The Secret Language of Comics: Visual Thinking and Writing

Tag: sk11

Seeing and Being Seen ft. Queen and Slim

Student Posts

Over the break, I saw the movie “Queen and Slim” with my family. I watched it after an emotional experience, and then the movie only heightened my emotional fragility. I was moved. Even though I have my critiques, I must say that the visuals were stunning. I chose this iconic image for a few reasons: the movie was on my mind, my friend has a jacket that has the same neckline, and all you have to do to recreate the photo is look at another person. I know that I am white and do not have a car to sit on or a small animal print dress, but I feel the most important part of this image is what Queen glancing at Slim, and Slim’s cool glance at the camera tells about their complex and sudden relationship. It was a lot harder to recreate than I thought it would be because I couldn’t look at my friend without laughing. It felt uncomfortable to study someone’s face when they aren’t looking at you, but know that you are looking at them. Recreating this image helped to reinforce the emotions prevalent in this scene.

Sock Vader vs. Bread Kenobi

Student Posts
“Your powers are wheat, old man.”

Yeah, I recreated what is one of my favorite scene in the Star Wars saga with a piece of bread and a sock. I know this duel gets knocked for its less than flashy action, but the quips and calm demeanor of Ben’s final moments are what sell it for me. And Luke’s ensuing “No!” and John Williams’ music are a cinematic embodiment of that Pacha meme.

Image from Star Wars (1977), via the website Nerdist

Above is the image I used for reference. May the force be with you.

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial… kind of

Student Posts

For this week’s recreation of a movie assignment I chose to depict a scene from the classic movie- E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. When I saw the picture of this particular scene I knew it be great to try to recreate. I already had the red sweatshirt and I saw a weird sloth stuffed animal hanging from my roommate’s bed that would make the perfect E.T., so I grabbed that and a basket from my residence hall lounge and hopped on some random bike for the picture. Ultimately, I think it turned out really great and I had a lot of fun completing this assignment.

Sketch 11: Recreate a movie scene

Sketches

Chris Pratt holds the raptors at bay in Jurassic World.

Due: 12/1

Tag: sk11

Choose a single moment from a movie or television episode and recreate that scene as closely as you can in a single photograph. Think about how you can creatively use wardrobe items or props that you already have at your disposal and the landscapes and building spaces available to you in order to create your scene. In fact, you might find that it’s best to begin by thinking about what you might be able to pull off and to work backward from there to choosing a scene.

By definition, you don’t have incredibly powerful movie cameras, cinematographers, a cast and crew, a prop and set design department, and CGI f/x staff for post production; therefore, you are never going to perfectly recreate any scene. However, with a little creativity you can still create a powerful version of a scene even without all that fancy paraphernalia, as in the version of Jurassic World at the top of this post and others seen here.

More than a decade ago, I recreated these scenes above as part of a larger photographic creative project. For my version of Lost in Translation, I rearranged the furniture in my bedroom and borrowed my wife’s bathrobe. I could never quite get the tilt of my head right. For my recreation of Albrecht Dürer’s Self Portrait of 1500, I couldn’t reproduce the proportions because I was required to make all my shots 4×3 landscape photos and my hair wasn’t long enough to quite pull off the portrait. But I bought a black plastic tablecloth for 99 cents for the background and made the sleeve decorations with crayons on paper. I used a fuzzy scarf and an old leather jacket for the clothes. Despite taking numerous shots and studying the painting very, very closely, I could never get my right hand into exactly the correct position.

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