A survey of comics research in computer science

Graphical novels such as comics and mangas are well known all over the world. The digital transition started to change the way people are reading comics, more and more on smartphones and tablets and less and less on paper. In the recent years, a wide variety of research about comics has been proposed and might change the way comics are created, distributed and read in future years. Early work focuses on low level document image analysis: indeed comic books are complex, they contains text, drawings, balloon, panels, onomatopoeia, etc. Different fields of computer science covered research about user interaction and content generation such as multimedia, artificial intelligence, human-computer interaction, etc. with different sets of values. We propose in this paper to review the previous research about comics in computer science, to state what have been done and to give some insights about the main outlooks

Gender and Videogames: The political valency of Lara Croft

The Face: Is Lara a feminist icon or a sexist fantasy? Toby Gard: Neither and a bit of both. Lara was designed to be a tough, self-reliant, intelligent woman. She confounds all the sexist cliches apart from the fact that she’s got an unbelievable figure. Strong, independent women are the perfect fantasy girls—the untouchable is always the most desirable (Interview with Lara’s creator Toby Gard in The Face magazine, June 1997)

The (Counter) Politics of Digital Comics in India: Reading Literature of the Digital Space

In her 1984 essay, “A Cyborg Manifesto,” Donna Haraway envisioned that digital technology would introduce a utopian space which would liberate women from gendered power dynamics. Despite such optimism shown by third and fourth wave feminists in India, political inertia and juridical failure to implement laws and justice for victims of gender violence, be they domestic violence or sexual assault, have manifested how the digital sphere has failed to become a post-gender space. On the other hand, the pervasiveness of online gender-based violence in social media and other interactive web platforms exacerbates women’s exclusion from the public political sphere. Against representations of gender violence and injustices online, Indian female comic artists have created counterpublics as a way of countering mainstream politics and the technologies of governance that have othered, ostracized, and discarded gendered victims of violence. Using the theoretical frameworks of Foucault’s biopolitics, Mbembe’s necropolitics, and Fraser’s “counterpublics,” this article aims to examine the representations of sexual violence, stalking, and gender discrimination within cyberspace. It focuses on how the feminist webcomic format in India is challenging female subjugation and advocating against the lasting physical and psychological trauma of gender violence through web comics such as Doddlerama, Sanitary Panels, and Priya’s Shakti. The article also analyses how the digital space in India has become a male-dominated, brahmanical space of surveillance, control, and discipline that offers limited agency and voice to women in India, and how female illustrators are reclaiming the digital space by creating their own counterpublic spheres of resistance

Visual Discourse of Comics in English Language Teaching

This article discusses the findings of theoretical research on visual communication and comic book discourse that aimed to identify viable approaches for English language teaching based on comics. Comics are one type of creative text that can have the same complexities or intricacies as for example a novel. One problem identified in SLT is that while creative texts are used in teaching, the focus is on the written word - novels, short stories, poems. Few if any teaching approaches promote the use of comics in the classroom environment. If comics are suggested as teaching materials, the recommended approach is very similar to that used when dealing with non-visual texts. As a consequence, students tend to ignore the images and thus miss out a possible avenue that can help with meaning making. There is then a need for a better understanding of how visual communication works in comics and how meaning is created from the interplay of image and text. This article examines how visual communication happens, what are the elements of a visual narrative and then continues to identify the elements that form the comic book discourse. Using a framework based on the theories that identify and explain the workings of the structural elements of a panel as well as the social function of visual communication this researcher discusses how comics communicate to their readers. The findings suggest that in order to develop a methodology and to successfully use comics in teaching, the educator needs to rethink the current practices when dealing with comics or any other "image + word" texts. Image and text cannot be separated and must be treated as a whole; only then will comics reveal their full potential as viable, creative teaching materials

Fragmented Narratives: Exploring Storytelling approaches for Animation in Spatial Context

Animation is considered a prevalent medium in contemporary moving image culture, which increasingly appears across non-conventional surfaces and spaces. And while storytelling in animation films has been extensively theorized, narrative forms that employ physical space as part of storytelling have been less explored. This paper will examine the narrative aspect of animation works which are screened outside the traditional cinematic venues. It will look at how these animation works tell stories differently - using the full potential of the space, as a narrative device, a tool, and a stage where the narratives unfold. This paper will look at the historical perspective and the state of the art in animation installation today, exploring the relationship between the space and narrative in pre-cinematic, cinematic and post-cinematic conditions. It will examine how narrative structures in animation have changed over time, on their way from the black box of the cinema to the white cube of the gallery and even further, where they became part of any space or architecture. Through case studies of works by Tabaimo, Rose Bond, William Kentridge and other relevant artists, the interdependency of the narrative and the space where it appears will be explored, in order to identify new strategies for storytelling in animation. The aim of this paper is to emphasize the storytelling novelty that animation installations offer, which goes beyond the narrative structures that we are used to see on a single flat surface

