From the Streets -

from the Vaults -

Sorting out the loft and found a pile of old drawings, from what I'd guess was a 9 to 11 year-old Jimmy. It's remarkable how I've not progressed at all - not a single new idea since then.

(Too-Rye-Aye is still a cracking album)

Directional flow in comics

Sometimes when I'm teaching comics, and I'm trying to encourage kids to keep it all clear and simple, I'll tell them Charles Schulz's observation that "good cartooning is good design". I'll show them a few images of inflight safety cards and we discuss why it's important that the information is easy to 'read', even though they are always wordless.
And sometimes I'll find myself talking about how artists often use the fact that we read (both words and images) from left to right, and use it to subtly make their story (or 'information') clearer or more explicit. I think I probably became aware of it myself having read 'How to Read Nancy' by Mark Newgarden and Paul Karasik, which unpicks the visual mechanics of Bushmiller's deceptively simple creation -


Just about every Nancy strip I've ever seen has begun with her walking into the story left to right, just as you the reader are doing, leading you smoothly towards the next panel - before you even realise it you've read the whole story (I've a quote somewhere that I will post as soon as I find it, that essentially says that Bushmiller makes it impossible to look at the strip and NOT read it).



He is also very skilful at halting this flow when the story calls for it - usually at the end or punchline - by turning Nancy or another character to face to the right. Visually this acts as a kind of punctuation - stop reading here. In the traditional newspaper strip format this is especially useful, rounding the story off and making sure you don't start straight into Dilbert or Garfield without an appropriate pause.

Since I became aware of this manipulation I've noticed it everywhere, in comics and childrens books. For example, The Berenstain's Bears in the Night, which structurally hangs on you identifying and relating to the cubs, following alongside, being visually confronted and startled by the owl, then turning back on yourself and racing back in the opposite direction.

(not the complete book, just sample pages to make the point)

In a strange way, the cub racing right to left, against your natural inclination to read the page left to right, has the effect of making him race faster, like being on a moving train as one passes in the opposite direction. The cubs haste here is not just created by the cartoony wooshlines and dustclouds, but also your eye travelling across the spread.

A procession depicted moving right to left also seems to work visually better than the other direction - we feel more like spectators stood watching it flow past -


- if for whatever reason we wanted to create an image of a procession that we want the reader to be immersed or involved in, then depicting it travelling left to right will make the reader move in the same direction.

Playing Out

page 5, first rough. click to enlarge.

Not entirely happy with this yet, so describing it as a tester. Needs a lot more dark and midtones to enrichen it. Also I've not really thought out how many background figures this is going to involve - the whole thing is set in town on a bustling busy day, so need to decide exactly how much effort to invest in all the periphery stuff.

Connor, Kieran and Jamal are tutting about the price of a pair of trainers, when they spot a 'living statue' (talentless weirdo). On the following page, Jamal also strikes a pose and gets given a quid by someone for his efforts.

Update

First of all, thanks for all the positive comments on my competition entry Paul Crystal - it makes me feel like I didn't waste four days after all.

portrait by Hayley - thanks!

I had a good day out last week to Wrexham, visiting the Illustration for Graphic Novels BA. Did a talk on how and why to draw cats which seemed to go well, and got to see a handful of students about their current projects. Seems like a really good course so far, and I'll be interested to see their degree show (some way off, as they've only got 1st and 2nd years so far). Many thanks to Dan Berry for having me, and all the students for sharing their work. Whilst I'm on this, I can recommend Dan's Comics Bureau blog which he uses to keep the students notified of comics stuff they need to know about - I check it every few days and always find something.

As an early birthday present, my delightful girlfriend Katy booked me onto a print weekend course at the excellent Hotbed Press in Salford - Gum Arabic Transfer. Emerged two days later with 40 prints, around 10 of them presentable, and very excited about the potential of this amazing technique. Essentially it's a poormans lithography, in which you paint photocopies with gum arabic solution, ink them up with oilbased relief ink which is repelled by the damp gum but stays on the black toner, then run through the press to transfer to your paper. There's a lot more to it than this, and plenty of creative ways to play with it, but basically that's it.
Most of my time I spent getting the hang of controlling the variables, but did manage a handful of satisfactory experiments.
Colour separation using a different photocopy 'plate' for each colour -


Using cut and torn tissue paper to create other colour effects -


-and I even tried a 3 colour separation -

-which might've worked if I'd not rushed it (slapping too much ink on, poor registration etc). Although it's messy and not of a cat (weird, I know), there's something almost working with this one, and I think it's probably that the other ones were from copies of essentially line drawings while these trees were drawn without outlines and more as areas of tone and colour.
In the new year I'll definitely be back there having another go at it.

