OOTS, minimalism, and art history

[pendell]

Seen on facebook . I'm going to have to educate myself just to get the joke.

Anyone out there want to explain it to a clueless computer science major?

Still, just based on the strip ... I have to wonder whether OOTS and XKCD have a place in art culture as a new style. Call it "minimalist pop art", in which fine detail and realism take a back seat to the story.

At the very least, it's enough of a trend that PVP online can make fun of it.

...

Someone remind me why Rich Burlew deliberately chose stick figure art as the medium for his story? As anyone who's seen his rendering of Elan's mentor and the mummy knows, he didn't have to do it that way. But he didn't just stay with stick figures -- he's been deliberately making the art more sophisticated, until we get things like Belkar's album cover.

Why choose a minimalist form to convey the story? And, once a minimalist form is chosen, why continue to step it up, deliberately challenging yourself to see just what you can express with this metaphor?

For most web comic artists, I suspect the choice of minimalism or mechanima is a pragmatic one -- a lot of webcomic authors can't draw well. Minimalism opens the field for people who would otherwise be locked out by the technical demands of the medium. What, then, does a skilled artist gain from minimalism?

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[Keltest]

Well, OOTS started as a joke a day strip, so im guessing that Rich chose to use the style he did because it was easy and convenient rather for some deep storytelling purpose. Im fairly confidant that were Rich to want to, he could create a masterpiece every panel, but frankly that sounds like a lot of work, and even now 99% of the story is told through dialogue, with the pictures being supplementary.

As for the link itself, my takeaway as a fellow clueless Comp Sci major is that pretentious artists are scary and strange.

[Snails]

Why choose a minimalist form to convey the story? And, once a minimalist form is chosen, why continue to step it up, deliberately challenging yourself to see just what you can express with this metaphor?

As Keltest said, when your goal is a joke a day that appeals to specifically a gaming audience, how much time are you going to invest?

But the other aspect is that a minimalist style can convey a lot. Arguably minimal faces invite the reader to actively empathize more than detailed faces, so the effort of more detail does not automatically buy you as much as you might think. If you want to see more on that idea, I cannot recommend enough the book Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud. It is a classic.

[pendell]

But the other aspect is that a minimalist style can convey a lot.

Indeed. I think similar things could be said of the film versions of Lord of the Rings and the special editions of the original Star Wars. Sometimes the most horrifying and frightening monster is the one you only hint at, allowing viewers to fill in the blanks from their own imaginations. You can detract from the story by actually putting the monster on-screen, because the creature you put up there is never going to be as frightening as one conjured from the audience's own imagination.

So it's possible that the minimalism , ironically enough, makes the story more immersive. The more details you render on-panel, the more things there are to get wrong, which can shatter a nitpicking suspension of disbelief. But when there AREN'T any details to speak of, it essentially tells the critical side of the brain that it's okay to calm down and just enjoy the story.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[evileeyore]

Anyone out there want to explain it to a clueless computer science major?

It was a look at the different styles of art.

Was it supposed to be humor or just a very good layman's visual explanation?

Why choose a minimalist form to convey the story? And, once a minimalist form is chosen, why continue to step it up, deliberately challenging yourself to see just what you can express with this metaphor?

My guess: Because Mr. Burlew couldn't draw when he set out.


You can a similar progression with both Sluggy Freelance and Schlock Mercenary, both started out very rough and ugly artwise, and both have gained in artistic skill over the years (15 years for both I think).


EDIT: Schlock Mercenary hit 14 this year and Sluggy is 17 years running.

[snowblizz]

It was a look at the different styles of art.

Was it supposed to be humor or just a very good layman's visual explanation?


My guess: Because Mr. Burlew couldn't draw when he set out.

Tut-tut tut. Mr. Burlew is an Art major and could definitely draw (also worked as a graphic artist). Stick figures were a conscious choice of style he did to emphasize the joke-a-day style. Or something like that, I *just* read that bit of commentary in War and XPs, but damned if I remember it verbatim. I'll have to check at home.
He also mentioned that the style came into its own for the big battle scenes where he needed to have a lot of stuff going on.

The advancement of the art in OOTS is again IIRC as said by Rich something he did to push himself, to keep it interesting. He does come form the the graphics field after all so it's not surprising he tries to push the limits of stick-art.

You can a similar progression with both Sluggy Freelance and Schlock Mercenary, both started out very rough and ugly artwise, and both have gained in artistic skill over the years (15 years for both I think).


EDIT: Schlock Mercenary hit 14 this year and Sluggy is 17 years running.

Mr. Tayler (Schlock) has a degree in music composition and worked in the computer engineering field so it's kinda natural that he'd start out a bit rougher. Mr. Abrams interestingly is a trained comic/graphic artist but started working as a webdesigner. But according to Wikipedia was just doing a rougher quickly draw comic at first, because that web-stuff will quickly blow over surely.

