Ellis Broadhead EPQ

For Week 4, I decided to do a session on Art Styles and Drawing Tips, as I'm aware that many students at the club feel insecure towards their drawings. In this lesson, I aim to show them that their are many ways of drawing characters for a comic - they just have to find their own style.  I chose four notable art styles from cartoons and comics they may recognise to emphasise my point: Adventure Time Marvel Comics Avatar: The Last Airbender Gravity Falls

I found an academic source by Arthur Berger through Google Scholar named Comics and Culture.  Session Date: 14/12/17 Resource Used: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.0022-3840.1971.0501_164.x  by Arthur Berger. Brief Summary/Description of Source: Comics and Culture discusses the negative attitude that has been taken towards comics within society, viewing them as a 'lesser' piece of media, and argues against this. What Was I Hoping To Find Out?: I was hoping to understand how attitudes towards comics have changed over time. Brief Summary of What I've Learnt From the Source: I learnt how the popularisation of comics provided entertainment and laughter in bleak times, and how Berger believes they shaped American culture. Reliability of the Source: Due to the fact that this is an academic source from a published book, I think the source is extremely reliable. However, it was written in 1971, so I must be wary of how attitudes have been changed tod...

Here's the link to the PowerPoint from today's session: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uVlcyKnEYJqosNs2UPX9j89kCCCWfJR_/view?usp=sharing What Went Well: I had to do a lot of research into this topic, as I didn't know too much about writing an effective plot for a comic book, but I'm confident I managed to present my findings well to my students!  Areas for Improvement: Firstly, they all immediately neglected to ignore my advice on needlessly killing off characters. However, this week I decided to add a section at the end where they could discuss their plot ideas and receive feedback, but unfortunately, this discussion tended to deviate frequently from the topic. Therefore, I don't think I'll be adding that again.

For Week 3 of comic club, I'm doing a short session on how to write an effective plot! Of course, plot is one of the most important aspects of writing a comic, so naturally I need to teach my students what they should and should not be doing. To aid me in this, I found another Terrible Writing Advice Video:

I found this article while researching the importance of the creative subjects in our modern society. Session Date: 6/12/17 Resource Used: https://www.designweek.co.uk/issues/27-november-3-december-2017/creative-sectors-worth-92bn-uk-economy-government-research-reveals/   by Sarah Dawood Brief Summary/Description of Source: Design Week is an online news source that primarily discusses creative industries. What Was I Hoping To Find Out?: I was hoping to understand the importance of creative subjects in our society. Brief Summary of What I've Learnt From the Source: I learnt that creative industries have the highest growth rate, and are worth £91.8bn to the UK. " The sector that provided the most value to the economy in 2016 was digital, making up 6.7% of the UK economy, followed by the creative industries at 5.3%, and tourism at 3.8%." Reliability of the Source: Design Week appears to be a legitimate online news source, with professional journalists, despite ...

Here's a link to the PowerPoint from Week 2! https://drive.google.com/file/d/1v5Vnda99js3KBswVtBNu56V-Nxx_gEq9/view?usp=sharing What Went Well: Introducing harder to understand topics with concise bullet points has worked really well. For example, there are many varied ways to write good characters, but I've explained what NOT to do in a clear way very simply. Furthermore, including a video was a good idea, because this is way more engaging for the students than me talking. Areas to Improve:  I think I included a little too much this week, as the session ran over a little. I needed to take into account the fact that my students ask a lot of questions, which takes up quite a lot of the time.

Right now, I'm toying with the idea of writing and drawing my comic on two characters I developed quite heavily fairly recently. The story is about Lunar and Avery, a real-life prophet and his manager, who own and run a fortune-telling business, while trying to escape the clutches of an evil organisation who just want to use Lunar for his powers. Here are some concept sketches: And here's some sketches of a possible main villain:

For Week 2, I decided to research on YouTube for some fun and engaging videos that could assist me in teaching my students about the importance of character creation. From here, I stumbled across this video on the clichéd 'Mary Sue' character types, on a channel called 'Terrible Writing Advice'. Session Date: 1/12/17 Resource Used: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhrfhQbY0K8 Brief Summary/Description of Source: Provides a simplified incredibly sarcastic description on how not to write a character. What Was I Hoping To Find Out?: I was hoping to find an engaging video on character creation that was easy for my students (aged 11-14) to follow and understand.  Brief Summary of What I've Learnt From the Source: I learnt all about the common cliché of 'Mary Sues' within character creation, and how immensely unpopular they are to an audience. Reliability of the Source: By searching through the account's YouTube, I found a link to the creato...

Where I'm At: Despite the fact that I was ill on the intended first week of comic club and had to push it back a week, I feel that I have made tremendous progress this month. Firstly, I managed to run a successful first club meeting, and I spread the word effectively around school in order to ensure I got a decent number of dedicated students. I also managed to jot down some initial ideas for my own comic. Goals for December: -  Research.  I need to do some research for both the second and third club meetings. The second week is on character creation and design, whereas the third week is on writing an effective plot. To be able to do this, I'll have to research into each topic in detail, and find videos on YouTube by writers and artists on how to do this. -  Ideas.  Further my own comic ideas and try to finalise them and decide what I want to do. Because it takes me a long time to decide, for now, I've decided that I'll simply work out a plot outline. -...