I've just put the boy on the bike up on my shop, and if there are any takers I'll put the 3 lads and the 2 kids up there too.

Paul Crystal, Graphic Designer

My entry into this year's Observer/ComICA/Johnathan Cape long name short graphic story competition.

Click to enlarge to readable size

Aware that the winning story (which was very good) was to be printed across 4 pages of the Observer magazine, I created this specifically for such a context. For the benefit of those who are not Observer readers (the foreign and the non-middle class), the story pokes fun at the pretensions of many of their features, whilst berating the Saturday Guardian (same publisher) for so savagely dropping the Comic section. Which might be why I didn't win.

Wolfy & Jack

Well, both of the Hey 4 Eyes prints have sold, pretty quickly too, but the actual zine is available from the States - let me know and I'll pass on Robyn's email address to you rather than put it up here. As Christmas draws nearer I'll see if I can dig anything else out of the back of the plan chest.

in other news, yesterday was spent at Manchester Art Gallery with Steve, Mike and Dan attending the second day of my Create Comics weekend. following in the great tradition of Lumberjack and Mountie comics in Manchester -



- we created the following Connect the plots comic -

Print available

to balance out the amount of money that the internet takes away from me, I'm putting 2 of these lovely prints up on Paw Quality Clutter online store for your purchasing pleasure. It would be nice if you bought one, as I'm in a bad mood - spent half a day writing a brilliant proposal for a certain secondary school who were inviting applications for involvement in a big project, and have not even received the courtesy of a response.
If only everyone were as thoughtful (and talented) as Lizz Lunney, who sent me a little tote bag with this on it -
Thankyou Lizz, you are nicer than all the secondary schools put together.

Merry-Go-Round, October 1949

A recent very cheap eBay find, in my quest to explore the history of comics in Manchester. Published by JB Allen ("1180a Chester Road, Stretford, Lancs, and printed by BIBBY & BARON LTD London & Bury"), with a mix of adventure, funnies and non-comic stories, including 'Dick and Doris' written by Bunter creator Frank Richards. around the same time, John Bevan Allen also published a couple of other Richards (non-comic) titles. Further (lazy internet) investigation reveals previous titles Comet (1946 to 59)- succesful, and eventually bought by Amalgamated Press, Fitness and Sun (becoming simply Sun), and a handful of very shortlived titles.
Seems there were only 4 issues of Merry-Go-Round ever produced before it was incorporated into the brand new exciting Eagle (published by Hulton), in order to boost their post-war paper quota.

Comet incidentally featured the debut of Thunderbolt Jaxon, apparently still superheroing somewhere, drawn by Mancunian Hugh McNeill (who drew Pansy Potter in the first issue of the Beano, then worked on LOADS of other comics including many tots titles like Playhour and Jack & Jill)

I could go on, but at the moment, I won't.

Joshua & Alex in Night at the Gallery

Just completed the final of 4 very enjoyable mornings of comic workshops at the Ark Pupil Referral Unit in Whitefield. One of the mornings was a trip to Manchester Art Gallery, which inspired our connect-the-plots comic (planned, drawn, printed and stapled in about an hour!) -
Joshua the Lion is taken from Landseer's amazing lifesize painting, and Alex is a fictional member of out group that gets left behind and locked in overnight.

click images to enlarge-


Congratulations to all the children and parents that took part - all have been brilliant in creating such a funny and skillfully drawn story. Keep drawing, everyone!
Also, thanks to all the staff for looking after me so nicely, and awarding me this great certificate -

They're the first place to ever have me back (last year's Bob & Bonecrusher comic posted here), so I'm chuffed about that too.