[evileeyore]

Tut-tut tut. Mr. Burlew is an Art major and could definitely draw (also worked as a graphic artist).

I said "My guess". It's not like I did any research in any way.

Just noting that in this case (as in the other two) there has been a marked increase in the quality of the art over the years. As such I figured it was natural none of the three (I did actually know Mr Taylor wasn't an artist at all in the beginning) started as artists.

[Jasdoif]

My guess: Because Mr. Burlew couldn't draw when he set out.

The Giant has posted drawings from 2002, and explained how they could be considered direct ancestors to OOTS, so that's not the case.

The intro to Dungeon Crawlin' Fools explains the original choice a bit. To summarize, the comic was added for the site, and his stick figures were already a defining feature on the site because they were well-received as choose-able avatars for the forums; so it seemed a natural extension to use the same stick figure style in the comic itself.

[Corneel]

I see the OOTS style, certainly post DCF, as an extreme form of ligne clair / klare lijn.

I also wouldn't consider XKCD as having the same style as OOTS, it lacks the play with colour and the background work of the OOTS. They only have stick figures in common and even those are quite different.

[Vinyadan]

I think it was a matter of efficiency. The style wasn't born for the comic - it was the way he made miniatures for his D&D campaigns. He just adapted it to the comic and occasionally updated it. (if I am wrong, please correct me, I am speaking from what I remember.)

The decision of drawing it himself probably had a role in choosing a relatively fast art style he had already developed. Another comic from him I've seen (Five Foot Step) also has a relatively streamlined look.

I have the impression the Giant doesn't like clutter and has a very strong perception of what is needed for the story, what is needed for the world, what is needed for showing the flow of the story, what is needed for good identification of single elements, and what is needed for good composition, but avoids whatever comes in that doesn't help for these.

[xroads]

If you want to see more on that idea, I cannot recommend enough the book Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud. It is a classic.

I'll second this as well. I'm a CS graduate, and I found this book informative. Plus Scott McCloud presents it in the form of a comic, so it's very readable.

[Lexible]

As for the link itself, my takeaway as a fellow clueless Comp Sci major is that pretentious artists are scary and strange.

Keltest, any reason you are singling out art majors? Are pretentious Comp Sci majors not also scary and strange? What about pretentious population biologists? Scary and strange?

[Keltest]

Keltest, any reason you are singling out art majors? Are pretentious Comp Sci majors not also scary and strange? What about pretentious population biologists? Scary and strange?

I wasn't aware I was singling out art majors, and while I suppose pretentious comp sci majors can also be scary and strange, they aren't especially relevant to the link in the first post.

[Lexible]

I wasn't aware I was singling out art majors, and while I suppose pretentious comp sci majors can also be scary and strange, they aren't especially relevant to the link in the first post.

o_O

There really is nothing quite like bald face dissimulation, is there? Of course you singled out art majors... that would be where you, you know, singled them and no one else out for scary and strange pretentiousness.

[Keltest]

o_O

There really is nothing quite like bald face dissimulation, is there? Of course you singled out art majors... that would be where you, you know, singled them and no one else out for scary and strange pretentiousness.

Ok, perhaps that was miscommunication on my part. Obviously I singled them out in that way, but I didn't do it in such a way as to seem that I considered only art majors capable of pretentiousness. Given the topic of the conversation however, im not exactly going to proclaim a fear of, say, prideful electrical engineers, am I?

[brian 333]

o_O

There really is nothing quite like bald face dissimulation, is there? Of course you singled out art majors... that would be where you, you know, singled them and no one else out for scary and strange pretentiousness.

I find it scary and strange that you are singling out Keltest for a joke. Do I detect a hint of pretentiousness?

I thought you were mocking wizards. What would you do if I mocked the bards?
I'd probably laugh.

Even Elan knows not to take this stuff too seriously. And really, why go looking for hurt feelings in a world which is all to prepared to make you cry anyway?

[evileeyore]

I find it scary and strange that you are singling out Keltest for a joke. Do I detect a hint of pretentiousness?

I think you detect a hint of art major.

[Surfing HalfOrc]

If I recall, Rich said he used to do quick stick figure drawings as minis for his game table, and the simple art style was what he used to quickly generate NPCs for a battlefield.
If you look at the pregenerated avatars, there is a Solaris Knight (or something like that), and I asked of it was a prestige class from some splat book. Rich himself replied, and said it was from his own tabletop campaign. I wonder how many of the pregenerated avatars had a place on his table.
If you look around, you can find Rich's Five Foot Steps comic. He used a more conventional art style for that one.