Objective: This work requires you to identify a comic book or graphic novel, the source material from one of the movies seen in class—it must have been shown in class, no exceptions. Work in groups of no less than 3 students. Identify a pivotal scene in the comic book, one with enough dialogue for the group to perform. If 3 students each have a character, then that's equal billing, but if 3 of you have to each do 2 characters, then that's also equal billing and acceptable.
Due Friday Apr. 19th, with all performances taking place from 11:45 a.m. to 1:45 p.m. You may invite guests to attend this event.
Students must state their intentions on Fri. Apr. 5, identifying the team members and graphic novel or comic book they'll be using.
Goals:
- research the printed source material(s) used for one of the movies we've seen in class
- interpret character or characters, giving life to the written words
- use your voice as a tool to create surprise, anger, mystery, compassion, fear, and/or any other emotion(s)
- entertain the audience while being true to the source material
Considerations, Resources, Rules:
- All text shown in the comic book must be voiced by a student or students.
- Share vocal and audio performance responsibilities, giving everyone equal work to do.
- You may perform a scene from your comic book that has been put into the movie, but it doesn't have to be in the movie adaptation. It could be something that was left out of the movie adaptation.
- You may not use a movie's comic book adaptation for your source material. For example, if you choose Captain America: The Winter Soldier movie and want to use its comic book source material, you may not use the comic book that is "the movie storybook" which translates the movie into a comic book. Instead, find a comic book or graphic novel with Captain America, or other characters from The Winter Soldier movie, that was printed/published before the movie.
- How can the source material inform the class about the movie or movies we've seen in class, giving us a deeper understanding of a character, situation, or backstory?
- Your source material may be full color or it may be black and white, but it must be in printed form originally. The RVRC (Rutledge Visual Resource Center) has a wide variety of comic books and graphic novels.
- If a movie was not based on a pre-existing comic book, but you can find a comic book that was made after the movie, that would be acceptable. For example, the movie Darkman was an original screenplay and movie and not based on a comic book that came before it. After the movie came out, if a comic book was made, then that could be an acceptable choice—provided you can find that comic book and that comic book was actually printed/published.
- How will you handle sound effects? Optional, but you may explore these performance elements. One team member may take care of sound effects—if appropriate for your work—and either perform the sound effects live during class (see here, all about WALL•E's sound) or pre-record sounds and play them during class from an audio device.
- No music.
- Ask yourself, How did this work get done during the golden days of radio? Look at The Shadow, among others, as well as Little Orphan Annie. There's also Superman on the radio. BUT, be "period appropriate" meaning, don't make yours sound old-fashioned like The Shadow or Annie, just to make it sound old-fashioned. Listen to those old broadcasts to learn about the voice performance, pacing, etc.
Format:
- find your source material, the comic book or graphic novel, and have it composed into a PDF or PowerPoint—scans work okay for this
- you must show one panel at a time, the drawn and illustrated portion of the comic, and while it's on screen, give a vocal performance
- identify a scene that takes approximately 8–10 minutes to perform, no more, no less
- rehearse, rehearse, rehearse… you should know what you're doing and have practiced it many times
- you may have note cards to read from, or a script—you need not memorize your lines, but you can
- a good model can be found with screenplays: 1 written page of a screenplay takes approximately 1 minute of screen time, so consider pulling out your text from your comic book and drafting it into a screenplay form
- this must be performed live, during class, in front of the class
- pre-recorded elements can only be sound effects
- any/all text in your comic book and/or graphic novel must be spoken: dialogue between or among characters, asides—such as Deadpool breaking the fourth wall, for example—narration, etc.
Evaluation
Worth 45 points:- 15 points: use of vocal tone, pitch, projection/volume, voice modulation, voice effects
- 20 points: teamwork, composing the vocalization as a group, and making it sound and feel natural, believable
- 5 points: appropriateness of chosen content, printed source material from a movie shown in class
- 5 points: preparedness, professionalism, following directions
- teams will receive a group score, so if a team of three students performs a scene from Akira’s graphic novel and they earn a 44 out of 45 for the work, each student would earn a 44 for their own score sheet towards the term's final grade
