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Is the Online World Superman’s Kryptonite?  - The Spirit of Comic Design on the Web

Comic illustration is a precise art that can only be perfected by those who have a natural eye for ‘instances’ (idiosyncrasies in life, particular imaginations or otherwise) which can be transformed into compelling tales. In recent years, original comic illustrative designs have emerged as one of many contemporary elements to grace the pages of popular blogs and websites. Some of these works are not meant to convey specific narratives, but to merely serve as eye-candy, whilst other web haunts have taken the conscious effort to construct more story laden sequences. Either way, comic styled illustrations seem to be the current way forward towards achieving a stunning and ethereal world of visual artistry, online.  The ‘conundrum’ which remains however is a question of logic. Can comic design principles be successfully integrated into web design with the same celestial beauty that people like Harvey Kurtzman and Wally Wood did for printed comics? There is no simple answer (hence the uncharacteristically long post!).

A Matter of Panels and Layouts

The comic piece on the left is a snippet from the famous Marvel series, Daredevil. Perhaps the single most obvious congruity the comic piece has with website design (apart from the illustrations) is the ‘panel system’ or in web design speak, ‘site divisions’ (sectional Div Containers for the CSS junkies amongst us!). Both mediums effectively use ‘panels’ to guide and direct the “fluency of viewing”; an un-interrupted sense of visual harmony. Most websites have the obligatory “header”, “body” and “footer”. Comics similarly contain storyboard panels which continually inform the reader of the narrative progression. 

The key difference here is that website sections serve less of a narrative function; they are containers of information that aid in visual and semantic presentation. In a website layout, ‘panels’ are functional in most instances, but there are particular occasions when the presentation of certain pictures and typographic elements follow a narrative structure (think Hosting Price pages).  The point is this: Can we have a similar “narrative value” when building websites? How do we “evoke a conversation” between the “Header”, “Main Body” and “Footer”, thus involving these elements in a dialogue of sorts, just like how a page from a comic book connects various panels together?  There are two ways which this has been tried and implemented by the most adventurous of designers.

Turn Your Website into a Comic Book (Approach 1)

The website included in this essay is an online publication from France. I cannot comment on the content (I cannot speak French) but from my initial impression it seems that the author is a comic book artist and its clear from the first page on, that he wants to tell his ‘stories’, comic book style. The traditional website layout is subsequently abandoned; although there are remnants of it in the form of tabbed hyperlinks (I guess you can’t avoid that!). This approach is effective but it misses my main point: how do we actually bring together the ‘traditional’ building blocks of a website and weave them into a single ‘story’ – a tale which explains something captivating to the reader?   

Draw Your Heart Out (Approach 2)

Attack from the Web, a UK based design studio quite enchantingly shows us how brief narratives can be told succinctly whilst also left open to interpretation. As I’ve mentioned before in a previous article, this website succeeds in pulling of that comic book feel without neglecting the finer principles of website presentation. The author is ‘fighting against ‘computer-bots’; his website serves as an ode to making ‘greater’ leaps and bounds in the online world (however I have a funny feeling that my interpretation might flatter the designer’s actual intention!). The central point being, Attack from the Web, like its name, is simple without an unnecessary amount of over-exaggerated flotsam. 

Straight from the exotic continent of Africa, designer Mark Forrester serves up a visual siesta with a clean and functional website that features a very compelling “comic-like” back-story. The “Header” speaks volumes, literally. Iconic figures such as the Big Ben, the feet of a mythological dragon and a series of visual details, tell a quirky imaginative tale. Scroll down to the footer, and you would notice an illustrative depiction of Mr. Forrester himself, tucked within a secret underground space. This is a fantastic attempt at bridging the illustrative comic medium and the web. There is no sense of disjunction as elements from both fields are quite perfectly nestled together in compatibility akin to Queen Elizabeth and the Buckingham Palace! 

The Website as a Visual Storyteller

The illustrative features of comic books and the structured complexion of website design are not natural bedfellows. For those who want to achieve a balance between meaningful illustration and functional website layout design, more thought needs to be directed at how a website ‘tells’ its own original story.