Panel after panel of people opening their mouths is not a fun idea. So how is this problem dealth with? How to draw a long conversation without mentally killing oneself?
Keep their hands busy!
There were a lot of fan theories to explain the quirky habits of the three detective masterminds, but I believe it was mostly to make Takeshi Obata's job easier. It can be hard to draw idle characters, so basically you need to have some kind of physical thing going on if you want to make the talky bits visually interesting. It gets dull just having the characters sit still and exchange their lines. Something more needs to happen, even if it's just a bar of chocolate.
(Billy Bat)
Again, I'm reflecting the subject to my own projects! Incidentally the second issue of Phantomland has so much dialogue that I'm constantly at my wit's end trying to deliver it all smoothly. As a consequence some of the characters have become coffee or tea drinkers... although I kind of hate drawing dishware.
That said, there are also things like Jon's smoking. He didn't always smoke in my drawings - some of my earlier story plans actually had a completely abstinent Jon. But he's not that smart anymore, partly because the fact stands that smokers have better poses available. It's easier to look cool and dignified when you have an item to hold.
Like Freud.
I love that zooming thing Urazawa does. The consistent use of close-ups makes his storytelling really dynamic even when it's all about those talking heads. What's really impressive is that he does it with like every page and it keeps working, probably because the style makes the most of the characters even when they don't really do anything other than glare.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I was just raging at every single piece of BL ever having at least one of the leads smoke. I mean, it's one thing when you have a gruff, cool-looking guy who could totally do some Freudian posing like your dude there, but when a bunch of lanky yaoi boys are at it, it's just kind of sad and really done to death. And it's not like the average BL story even has that much dialogue to cover... (Yeah, I needed to vent.)
Very interesting post. It's true, I've lost interest in stories because of too much dialogue and not enough action.
ReplyDeleteFreud ... .... oh no you didn't XD
ReplyDeleteI found death note 13, the one that explains quite a bit about the making of the series interesting. I think the authors wrote about this thing in there, too, at least my memory recalls so. Nevertheless, good points.
Käsiin kannattaa varsinkin joissakin tilanteissa todella keskittyä. Sillä ei ratkaise pelkästään puhuvien päiden ongelmaa vaan voi myös tuoda esiin yleensä hahmon persoonallisuutta tai tunnetiloja kehonkielen kautta.
ReplyDeleteJoo, ja tämä tulee sellaiselta ihmiseltä, joka on itse syyllistynyt puhuviin päihin dynaamisen kerronnan sijasta ja ei yleensä tule keskittyneeksi käsiin sen vertaa että ne näyttäisivät käsiltä... Ei sellaista olisi pitänyt päästää julkaistavaksi asti. :/
Oh lord. I actually never thought about this. I haven't really tackled the subject of writing and drawing a comic and this is a really interesting point to raise. In action-scenes, you always got an idea of how to fill the panels because the scenario progresses by itself. But at times when situations are contemplated and solutions concluded, you gotta come up with something. I can see it now, the hands in Death Note and *certain* other things in Urasawa's work. I think with Urasawa, it's even more complicated. I see mutual zooming in on faces, I see slow but notable moving of faces and changing facial expressions – all in all, it seems a little like a dramatic flip-book-movie, prolonged by dialogue.
ReplyDeleteUnless I'm reading too much or the wrong things into this, it's rather interesting!
That said though, I remember reading that Tsugumi Ohba, the writer of Death Note, had to cut out a lot of text, each time the two creators met up with their editor to talk about the storyboard, haha.
And I know what you mean when you talk about the danger of too much dialogue in manga and comics. Taking Death Note as an example again, there were times when I was really excited about the story but when I turned the page and saw 60% of it being speech-bubbles, I sighed in chagrin~
Still, worth it!
Thanks for this entry, it made me think, haha... Keep it up!
Arana: Haha, now that you mention it, most of the BL semes I can think of are indeed smokers.
ReplyDeleteralleywolf: But dialogue isn't a bad thing as long as you know how to present it right...
Eva: What about Freud? :D He looks pretty cool there right?
Aura: Jep! Kädetkin kuuluu tosiaan kehonkieleen. Harmi vaan että käsiä on joskus todella vaikea piirtää :-D
MisterFox: True, there are a lot of things about comics you just don't realize until you're drawing one yourself...
And yeah, haha, even after the cuts Death Note still has a pretty sick amount of dialogue. But then again, it's not exactly worse than just reading a book I guess.
Eipä tuota koskaan ole tullut ajateltua tietoisesti, mutta nyt kun mainittiin niin huomaan itsekin helpottavani keskustelujen piirtämistä antamalla hahmoille jotakin pientä puuhasteltavaa.
ReplyDeleteOikeastaanhan tuo on myös sinänsä realistista, ihmisillä kun on helposti tapana etsiä käsilleen tekemistä (kynien naksuttelu, itse huomioin harrastavani puhelimeni läpän avaamista ja sulkemista, jos olen toimettomana.)
I am more than familiar with this problem... Years ago I was working on a storyboard for a lengthy comic starring (imaginary) German Great General Staff officers. (I never finished this one, so don't even ask where to get it.) It was an angsty drama heavy on scenes of these guys masterminding military operations. An exciting and dramatic subject, yes, but it was damn hard to make look good on paper since my characters were mostly sitting and discussing and, at their most exciting and dynamic, pointing at a map.
ReplyDelete...not to mention that the script was a pain in the butt to write, since I didn't go to the Kriegsschule.
However, the style was rather expressionist (more like shojo manga from the 70's than a military drama...duh), so I was able to use unconventional page layouts and fancy effects to my heart's content. So adorning the background with apocalyptic visions from the front while LtGen X was pondering the consequences of his decision was a common trick. Of course I couldn't resort to this all the time, so many of the characters developed peculiar mannerisms. In my honor it must be stated that none of them was a chain smoker or a manic tea/coffee/[insert something else] drinker though.
I found this blog a while ago and have been really enjoying it. Seeing how much thought you put in your work, I have come to respect you.