I've always wondered about that, if certain panel juxtapositions were easier to read than others
I'm inclined to say yes, but that's an answer borne out of personal experience and my sitting and nodding at telophase's visual flow analyses, rather than from extensive perusal of the available scientific evidence.
If certain panel juxtapositions are easier to read than others, there's probably some degree of cultural variance. I remember while I was a student in a film class, being absolutely thrilled to realize that saccadic patterns in the American version of The Ring were mirror-reversed from the original Japanese Ringu (left-to-right is natural for Americans; right-to-left is natural for Japanese, although I've been told there's some funky text tricks depending on whether the text is horizontal, vertical, romanji, or not romanji. Japanese seems to be fiendishly difficult).
Now, I started reading American comics in high school and I would like to say that I don't believe myself to be an "unskilled reader" in my preference for manga.
God forbid that I should give the impression in this post that I think manga is less inherently sophisticated than American comics, or that preferring manga marks one as immature or naive as a reader. I have had experience with both, and though I deeply love American comics (especially capes), and all their weird idiosyncrasies, I prefer manga; I find manga to be, on the whole, a more fulfilling comics experience than western comics. I've seen a lot more manga achieve that sublime harmony between word and image that sets comics apart from novels and cinema than I've ever seen in western comics; if I step very carefully around text-heavy western comics, it's because I have a lurking suspicion that an illustrated text story is in some kind of class of its own, and I'm reluctant to dismiss it as an artistic aim.
The word easy is a dangerous one, and I've used it to my own peril: easy is wonderful if you're in advertising, deadly if you're a critic.
I'm thrilled that the audience for manga has many people who have never read, and may never read American comics. I'm glad it can reach a new audience, a healthy audience that isn't dependant on the precarious American comics industry; when I speculate about the reasons why it can reach that audience, it's fueled by curiousity about what it is in comics that reaches readers, and not by a desire to pass judgement on those readers.
Some American comic storyboarders don't even pay heed to speech bubble placement-- they draw the art first and Photoshop bubbles in later to accomodate space rather than to enhance flow, so it's naturally more difficult to follow
True. I think this is greatly a product of the way so many American comics divide responsibilities between writers, pencilers, inkers, and letterers. Of course, many solo indy artists share the tendency to shove text off in a corner where it won't interfere with the art, but I tend to believe that's mostly an aesthetic legacy; it's something that American (and, for chrissakes, all the other western comics artists that I'm lumping together in my own ignorance) artists and readers can and maybe should learn to overcome.
pt 1
I'm inclined to say yes, but that's an answer borne out of personal experience and my sitting and nodding at
If certain panel juxtapositions are easier to read than others, there's probably some degree of cultural variance. I remember while I was a student in a film class, being absolutely thrilled to realize that saccadic patterns in the American version of The Ring were mirror-reversed from the original Japanese Ringu (left-to-right is natural for Americans; right-to-left is natural for Japanese, although I've been told there's some funky text tricks depending on whether the text is horizontal, vertical, romanji, or not romanji. Japanese seems to be fiendishly difficult).
Now, I started reading American comics in high school and I would like to say that I don't believe myself to be an "unskilled reader" in my preference for manga.
God forbid that I should give the impression in this post that I think manga is less inherently sophisticated than American comics, or that preferring manga marks one as immature or naive as a reader. I have had experience with both, and though I deeply love American comics (especially capes), and all their weird idiosyncrasies, I prefer manga; I find manga to be, on the whole, a more fulfilling comics experience than western comics. I've seen a lot more manga achieve that sublime harmony between word and image that sets comics apart from novels and cinema than I've ever seen in western comics; if I step very carefully around text-heavy western comics, it's because I have a lurking suspicion that an illustrated text story is in some kind of class of its own, and I'm reluctant to dismiss it as an artistic aim.
The word easy is a dangerous one, and I've used it to my own peril: easy is wonderful if you're in advertising, deadly if you're a critic.
I'm thrilled that the audience for manga has many people who have never read, and may never read American comics. I'm glad it can reach a new audience, a healthy audience that isn't dependant on the precarious American comics industry; when I speculate about the reasons why it can reach that audience, it's fueled by curiousity about what it is in comics that reaches readers, and not by a desire to pass judgement on those readers.
Some American comic storyboarders don't even pay heed to speech bubble placement-- they draw the art first and Photoshop bubbles in later to accomodate space rather than to enhance flow, so it's naturally more difficult to follow
True. I think this is greatly a product of the way so many American comics divide responsibilities between writers, pencilers, inkers, and letterers. Of course, many solo indy artists share the tendency to shove text off in a corner where it won't interfere with the art, but I tend to believe that's mostly an aesthetic legacy; it's something that American (and, for chrissakes, all the other western comics artists that I'm lumping together in my own ignorance) artists and readers can and maybe should learn to overcome.