So Scott McCloud, creator of 'Understanding Comics' and 'Reinventing Comics' is going to universities all around the country speaking about his new book 'Making Comics'. I happened to be in a town where this was happening. It's insanely cool to hear this guy talk. It's like hearing one of those esoteric college english professors talking about something, but in this situation I'm actually interested in the subject matter. McCloud did point out where he's been critisized in the past, and how in the future at the end of the day comics may not be what people turn to for entertainment, but he did bring up to point about "Successful Mutation" occuring because of web-cartoonists creating so many different kinds of ideas with their work. I think that's something everyone should think of when doing comics. Sure, we may not be good enough yet to experiment with the type of stuff that McCloud is taking about, but we can try to improve the most that we can and move towards developing ourselves as artists while experimenting with what comics can do (although at the moment I'm mostly in the 'developing of my art' phase after not improving much from doing just comic pages).

Anyway if McCloud is speaking anywhere near you GO SEE HIM. I believe it's a fifty state tour. Also read 'Making Comics' as well as his other books. They're good stuff.

I of course came off like a fanboy because of the fact that I'm a highschool student going to this college-oriented thing...oh well.

I think everyone on this site should read Making Comics.

I'm definatly going to see McCloud, but I don't think he reaches Colorado until summer next year.

*sigh*

I really liked Understanding Comics. I think I'll check out Making Comics.

Loki
I think everyone on this site should read Making Comics.

I agree. It's very helpful to comics of ALL kinds.

I have never heard of this guy before. I'm assuming he is some sort of big-time comics guru or something?

you haven't heard of Scott McCloud?? He's the best brains in comics since Will Eisner (in my eyes anyways).

If you're interested in comics, you should all three of Scott McCloud's books in the "...Comics" series, and then see the stuff he's got over on his site www.scottmccloud.com

He's also a big supporter of webcomics. His lecture had a lot of slides with clips from comics like Diesal Sweeties, PVP, Penny Arcade, Scary Go Round, etc.

The best part about McCloud's books about comics is that they're in comic form, so they're easy and fun to read, and they demonstrate what he's talking about right there on the page.

Once again, Tater, you manage to add absolutly nothing to the discussion.

I liked Understanding Comics, and bought Reinventing Comics but have yet to sit down and read it.

And now I need to add another book to my list. Yay.

I just bought Making Comics and so far it's pretty good.

Tater Salad

ccs1989
Once again, Tater, you manage to add absolutly nothing to the discussion.

Maybe people should say who the fuck he is instead of assuming that we should know him.

*cough*
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_McCloud [en.wikipedia.org]
:)

no prob

hpkomic
I liked Understanding Comics, and bought Reinventing Comics but have yet to sit down and read it.

Some of the idea's in Reinventing Comics is not as entertaining. Micropayments is one that really just kinda drags on. Not his best work, but still informitive. Making Comics is honestly better

I havent read Making, but some of the ideas in Reinventing I found quite hard to get my head around.

Damn you lucky americans.

I don't get what's so hard to understand about Reinventing Comics. I've read it three times. The only part I tend to skim over is the history of the creation of the internet.

The problem with Reinventing Comics isn't that it's dull. The problem is that its gee-whiz ideas for the "future of webcomics" seem a bit outdated today, especially since some of them never really panned out. (Micropayments, for example. Scott knew that people would rather pay a little money instead of a whole lot of money to read a webcomic, but what he didn't seem to realize was that people would also rather pay no money at all instead of a little bit of money to read the same quality material. Which is why there are so many free webcomics out there, why ModernTales opened some of its comics' archives to the public, and why we're not all filthy stinking rich.) The Web 2.0 has arrived, and I think that it's a lot more diverse, community-oriented, user-friendly, and above all weird than Scott imagined in 2000 when he penned Reinventing.

Of course, I could be wrong. Feel free to debate me. And no, I haven't read Making Comics just yet, but I really, really want to.

~IJ

I agree. Besides, all those 25 cents tend to add up, and people are too damn BUSY to sign up to all of this other crazy stuff.

speaking for myself, any interner payment system doesn't work for me because I dont have a credit card and none of my family had any interest in buying anything online

Well, hey... He's not just touring Colleges/Universities around the US, but he's also going to the UK and Canada. It's a 1-year, 50 state (plus a few countries) tour with his wife and kids. Not just that, but he's also scheduled signings at various comic book stores.

(There's more about the "Making Comics" tour over at http://www.scottmccloud.com/makingcomics/tour.html. There's even a blog dedicated to the tour, which is updated by not only Scott, but also his wife and kids: http://mccloudtour.livejournal.com/)

I think Scott has a brilliant mind in regards to the essence of what a comic is, and what it could be, but I think the success of his first book went a bit to his head and he seems to think he knows a lot about every aspect of comics, ever, which he doesn't.

Inkmonkey
I think Scott has a brilliant mind in regards to the essence of what a comic is, and what it could be, but I think the success of his first book went a bit to his head and he seems to think he knows a lot about every aspect of comics, ever, which he doesn't.

