I carry on! In spite of what was one of the busiest weeks on record at work (my manager was on vacation, and thus I got to do the work of two maxed-out people), I managed to get some good writing in.
Translating Thunderstruck to prose has really given me an appreciation of how much flexibility the comic form gives you. There are some really cool things that you can do in comics that have no direct analogue in prose. I mean, this comic for example:
Comic 56 from Chapter 3...
I like that one. You get an ominous feel for what Grandma is up to, all done in pictures. Now, I can think of a way to describe those scenes of Grandma's and make it work, but the way they're plopped into the middle of Sharon and Gail's conversation is just not a thing that will fly in a prose context. Then you move on a few strips to something like this:
Comic 59 from Chapter 3...
And that's pretty much a wash. There are literally ten scene jumps on one page. You can make that work in a comic (I thought so, anyway), but in prose it would be a mess. And yes, there are plenty of solutions for getting across the same point. It's just interesting to appreciate how much freedom for certain things that the comic form allows.
Prose, on the other hand, has its own strengths, like I said in my last post. The translation between the two is giving me a new appreciation of both.
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1 comment:
Not quite. First, you can easily divide up the conversation between Gail and Sharon and on their Grandmother's antics in preparing her trap against Sharon. In fact, that would be the most effective method to tell that story prose-wise.
As for the section on November 1, 2004, what you have to do is eliminate the extraneous details and cut to the core of the discussion. For instance (and this is fairly bare-bones here, my apologies):
"Anyway, this is going to be the first big party since youv'e been healed," Gail said, glancing over at Sharon. "I wonder what people will think?"
Sharon rubbed the side of her head and gave her sister a half-smile. "Mom's been preparing her friends, but she can't really keep her story straight. Let's see... there's 'electro-therapy,' the "surgery thing with electrodes,' and of course my favorite, electrolysis!"
Gail smirked back at Sharon. "Oh, like YOU have room to talk!"
"Who me? Hee hee!"
"Yeah you. Let's see... acupuncture, hypnosis, the baboon spine transplant, and my favorite, the 'strategic use of small explosive charges.' I swear, people will believe ANYTHING if you say it with a straight face," she said, shaking her head in disbelief.
Sharon looked over at Gail and shrugged, "Hey, the truth is even weirder, you know."
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It's doable. You just need to stick with the core elements and toss the extraneous fluff.
Rob H.
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