|
from Manga Max Magazine |
|
| 1.Big
Hair, Big eyes
The obvious starting point. Looking at some pseudo manga you'd think this is all it takes. Except that plenty of manga have neither, so there must be more to it than that. Mind you, you'd be suprised how hard it is to recognise some of your favourite characters without their improbable hairdos! (Pseudo manga is non japanese manga made by non japanese artists hopefuly mine will become one) 2. Proportions Manga isn't short of legs up to arm pits types. As western comics character's proportion are exagerated for dramatic or comedic effect, but while the US sterotypes are bodybuilders and play boy pin ups, the japanese generally veer more towards leggy super models and malnourished waifs. Not just limbs, but also faces, noses and fingers are wildly elongated epsecially in shojo (girl comics) while the average babe would have a skull scarily like a baby's large cranium, big eye sockets wide apart, and a tiny pointed jaw. 3.Super deformed Unique to japan- serious characters whose bodies (and personalities) have been brutally compressed into cute manic parodies of their former selves. The Japanese are happy to suddenly integrate this sort of gag style artwork into an otherwise serious strip to highlight a comical moment something that, to my knowledge, has no parallel in western comics. 4. Visual shorthand All comic art is form of shorthand, a linear smiplification |
 |
| of reality, but manga sports plenty of unique devices to convey emotions which you'll see popping up time and again. A few examples: the fountaining nose bleed indicate lust, the simplified cross of imminently brusting blood vessels to denote anger, or the single large drop let of sweat signalling exasperation or embarrassment. Sprinkle a few through your comic for that authentic japanese touch. Also study the style of simplification of things like high light s on hair, or complex items like explosions. | 5. Storytelling-
had to be shorten
Manga artist have a fundamental advantage over their western counterparts. Room to manoeuver. With comics the size of telephones directories they have the extra page count to take their time unfolding events- something that suffers in translation as their work is chopped into small protions to fit US. So US has to break it down to fit in a small sized comic book. |
| 6.Shading
Since most manga are confined to black and white it's artists are forced to find more ways to convey three dimensional form and texture, resulting in elaborate crosshatching techniques and use of printed tones whose subtle effects were often destroyed by unncessary use of colour in early US reprints. |
7.Sound effects
Far more integral in manga than western comics. Used to accentuate mood and provide dramatic impact, the use of small subtle sounds ( sounf of silence which is shiin) being as important as flashy bangs and crashes. |
| 8. Dead space
again a benefit of more pages- room to make dramatic blank areas od black and white to convey for example loneliness. |
9. Abstracts
Manga seems to make more of abstract shapes, patterns and the symbolic use of items like flower petals and shards of broken glass, epsecially in girls manga with their flowing dream like sequences. |
| 10. Speedlines
Right up there with #1 as must have ( at least to western eyes) for definiative manga look. Mind you the illusion of frantic speed conveyed by hundreds of speedlines seems in inverse portportion to time it takes time to draw hundreds of these lines. |
|