Graphic Narrative Olivia Bolt

Children's Books

• Children’s book normally go up to the age of 12. They are defined in three different ways: written by children, for children, or chosen by children. Picture books include: board books, concept books, pattern books, wordless books. Traditional literature includes myths, legends, folklore and fairytales. Children’s books include Anthromorphism, magic accepted as normal, happy endings and stereotypes. Children books can be very experimental with their design. They are many types of children’s book and a lot of potential with how creative you can be.

This is a concept creative children's book about the alphabet. They teach this in a creative way through illustration and very little text.

This is a board & concept book, its designed for teaching children about animals making it fun with bright colours and pop out characters to let the child interact with the story.

There is massive range of all types of children's books out there as you can see from the picture above.

By age category • In children's book there are different ages categories with in the age range.

• Age 0-5 picture books: These are mostly visual means than text. A range of different materials are used such as pencil, paint, media and oil painting. The illustrations are much part of the experience and overtake the written text. Simple illustrations allow the children to see what is going on. Normally adults will read these with young children then they help the child to learn to read themselves. Fabric may be used with the illustrations to get the child involved within the story.

• Age 5-7: These books are usually helped designed so the child can improve their reading skills. They use more written text that is spaced out and simple for the child to read it easily. There is some illustration to allow the child to see what is going on and make the book more young and fun. These may have small chapters

• Young adult Chapter books: Short chapter books- Ages 7-11, These books include short chapters but more words and more pages to develop children's reading even further. They are designed to challenge children and to make them stronger readers. Ages 9-12 longer chapter books- A lot more text than visual means and they are longer chapters which make the book longer and bigger to read. This develops the reading skills further and prepares them for adult/ young adult reading.

• Young adult fiction- 12+ These books are designed for teenagers and young adults. They are easier than adults fiction but not as easy as they contain long chapters mostly text, smaller print and no illustration. They are to challenge the reading level and prepare them fo0r adult books. They also allow the stories and writing more advanced.

Age 0-5 books Age 5-7 books

Young adult chapter books 7-11/ 9-12

Young Adult fiction 12+

Fonts

• The font style in children's books are very important. Choosing the right font is very important. Among the most common are Times Roman, Goudy, Garamond, and Baskerville. These are quite simple fonts that makes the text very easy and reliable to a child. Children's books are commonly set in a serif font, because of their clean straight lines: The serifs help to guide the eye from one letter to another making the text easily readable A sans serif font such as Arial should be avoided for the main body of the text.

Times Roman Goudy

Baskerville

Graphic Novels

• A graphic novel is a narrative work in which the story is conveyed to the reader using artwork. The artwork can be very experimental in design or follow a more traditional comic book format. Graphic novels are normally longer and more durable formats ,They use the same materials and methods as a printed book does it just includes a lot more illustration than an average novel does. They are generally sold in bookstores and specialty comic book shops rather than in newsagents. As they have a specific audience. Such books have gained increasing acceptance as desirable materials for libraries which once ignored comic books.

• Graphic novels are often the inspiration behind films and TV series such as Scott pilgrim ,Batman or Doctor Who and many recent films started out life as and continue to be graphic novels. Sometimes this works both ways, with films or TV series providing inspiration for graphic novels. Here is some of the on screen media which has reach a graphic novel

Text

• The text is really important when creating the graphic novel. The limited text goes with the image to tell the story. The amount of text that goes with the illustrations is different with every Graphic Novel, it is up to whoever writes/produces it .It depends on whether the person finds it easier or harder more or less to add text to their images. There are a few rules to consider. These are the conventions of traditional comic books and graphic novels. They are designed to make the story flow easily for the reader. There are a great variety of tools you can use. These have been developed over a period of time. Those used to reading comic books or graphic novels understand the different meanings.

Less text

More text

Text

• There are a few rules to consider. These are the conventions of traditional comic books and graphic novels. They are designed to make the story flow easily for the reader. There are a great variety of tools you can use. These have been developed over a period of time. Those used to reading comic books or graphic novels understand the different meanings

Balloon A balloon tail points to a character's mouth as if an invisible line continued on past the end of the tail to their face

Joining Balloons with connectors; There are two instances where this is used. The first is when a character says two separate ideas expressed one after the other. The second instance is when two characters are speaking in a panel and the conversation goes back and forth between them.

Burst Balloons: These are used/represents when someone is screaming their dialogue. Burst balloons typically aren't italicized, but are often bold with certain words enlarged or underlined for even more emphasis.

Thought balloon: This shows when someone is thinking by it being like a bubble. This is rarely used now and is slowing fading out.

Captions

• There are four different types of captions that can be used in comic books;

• Location and time: The fonts are the same font as your dialogue, Inside a caption box and italicized

• Internal Monologue: Captions largely replacing thought balloons. The inner voice of that particular character. Typically italicized

• Speak Captions. Shows when someone is speaking and is off camera. These are not italicized but use special quote marks

• Narrative captions feature the voice of the writer or editor are also italicized

Layout

• In the earliest comics the layout was always grid format. Over time this has changed to modernize comics and to make them more interesting. You can now how integrated scenes and many more different kind of layout formats. As comics grew in popularity and the talent level increased, artists injected their creative influences and began to produce layouts that did not necessarily conform to a grid format. While they can be stunning to look at, these pages can be a logical disaster if not planned properly. The most common grids are the 9 and 6 panel grids. The 9 panel grid is most useful when the story contains a lot of information.