Visual Techniques
History
Story Tropes
Vocabulary
Potpurri
100
When an object or character in one panel intrudes into another panel.
What is bleed?
100
The year the first modern comic, The Yellow Kid, was published.
What is 1898?
100
Often the protagonist or "good guy," this kind of character is usually a metahuman with "powers."
What is a superhero?
100
What is a short story or joke told in a sequence of panels?
What is a comic strip?
100
The man Captain America punched in the face on the cover of his first comic in 1941
Who is Adolf Hitler?
200
When one page or panel has an overall darker or 'heavier' feel to it, conveying a certain emotion.
What is graphic weight?
200
The superhero upon whom almost all subsequent superheroes were based.
Who is Superman?
200
Like Alan Moore's Rorschach or Stan Lee's Wolverine, this kind of character is lacking in traditional heroic attributes (for example, they don't stand for "truth, justice, and the American way").
What is an antihero?
200
A bound collection of comic books originally not published with the intention being collected together.
What is an anthology?
200
This is a term used to describe when two companies, universes, or continuities "invade" each other or temporarily take place in the same space.
What is a crossover?
300
A panel that takes up one or two whole pages.
What is a splash panel?
300
A name for comics or graphic novels with explicit violent, sexual, or mature themes. Often associated with underground and illegal publications.
What is comix?
300
An attribute of a story or character which qualifies it as legitimate and having actually happened within the continuity.
What is canonicity?
300
A storyline set in an alternate timeline which usually plays out following only one small change. It is often used to satisfy a community of readers who were unhappy with the ending of a story.
What is a what-if story?
300
The censorship bureau that approved comics for publication that were free of any suggestive or sexual themes as they saw fit, first established after the publication of the graphic novel, The Seduction of the Innocent, in 1954.
What is the Comics Code Authority?
400
A longshot or extreme longshot panel which sets the stage for the forthcoming action, similar to a technique used in sitcoms.
What is an establishing shot?
400
This was considered the second great "age" of comics, during which Marvel Comics thrived and DC Comics declined in popularity.
What is the Silver Age?
400
Within the superhero action genre, this is said to no longer exist after 1992's "The Death of Superman." See also: X-Men's Jean Grey
What is death?
400
The unit of a comic book. The action takes place in these usually-rectangular frames.
What is a panel?
400
Named for the creator of "The Spirit," this is considered one of the highest honors in the comic book industry.
What is the Eisner Award?
500
It's not a rectangle, and can be used to convey emphasis, emotion, or motion.
What are irregularly-shaped panels?
500
This graphic novel was considered a landmark in the genre, published by Art Spiegleman in 1986 and eventually winning the Pulitzer Prize.
What is Maus?
500
A cop-out device in which a writer ignores or completely "retroactively" changes a piece of established continuity involving a character or storyline.
What is a retcon?
500
This is the space between panels.
What is a gutter?
500
The author and illustrator who created Superman.
Who are Jerome Siegel and Joe Schuster?
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