, according to McCloud. The modern web users tend to have a very short attention span when viewing a page, jumping from one place to another constantly. The atmosphere in which an online reader views a comic strip is very different from print, where advertisements, merchandising, user comments and posts actually create a more inviting environment because of it is typically seen throughout webpages, making viewers feel more within the community. In the VG Cats website, the sense of online community is clearly evident. News posts and advertising is displayed alongside the comic which gives the structure as previously stated.

In issue 276 of VG Cats, the hybrid format of webcomics is shown. This gag-strip allows for a deep characterization within the subjects, as well as provide humourous anecdotes before the user moves on to the next page. This form of hybrid webcomics also vertically arrange the panels to prevent side-scrolling, while allowing readers to scroll downwards without much attention to be taken away because of its short and simplistic page-as-strips.

In Making Comics McCloud emphasizes key elements used in the creation and transitioning of web comics. On page 3 of Making Comics, McCloud discusses the use of colour and hues to create depth perception. Techniques like; blurring, saturation, blending and discolouration are used to form the illusion of real time and space within the comic realm. The online comic VG Cats utilizes these colouring techniques to create this illusion. Throughout #276 of the VG Cats series the colours of the books being observed by the cats are saturated causing the reader to recognize them as parts of the background. In contrast the cats themselves are depicted vividly with bold lines and bright colours making them the focus of the foreground. In frame 3 the cat reading the book is immersed in a section of his book. The use of further saturation and darker colours in the background help to give this sense of astonishment and interest the cat is felling. The reader is able to pick up these subtle changes in foreground and background allowing them to derive emotions, feelings and depth from the comic realm.

Designing comics for the web may pose some challenges as they do not necessarily follow the same practices of conventional comics. Web comic's disadvantage of displaying sharp detailed lines usually found in conventional comics is avoided by VG Cats by its minimal use of line work. The artwork in VG Cats are clear, bold, and large. This increases readability and the ability to distinguish the line details without the need to zoom in or out of the comic. This gives the artwork a simple, clean look of a vector based graphic found in most flash based animations. VG Cats also emphasizes thicker line-work on key items like characters that help distinguish the depth perception. The background uses less clearer, saturated lines to distinguish objects in the background such as the bookcase and the books in the comic strip. The line work used for the text is also important to address as cluttered, small text can decrease the visibility forcing viewers to zoom into the image. The text in VG Cats is large and spaced generously apart. This helps increase the readability of the text but is somewhat of a trade-off as this requires more space to be taken up by it.

Works Cited

//VG Cats//. Web. 22 Oct. 2009. .