When growing up, the newspaper to me always seemed
like something only old folks would read. It looked like just a jumble of
boring words, collected with boring pictures, on normal boring paper.
Everything about the newspaper screamed boring, that is, until the day that I
realized there are comics hidden inside the middle of every Sunday newspaper.
In 1994, Patrick McDonnell created the comic strip, Mutts. Ever since the day
that I discovered the exciting world of Sunday comics, I've enjoyed Mutts the
most.
So when asked to analyze a comic, it's only logical to use my favorite
one!
Cartoonist are used to working
with limited space. Their style is a little abstracted so the fine detail isn’t
always there. But cartoonists have a way of using lines to help viewers
understand what is going on. For example they can make objects look textured. In
the comic strip I have chosen, the emphasized texture is fur. Short lines
represent the fur that is flying off of the character and is sticking to
everything in sight. We can
conclude that the character, Mooch, isn’t exploding because in the final panel,
Mooch’s speech bubble tells us that it is shedding season. In this particular
comic strip, McDonnell has the character talking to us. Since Mooch’s eye line
is looking straightforward, as if he’s looking out of the comic and into the
real world, it helps convince us that he is talking to us.
The other details that McDonnell
includes but doesn’t get carried away with are the decorations in the room. We
can clearly see there are two armchairs, a pillow, and an oval. The armchairs
are very plain and do not have any pattern on them. One has a blanket and the
other has a single pillow. The lines coming from the wall signify that the
floor is hardwood. McDonnell doesn’t make them solid lines so that we focus
more on the character and speech bubble. There are also lines coming down from
the top of the comic. Once again they’re not solid lines and one could assume
that they’re representing wallpaper. The oval in the top left of the comic
doesn’t have anything in it. We can tell it’s a frame because McDonnell places
and oval inside of another oval. What it is supposed to be is completely up to
the viewer. Whether it is a window, mirror, or picture the choice is ours.
The last trick cartoonist have is
creating depth. McDonnell makes us believe this comic has depth by placing the
bottom of the armchairs a little bit below the plane (where the wall meets the
floor). This gives us the illusion that there is space between the armchairs and
the wall. Also he places lines under things such as the oval to represent a shadow.