I dunno, I didn't get that sense from him. He seems to think that he's just the guy recording comic's history, watching as individual creators take comics to new places. He's kind of like "The History Channel" for comics.

I guess you'd have to see some of the stuff he does that doesn't end up getting published to really see what I'm talking about. He does a good job of not injecting too much "opinion" into his published work.

When is he coming to Florida? :O

Ian Jay
gee-whiz ideas

Yes!

Maybe I'm misinterpreting what ccs posted about experimentation and mutation but to me the best works, the most timeless works tend to be stuff like Krazy Kat or Peanuts which although full of ideas and innovations come down to a cartoonist, a sheet of paper, and some ink. And all his talk about infinite canvas and mutation, or virtual reality in Reinventing Comics while having its place, seems kind of pie in the sky technology chearleading and gimmickry to me.

I still enjoy his work, though, and its interesting how much Understanding Comics has affected the way many people talk about comics.

Ian Jay
Scott's out of date

Kline
Scott goes too far

I dissagree with you both. He started people thinking along some lines that not many were thinking along before; that's what he brought to the table.

Most traditional paper comics are still doing things the same old linier way, even when they go on line. Most pure webcomics are doing things that way too... We could ALL use a little creative McClouding!

ozoneocean

Ian Jay
Scott's out of date

Kline
Scott goes too far

I dissagree with you both. He started people thinking along some lines that not many were thinking along before; that's what he brought to the table.

Most traditional paper comics are still doing things the same old linier way, even when they go on line. Most pure webcomics are doing things that way too... We could ALL use a little creative McClouding!

that's not what I meant. I didn't mean that he "goes too far."

In Reinventing Comics he presents a sort of "End of Art" argument (to play off of Fukuyama) we he describes Virtual Reality as the final destination for the journey of storytellers..toward a creation of the world so real it can make us forget the one we live in. He then starts going off about multimedia comics and the power of technology. I think this progressive view of art is silly. After Centuries Gilgamesh still resonates strongly and I doubt being able to "be" Gilgamesh (to use McCloud's example with Spiderman) would improve it. I don't have a problem with advocating new tools or approaches. Just that he often frames it in this progressive argument. The pen and paper comment I made kind of misdirected what I meant. Mostly I meant that it isn't the fancy tools or gimmicks used that make a great work or necessarily hold art back.

Kline
In Reinventing Comics he presents a sort of "End of Art" argument (to play off of Fukuyama) we he describes Virtual Reality as the final destination for the journey of storytellers..

Heh, I bet no one got the Fukuyama reference. However just like Fukuyama, McCloud is somewhat hasty in his ideas about the net. Fukuyama wrote his book at the end of the Cold War, when it looked like liberal, capitalist institutions would win overall. It's an optimistic argument, but it's also idealistic. We know from the past 10 years that the world has entered a new battle, just as we know from the past 5 or 6 years that the internet is different than anyone could have imagined. This expanding amount of webcomic artists aren't looking for a "new approach". They just want to tell their story now. McCloud actually realized this and talked about it in his seminar. He said that he knows it will probably be a bunch of artists who, in process of creating, will somehow create a change in the way comics are read (it's a possibility). But just people sitting around a table wondering what the next "successful mutation" for comics will be won't get us anywhere. It takes experimentation, and that's what McCloud, as well as other artists, are doing.

It'll also take money though, since revolutionary changes usually don't occur without finnacial backing. For example, it probably took a lot of money for the big comic companies to switch over to computer coloring. Of course comics have always been about the individual. So I guess we'll have to wait and see...

ccs1989

Kline
In Reinventing Comics he presents a sort of "End of Art" argument (to play off of Fukuyama) we he describes Virtual Reality as the final destination for the journey of storytellers..

Heh, I bet no one got the Fukuyama reference. However just like Fukuyama, McCloud is somewhat hasty in his ideas about the net. Fukuyama wrote his book at the end of the Cold War, when it looked like liberal, capitalist institutions would win overall. It's an optimistic argument, but it's also idealistic. We know from the past 10 years that the world has entered a new battle, just as we know from the past 5 or 6 years that the internet is different than anyone could have imagined. This expanding amount of webcomic artists aren't looking for a "new approach". They just want to tell their story now. McCloud actually realized this and talked about it in his seminar. He said that he knows it will probably be a bunch of artists who, in process of creating, will somehow create a change in the way comics are read (it's a possibility). But just people sitting around a table wondering what the next "successful mutation" for comics will be won't get us anywhere. It takes experimentation, and that's what McCloud, as well as other artists, are doing.

It'll also take money though, since revolutionary changes usually don't occur without finnacial backing. For example, it probably took a lot of money for the big comic companies to switch over to computer coloring. Of course comics have always been about the individual. So I guess we'll have to wait and see...

Ah, now all that I can get behind. Thanks for clarifying the matter.

In regards to money spent on digital production, I'm sure it did cost money, requiring better equipment and printing. On the other hand, no more color guides and old school color separation were needed so in the long or even short run maybe it actually cut costs. But I really don't know and I guess that would be beside the point anyway since it still probably required at least an initial investment as you pointed out.