I thought it would be nice to summarize the entire For No One Project into a little video.
Here’s a video of me explaining how to make a song into a comic:
When I started calling myself ‘comicsperimenter’ this is really what I had in mind. Seeing how far I could push the envelope in creating sequential art based on the possibilities of the medium.
I hope this not only makes you realize what comic book art really is about, but also might inspire other creators to think outside the box a little themselves.
Oh, and makes you appreciate how much effort I’ve put into this haha.
==video transcription==
Hello and welcome to this comicsperimenter video.
Today I’ll discuss how to make a song into a comic
Ready?
Here we go!
Step one: pick a song, most preferably one that you find staggeringly beautiful for years. For No One by The Beatles, for instance.
Step two: create a rough outline of the song’s progression
Step three: divide each section in blocks corresponding with the way the lyrics are arranged into the score.
Step four: Add the chords of the song to each block
Step Five: And while you’re at it, mark the places where the lyrics actually rhyme.
Step six: Split each block to create a rough comic book panel grid
Step seven: Take the circle of fiths, in which the next note is always exactly a fifth above the previous one, covering all TWELVE notes and place it over the color wheel which is made out of TWELVE colors to, choose a corresponding color for each chord.
Step eight: apply these colors to the comic book panels.
Step Nine: Use figures with a corresponding pose in places where the lyrics rhyme, as a sort of visual replication.
So where breaks rhymes with aches, you draw a figure with roughly the same pose.
Step Ten: As a background use a recurring interior in colors of the corresponding chords. The repetition of this background will provide a musical pattern within the comic.
Step Eleven: Take a detail from the verses as a starting point for the way you fill in the chorus. Because a chorus is the exact same each and every time, you can choose to let this sequence evolve slowly, just like a chorus gains meaning while the song progresses.
Step twelve: As for the substance of the story, pick a subject related to the theme and lyrics of the song. In this case a man feeling imprisoned and heartbroken within his relationship with a woman that does not seem to love him anymore.
Step Thirteen: To finish up and create the illusion of intellectual and literary quality pick a different writing style for each section, like for instance an invitation, a handwritten note, a phone call, a whatsapp conversation, and a how-to-text about birdhouses.
Optional 1: Design a cover for the comic, inspired by the album cover of the record the original song was on.
Optional 2: Arrange the song’s accompaniment, including unplayable horn solo, for acoustic fingerstyle guitar and ask a befriended musician to perform it with you while a befriended sound guy creates an audio video registration you can share with your readers
To Conclude:
Publish the comic on your own blog and share it with your readers.
Wait a while before you explain how the story exactly came about so they can find out for themselves and flood you with compliments about how incredibly smart, complex and intelligent your comicsperiments actually are
…
Okay, this was my video about how I adapted for no one by the Beatles into a …comic.
I hope you liked the way I used video to explain all this, so I hope you liked it.
Please don’t forget to check out the music video of me and Marcel playing our version of the song.
I’ll see you soon!