An empirical framework for human-robot proxemics

The work described in this paper was conducted within the EU Integrated Projects COGNIRON ("The Cognitive Robot Companion") and LIREC (LIving with Robots and intEractive Companions) and was funded by the European Commission under contract numbers FP6- 002020 and FP7-215554.An empirical framework for Human-Robot (HR) proxemics is proposed which shows how the measurement and control of interpersonal distances between a human and a robot can be potentially used by the robot to interpret, predict and manipulate proxemic behaviour for Human-Robot Interactions (HRIs). The proxemic framework provides for incorporation of inter-factor effects, and can be extended to incorporate new factors, updated values and results. The framework is critically discussed and future work proposed

Red Riding Hood Across Media: Transmedia Storytelling in Contemporary Adaptations of “Little Red Riding Hood”

The dissertation explores the complex structure of transmedial universes, which are the most prevalent and pervasive model in contemporary popular culture, and examines them within an interdisciplinary framework. In the chapter on the theoretical background of the research, in addition to general theories of adaptation, certain notions of media theory and transmedial narratology are included as well. Furthermore, as the title of the dissertation already indicates, the genre of the primary sources makes it necessary to incorporate relevant theories from the field of fairy tale studies as well, especially those referencing and relevant for the discussion of the story of “Little Red Riding Hood” in particular. The notion of transmedial microcosm used in this dissertation combines and complements Henry Jenkins's and Jan-Noël Thon's theories with Cristina Bacchilega's conception of the fairy-tale web. Transmedial microcosms thus designate and delineate specific groups of adaptations that are based on the same source text and recount narratives set within a shared storyworld, yet they are markedly distinct from other transmedial microcosms relying on the same source text. The dissertation analyzes five distinct groups of adaptations that can be understood as transmedial microcosms from within the transmedial universe of “Little Red Riding Hood.

ENGAGING CHILDREN THROUGH LANGUAGE, PICTURES, AND ANIMATION

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengidentifikasi makna interpersonal yang terdapat dalam buku digital interaktif berjudul “Kancil dan Buaya” dan mengamati bagaimana makna interpersonal dapat mengikat anak-anak untuk membaca buku digital interaktif. Makna interpersonal dalam buku digital interaktif dapat diwujudukan atau dikonstruksi melalui teks, ilustrasi dan animasi. Makna interpersonal dalam buku digital interaktif penting untuk dianalisa karena makna interpersonal dapat membangun ikatan antara pembaca dengan karakter yang digambarkan dalam buku digital interaktif. Sehingga, anak-anak yang malas membaca mau meluangkan waktu untuk membaca jika mereka merasa ada ikatan antara dirinya dengan karakter dalam buku. Lalu, untuk mengamati bagaiamana makna interpersonal dapat mengikat anak-anak untuk membaca buku digital interaktif, data yang diperoleh melalui observasi, kuesioner dan wawancara selanjutnya dianalisa secara kualitatif dengan merujuk pada teori reading engagement. Hasil temuan menunjukkan bahwa elemen multimodal yang ditampilkan dalam buku digital interaktif dapat mengikat anak-anak untuk membaca buku digital interaktif. Penggunaan moda yang bervariasi dapat mendukung satu sama lain sehingga anak-anak dapat memahami cerita dengan lebih baik serta membuat anak-anak dapat menyelesaikan tugas yang diberikan oleh peneliti. Oleh karena itu, diharapkan elemen-elemen ini dapat diimplementasikan dalam buku digital untuk membantu anak-anak tertarik dalam kegiatan membaca.;--- This study aimed to identify the interpersonal meaning realized in a digital interactive storybook entitled “Mouse deer and Crocodile” and to observe how the interpersonal meaning engaged children into reading the digital interactive storybook. Interpersonal meaning in a digital interactive storybook can be built or constructed via texts, illustration and animation. Analyzing interpersonal meaning in a digital interactive storybook is important for interpersonal meaning is known to create an engagement between the reader/viewer and the represented participants (RPs) depicted in the digital interactive storybook. Therefore, struggling readers, particularly children, would like to spend more of their times to read if they were engaged. This current study employed a descriptive qualitative research promoting case study design. In order to identify the interpersonal meaning built in the digital interactive storybook, the study applied systemic functional grammar (SFG), visual grammar and interpersonal meaning in action. Meanwhile, to observe how the interpersonal meaning engaged children into reading the digital interactive storybook, the data sets were analyzed qualitatively using different techniques of data collection including observations, questionnaire and interview by referring to the theory of reading engagement. Findings suggest that multimodal elements particularly the illustration and the animation elements implemented in the digital interactive storybook engaged children into reading the story. These modes supported each other to make children understand the story better and also to comprehend the tasks given by the researcher. Thus, in the future these elements can be implemented to help children engage into reading activity