ABOUT ILLUSTRATED TEXT...

When we talk about illustrated text my mind goes straight to children’s books and comics, but actually the topic is encompasses more than that and it originates a long time ago. First attempts to tell stories through graphics emerged from the paintings in caves. Then, religion, especially the Catholic religion, which used pictures to spread the belief to the masses. Then illustrations were used to decorate the first printed books and later on they were introduced in different genres including children’s books and texts for adults.

The first children’s books were thought to be educative; they showed how a good child should behave using examples of poor children, sometimes orphans, that could improve their condition only by following the right track. Children’s books became popular from the 19^th Century; some authors and illustrators of that time have become classics like Alice in Wonderland, Huckleberry Finn, Peter Pan not to mention the innumerable Grimm’s fables.

Illustrated texts have developed over time creating different genre such as comics, graphic novels and cartoons and covering a variety of topics like politics, superheroes, fables, tragic historical events and so on.

As a reader my interest rests with most of them, but when it comes to work for the realization on an illustrated text, children’s books are the ones that appeal to me the most. Inventing a story and creating its illustrations require the writer to pay attention to some rules regarding colours, shapes, placement and framing. It involves studying several aspects such as: the number of pictures necessary to balance the text; when to choose words over images; whether to use pictures that show the same things as the text (congruence), or pictures that illustrate something different (incongruence) or vice versa, or again pictures that add more details to the text (complementary) or the other way around; where to place the pictures into the text (left, right, above, below...). When you know the rules it is also possible to break them if necessary. To sum up, creating a children’s book means a lot of work to do, but also a lot of fun!     

      

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ABOUT WRITING FOR NOVEL...

I’ve always being fascinated by people, (especially young people), who are able to write a manuscript; have the chance – with also a bit of fortune – to be picked up by publishers and obtain success at their first novel. I’ve always wondered how they do it—how they go about creating an interesting and captivating story with consistent characters and dialogue. In other words, realizing a verisimilar story that keeps the readers glued to the book, page after page.

Well, the time for admiration turned into a time for experimentation when I had to put myself to action. The challenge is hard, the difficulties huge. From the choice of the plot to the creation of characters and beyond, in a language that is not mine, I’ve met with all obstacles that a novice writer often falls into. For instance, the  tendency to tell too much instead of showing. ‘Show, don’t tell’ is one of the most important rules every teacher will tell and repeat to their students, yet when writing it is not simple to apply. Telling and showing get opposite results: boring the reader with too many descriptions in the first case and, in the second case, involving the reader and letting them to forget about the author, let them see what is happening. Actions make the difference between one and the other effect. Complications need to emerge; in the construction of dialogue, you need to pay particular attention to the use of attributes. It is easy to lose control of them. The writer has to remember to make it clear who is talking, without weighing down the writing with with a lot of ‘he said/she saids’.

These are only few of the pitfalls I have faced; the list could go on and on, and still that question bounces in my head: how do writers do it? 

NEW MEDIA: AN EXAMPLE OF ITS POTENTIALITY AND DRAWBACKS

Internet and its constant development allows people to be both audience and producers of content.

The idea of ‘Producing’ appealed to Melbournian Owen Vanderberg, the creator of Capsule, TweetFilm and the current Death by Consumption, a podcast based on what people are passionate about and consume with voracity. Vanderberg is attracted by the accessibility of new media that rather than limiting his ideas allows them take form in different products.

“The idea that there’s so much the creator can do, and then it’s up to the audience to finish the work”(Vanderberg, 2014)

Capsule, a small dose of fiction was a literary space on Internet where everyone could submit their creations of 250 words. Readers could put comments on any short fictions and receive answer from the writer.

TweetFilm was a project that wanted to link the experience of watching a movie and interacting on Twitter. The result was the creation of a community who, from their home at the same time watched the same movie and interacted each other with comments through Twitter. Successively, it found a venue in the city where people could watch together the film on a screen. Tweets were projected alongside the movie. “It was a fun way to combine the old and the new”, said Owen. In fact, “if you made a joke you could actually hear laughter, something that comedy on Twitter usually lacks” (Vanderberg, 2014). The collaboration of new and old doesn’t emerge only from the product in itself, but also in the way to get audience; if new media allow new contents, it is still the ancient word of mouth that has a big role in informing and attracting people on new realizations.

