My project is a comic about the momentary connection between strangers in the pursuit of a sunset. The story is autobiographical and a reflection of what I hold dear in my life: the little moments we share everyday that we might not otherwise pay attention to. The final comic is the outcome of weeks of way finding and redirection: I started with a particular vision for the story I wanted to tell, but what I have now is a work in progress towards the voice I hope to develop to tell that story.
I started the semester trying different ways of making comics:
In my first couple of comics, I used zoomorphic characters to explore big questions. I would find a big idea to latch onto and form an argument around it to create a journey that is explored by the pondering cat or dog. I did this activity to respond to PCE readings, but also to get practice in forming a visual story.
I tried using the same zoomorphic characters to tell the bigger story I originally wanted to tell. I felt like I couldn’t relate to my own story anymore. My story also suddenly felt so big and scary that I felt like I couldn’t do it justice with the skills I had at hand.
I started practicing with different — real life — stories using different methods of making. I gave myself grace to work and rework entire comics and go back to quick, grimy, traditional making methods instead of using flashy, clean, digital drawings. I realised that, instead of telling a whole story, I felt much more equipped to tell stories in short chunks, like the above comic about discovering contentment and the one below about a sunset I saw in July.
This learning design project is unique because I, the designer, was designing for me. Through this experience, I learned how I wanted my story to be told and what I felt was missing in my ability to tell. There were parts of my story I felt comfortable writing in words or expressing verbally, but I couldn’t bring myself to express it in a visual medium. To me, it was reckoning of the fact that I haven’t developed my artistic practice enough to feel like the time taken to turn certain stories I have into a comic would be worth it yet. When thinking about myself as the client, I reflected a lot on what I wanted resolved. I, first and foremost, wanted to be able to tell stories in comics — I’ve been meaning to tell silly and non-silly stories in a visual format for a long time, and this was the perfect opportunity to 1. start and 2. learn about what I’d share if given the opportunity. I’ve found it easy so far to talk about impersonal and philosophical concepts; I can put in minimal effort to feel like I did the idea justice. When I start getting personal, it’s more difficult to be less intentional. I think this is because the story is about a feeling, rather than an explanation, yet the text cannot carry the weight of sentiment the same way it can carry an explanation, so the visuals need to do more heavy lifting to curate the nuance and the vibe. The below comic “A Sunset With Strangers” was designed to be read with no text, and was my attempt and storytelling through only visual elements.
