Blog #6 - TV

I watch TV on Thursdays at 8:30 to 10:00 for Community, Parks and Recreation, and The Office. On Sundays I watch the Walking Dead at 9:00 and sometimes watch the talk show for the Walking Dead afterwards sometimes hoping I can get my tweet read or if they answer my phone call. Also to see a review of the episode right after it aired. Sometimes when I miss these episodes or forget to watch them then I watch them online on the TV show websites as they post them on there. Sometimes I watch them on my phone when I am not home.

Blog #5 - Music Industry

Personally it makes no sense that artists want to sign on with itunes because it seems like they spend more money than they receive money. But because of the decrease in illegal downloads I suppose it would make more sense for artists and bands to hop aboard itunes and spotify. I see many people using spotify now and it seems to be doing well as it is quick access to everybody's favorite music and genres. Also when songs become popular most people want the highest and purest quality of that song so they do infact go out of their way to buy it just to be sure they can get the best quality.

Blog # 4 - Network Vs. Cable

Networks should do what AMC and FX are doing and release good quality television comedies and dramas. That is what I would personally want but it won't overtake the majority of the viewership from the reality tv shows. The networks keep airing these reality program because they know people will watch them no matter what. As long as people watch them then they will keep airing them. If the viewers want to make a change and send a message to the networks then they need to stop watching the reality programs. It's really lame when someone says Jersey Shore is stupid yet they still watch it. If they really cared about what was on television and on the networks then they would simply stop watching something that they did not like so the ratings go down and the networks can make a change to add quality programming to their schedule.

Novel Blurb

Talim Cross: First Story

The story of a boy(Tak) and his mother(Talim) wanting to find the boy's father. A game where people slaughter one another. A desire to meet one's true love. A prelude to a bigger plot. The start of the boy's journey to maturity.

Ideas for Final Class Novel

The theme for the graphic novel I want to explore is how a tragedy about another family member can effect a young boy for most of his life. When reading Essex County I was surprised that this theme was explored as well so inspiration may be drawn from that despite the characters in both pieces of literature being under different circumstances. The characters that are to be involved are a young boy, his mother, a killer, and a dog. Those are the four main characters. The plot idea for this novel is about a young boy and mother entering death game so the mother can see the father again (the man she loves). The boy never met the father as he impregnated his mother and left before he was born. A figure known as The Reaper appears in the story and ends up killing the mother. The boy lives by himself for 10 more years with a dog he finds during the death game until the next death game. The graphic novel is gonna explain the world (for good world building) and the rules of the game at the start and for the rest of the pages show the troubles of the boy during the first game. This is a prequel story to a much larger story that details the events of the next game that takes place 10 years after the first one the boy participates in. By the end of the novel the reader is going to know why the boy decides to enter the game again. In terms of character development the reader is going to see how the murder of his mother effects the boy as he gets older.

Blog # 3 - A Library without Books

I think that borrowing ereaders from the library would be useful but also be troublesome at the same time. It would require more money to fix a broken ereader than a broken book because the library charges fees for books that are damaged or late. If the library were to issue only ereaders then I would personally not check them out as I could probably download books from the internet for free and read them on my computer or my phone. In terms of publishing the printer companies may be obsolete eventually and the people working at these factories will be out of jobs. It is a serious concern for our economy as we face unemployment more rapidly now than we have in a long time. With these factories being obsolete that would make the unemployment problem even worse. So it is a bigger piece of the global economic pie.

Transitions in Maus

Art Spiegelman uses a variety of transitions in Maus. He doesn't stick to just one type of transition. In a graphic novel it is important to use a variety of transitions to add more effect in the story and to make the reader more invested in what is going on.

The first example of a transition that Spiegelman uses is on page 62 of Maus in the bottom panels. Vladek is being shot at in one panel and in the very next panel he ducks into a tent. This a good example of Action-to-action because the single subject (Vladek) is peeing in one scene and in the very next panel that subject is going into the tent (which is the second action).

The second example of a transition that Spiegelman uses is on page 55 of Maus in the four middle panels. This depicts Vladek and another individual talking while in bed. They are in the same bed for four panels but each panel they are moving different parts of their body. This is a good example of Moment-to-moment as the characters in the adjacent panels are the same subject characters for all those panels.

The third example of a transition that Spiegelman uses is on pages 46 and 47 of Maus. At the end of page 46 Vladek is getting a physical for the army and the very next page he is on the battlefield. This shows a timelapse between the two and shows the process of getting into the army and how it can feel like to end up on the front lines when at one point physicals were being conducted before. Little reasoning is required to explain the transitions between the two pages.

Art Speigelman is a brillaint author when it comes to using transitions because he does not stick to just one transition. He uses many types of transitions in his work to illustrate the extremeness of the story.