However, the risk to close down is always a constant, due to the vulnerability of the vehicle and the audience. Capsule launched in 2011 it hasn’t had a long life, TweetFilm closed in 2013 after two year of activity. As Vanderberg claims, “As soon as tech gets in the way of what you’re trying to do, you risk your audience switching off” (Vanderberg, 2014).

Reference:

·      Vanderberg, 2014 from a recent interview by Angela Meyer, lecture 7, week 7: People in Multi and New Media, presented 2 September 2014.

Note: all the information about the ‘life’ of Capsule and TweetFilm are based on the respective websites.

IF THIS COLOUR WASN'T A COLOUR

When someone names a colour, the majority of us think about the colour, not the word. People who are born visually impaired, have a different approach. What is colour to them? We see colours everyday, with their different hue. We learn to distinguish things from their colour, so the sun is yellow, the water is blue, the forest is green. Our life is coloured.

Today, I was invited to think about a colour and describe it without mentioning it. Hence, I suppose I should probably examine it as if it wasn’t a colour.

If this colour was a feeling, it would embrace a lot of emotions: it is happiness and fun. It is the colour of friends when they get together, when they share their stories and have a good time.

It’s a good joke, a burst of laughter.

It’s a baby that smiles at you.

It’s your dog that wags its tail when you take him for a walk; when you give him a delicacy he shouldn’t have or when you come back home.

It’s a reggae song, which pushes you to dance as if you have effervescent bubbles within. It’s a burst of energy; an idea that comes up to your mind; a desire to create.     

It’s a colour without sex, but like a coin, it has two faces. Indeed, for some cultures this is the colour of jealously and envy. When it comes to you it is difficult to get rid of. It resettles in your liver and makes you do regretful things.

If it is associated to a health matter, this may not be a good colour. It may be the alarm of a small or grave dysfunction.

If it was a smell or a taste, it can be nice or horrible, but in most cases it has an acidic, sour taste.

It’s the colour of something of vital importance for growth.

It makes you warm. You can love it, if you are cold, or you can hate it, if you are looking for refreshment. 

Need another hint? It’s the colour of the summer!

COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY IN THE FUTURE

People say that the smarter technology becomes, the more humans become stupid. Indeed, with the use of mobile phones and recent smart phones, for example, we use our brain less. We don’t have to remember things that our “friend” in the pocket can easily store.

Moreover, technology cannot stop its development. Certainly, the use of the Internet will not disappear, but the device will be subjected to some change. We already assist this change. In fact, even if they are not popular yet, different companies have already introduced to the market watches able to connect to the Net. So, we might assist the revolution of smartphone that will become the smart-watch, a device with the same function of the previous one, but just in a smaller shape.

User comfort has been considered important by a fashion designer who has released a bracelet that warns its owner, when she has spent too much time under the sun. Besides the high cost, this clever device has still to overcome other issues such as being designed only for ladies and, most important, its inability to work if wet.

It is likely that the development in communication technology will fix these weaknesses and encourage further research in linked fields, such as medicine. The improvement in technology may offer better communication between patients and their doctor, and a communication between patients and their sick organs, through devices able to sound an alarm when people put their bodies at risk.

In future videoconference, shortening distances will be the normality through 3D and intangible display with touch screen technology. Hence, during critical surgery, doctors in one hospital will be able to conduct the operation under the supervision of an expert situated on the other side of the world.

Students of tomorrow will probably not need to go to school, but class will normally hold by the Internet; or in a more futuristic scenario, children will have their personal teacher at home in the shape of Artificial Intelligence.

In this futuristic scenario, a few smart people will use their brain for the comfort of the masses, who will inevitably get lazier. We will communicate less with human beings and more with robots. We won’t call our husbands or wives in order to defrost something for dinner while we are at work, but we will communicate directly with our fridge, smart enough to follow our commands.

Sms language will improve so much that codes used today, such as smiles and other symbols, will be considered as hieroglyphics of the 21^st Century.

Few smart people will develop a universal war code that will aim no to kill soldiers and civilians, but attack only technological systems among countries in conflict. These will be the technological wars; countries in conflict will spread viruses through the Net, able to damage the entire technological system of a nation and cause more or less serious discomfort to its population. Until one day, in front of the impossibility to talk with our devices, some “stupid human being” will rediscover the necessity to really talk with another “stupid human being”.

Hopefully, in this futuristic scenario a few smart people will be smart enough to respectful the environment and develop innovative technologies that follow a green philosophy.