Week 3 The Comic Strip

Winsor McCay’s Little Nemo in Slumberland was an absolute treat to read this week.  I was transformed back into a little girl again, with extravagant dreams of traveling the world.  Each new chapter in this story took me to another place, and I was under the impression I was actually there.  I do not think I was actually paying that much attention to the characters but more to the backgrounds and new places that the characters were going.  The characters were very stiff and were hard to relate to when actions didn’t seem like actions.  But the detail of the background completely pulled me into this new world. I am a sucker for detail and the way McCay structured each of the locations for Nemo to travel was simply fun to explore along with him. The locations were always changing and getting more complex as it goes on.  It was more intriguing to watch the locations then the characters that kept the same identity and profile through each story.  The stories also allowed for my imagination to run wild and really fall into each location and feel with the characters.

As I said earlier, I felt like not only was I taken to a new place but also traveled back in time when  a child’s imaginations is huge and the outcomes of their imagination is even bigger.  This book reminded me why I chose my career in computer animation and why I have an undying love for performing music. When I was a little girl I was so fascinated with movies especially animations and would be stuck in front of the television for hours.  Watching those show movies was my escape from what was normal in my day-to-day life.  After many year of watching movies I was hooked.  I was a huge fan of Disney and animations.  The ability to create characters to pull the audience out of their norm but bring them back down by making those characters believable in their setting I found intriguing.  So I am now studying as a computer animation student in order to one day create these escapes for a future audience.  My performance in music also allows the audience and myself to escape to a different place.  The style of the music sets the mood and the location.  No words are needed.  Just the interlocking sounds and the experience the audience brings with them, creates a the escape.  Winsor McCay’s Little Nemo was an amazing little comic to read.  I never would have though that one comic could take me to all different places and travel time, as well.