Analysis

‘The Loneliest Rock’ is story about a day in the life of the moon (Luna). My idea was transform the moon into an animate object by giving it a conscience. Earth is the only planet in the solar system with one moon. I decided to use this fact and portray the moon as feeling very lonely. The moon is envious of Mars and the fact that it has 2 moons. The comic story also shows the launch of the first satellite, ‘Sputnik 1’ on October 4th, 1957 by the U.S.S.R. The moon has never seen a satellite before and is baffled when it sees Sputnik approaching for the first time. The moon gets really excited and wants to befriend Sputnik. The moon attempts to communicate with Sputnik, but, being an inanimate satellite, Sputnik proceeds on orbit and leaves the moon behind. The moon returns to his loneliness. I aimed to go for a tragedy rather than a comedy. ‘The Loneliest Rock’ is a touching story that attempts to narrate human thoughts and emotions in a creative and grander scheme. The historical launch of Sputnik adds a factual plot, thus making the story more relatable. As a short, graphic novel, ‘The Loneliest Rock’ is architected around Scott McCloud’s comic analysis model. McCloud states that the comic’s message is amplified to the reader through simplification. The more cartoony an image is, the more it is relatable by people. Our self-centeredness allows us to see ourselves in everything. “Identities are assigned where none exist” (McCloud) In other words, life is given to what is lifeless; to practically any inanimate object. All artwork was done using Adobe Illustrator CS5 and Comic Life. Planet shapes, space, galaxies and stars were simplified to what McCloud would call, an ‘iconic abstraction’. The art would be placed mid-top centre of McCloud’s picture plane. Moons, planet and stars are not mere circles and diamonds, they are much more complicated than that. We perceive such phenomena by representing them with simplified icons. I applied five out of the six categories of panel-to-panel transitions. The Loneliest Rock contains Moment-To-Moment, Action-To-Action, Subject-To-Subject, Scene-To-Scene and Aspect-To-Aspect. Transitions between panels provide closure to the reader. Arranging the panels was quiet challenging in terms of size and spacing. I wanted the reader to perceive the vastness and emptiness of Space. I thought this would be achieved by adding a couple of extra large frames to put the audience into perspective. Adding primary color to the comic creates a powerful iconic effect. We assign simple primary colors for planets. Earth for example is assigned blue and green, the moon is grey, and Mars is red. The colors emphasize the shapes and objectify the subjects. The use of colors and gradients give the comic its impact. ‘The Lonely Rock’ was carefully thought of and planned using McCloud’s theory. It is a deep and touching story that could metaphor how technology occupies our longing for meaningful and lasting social relationships. I hope you enjoy it.
 * __My Comic Creation Analysis__ **