Analysing Hergé's Storytelling | Strip Panel Naked 

Herge was a master of pace and gesture - he described his work like storyboards for Hollywood films. The black island maybe not the best example, flight 714 is a masterwork in pacing and suspense as is Castafiore emerald - his later work was a lot more sophisticaed - peak craftsmanship. Cool video.

The one thing I love to see that Herge does here and that I notice Peyo does a lot in his Smurfs and other comics, is the way the bottom of the panel becomes the ground. Characters walking across the panel are walking along the bottom border of the panel. There's a great example of this in the last page you show in this video on the top tier.

I always liked Tintin's straightfowrardness.

To me Hergé was the best artist when it came to illustrating sense of weight or pain, you always feel it when his characters fall or throw things - particularly in Tintin in Tibet; you really the weight of their luggage or the danger of walking through a snowstorm. It’s a masterwork of bodily struggles.

Another thing that were done in the stories were the uniqueness of the last panel on a lot of the pages. While sometimes the last panel would continue the story, quite a few times it would end on a small cliff hanger (making you think, 'Oh wow, what's going to happen next!') or a "completion" of a scene or gag.

I love the clarity by which you lay out the clarity of the art! I feel there is a musical component to the panels, tho what that is I find hard to put a finger on. I'm also interested in the use of Snowy as a pictorial and emotional element, and would love to hear more discussion regarding this key, if diminutive character: He's almost like a vocal counterpoint in a musical flow of information. Thanks very much for the incisive video.

This style of composition almost feel like continuous shot that never cuts. It moves with the characters, and you don't feel a cut. I love Tintin, and I love this style. It just works.

Great, short analysis. I love how you show examples of everything you speak about and highlight specific parts of the page. It is especially important in case of comics to 'SHOW' instead of just 'telling' :) There is a lot to learn from Hergé!

Another great one Hass! Congrats on the nomination!

I love this Channel and I LOVE Tintin. Grew up with these comics, and they re a pleasure to go back at even the 30th time. It just flows all so good, really true masterpieces.

Great video! Thought about doing one on Carl Barks?

As a french reader, I've read stuff like that countless times. But as I grew older and got more and more attracted to american comics, I've started to feel like french comics (especially their composition) were kinda... I don't know... unoriginal ? It's not taking many risks in my opinion. I've drifted away to another culture and it's been ages since I actually read some of the stuff I used to read when I was young. But watching your more optimistic approach (calling clarity what I used to interpret as laziness), it made me want to go back, pick up some Tintin, blow away all that dust on my mom's collection. I feel like I really need to give them another chance. On a side note, I haven't been able to watch your videos nor read PxP in months. I've been quite busy, and it most likely won't get any better for another few months. But I wanted to take some time to congratulate you, Hass. You're still producing the best comic related content (I'm not surprised to be honest). Whether it'd be here on RU-vid, or with PxP. Congrats for the Eisner nomination ! Even though I'm only judging it based on the first few issues, it definitly deserves it. That's why I'm still subscribed even though I technically don't have time to read it. I'll definitly take the time one day though. A big PxP marathon. In short, keep doing what you do. I'm still loving it !

Herge was my absolute favorite growing up - it stayed with me whilst Batman et al fell by the wayside. And I've seemingly internalized much of his storytelling techniques (which is why I firmly believe that all comic creators should read comics Every Single Day). Interesting thing I noticed for the first time, with the train page starting at 3:57: he not-so-subtly changes the angle of the panel to show Tintin getting thrown off the bench. If one were to take an invisible hand to panel #2 to jerk Tintin off the bench, the end result would be panel #4. Simply brilliant.

How do you notice all these small overlooked details? Like the panel layout. I don’t even know where to begin to even study and analyze such a thing.

There are several elements feeding into the finished pages as you see them here. This is not the original format of the pages as they appeared in the original printing of these stories. I believe the original pages had only four to six panels on them. When the books were later collected these pages were cut up and the four tier system was created to bring sprawling books with over 100 pages down to the standar 62 pages in which all the colour books now reside. Also the version of the book you are showing is a 1960s retelling of the story not the original 1930s newpaper version.

Congrats on the eisner nom! I really think you deserve

New to this channel and subscribed immediately, I’ve already been taking notes, wondering if you plan on analyzing some of Greg Capullo’s work or maybe some of Miller’s Daredevil work?

Thanks for actually doing the episode! It was very insightful! It is quite interesting how you explained the one-action-per-panel thing as creating a certain rythm that actually gets the reader through the comic more easily, whereas i thought of it as something making the action actually less fluent because it kinda breaks up the story. Once again thanks for your reply!

thank you!

Many comics and sequential graphic storytelling over the past 30-plus years comes across as pointlessly chaotic, which, to me, seriously BLUNTS the impact of the story action. It often feels like "display", a showing-off kind of gesture, where, repeatedly, little rhyme or reason rule the single page and flow from page to page. On another different, but related subject: HAVE YOU EVER COMMENTED ON THE WORK OF BERNIE KRIEGSTEIN IN RE: HIS EC HORROR COMIC PANEL WORK? I find great brilliance and a similar Herge-clarity in those talesl. (And, a master of "loose-yet-precise" that is ALL-TO-RARE). regards, rs

Can you do a video about Nausicaa, the comic book, by Miyazaki? That two-tomes story is another comicbook masterpiece..!!

I agree that Tintin is super clear and easy to read, but I'm not sure I would call it "frictionless." For example, he's constantly breaking the 180 rule so the reader has to think about which side they're on. Still, great video. My thing with Tintin is how weird the very wide horizontal gutters are.

Congrats on Eisner nomination!

Awesome. May I ask what edition you were reading? Looking to pick the collection up.

Loved the video, and found out that in English you call him "Snowy" and not Milu 😁

Any tips on where to start with Tintin? Been wanting to get into it for a while.

I think my greatest disapointment with the Tintin movie from 2011 was the camera work. I understand why they wanted to make the film visually exciting, they wanted to make use of the 3D etc, but they lost the "mood" of the albums as I remember them. I always imagines a Tintin-movie to be more like a movie from the 30s or 40s.

In the last panel Tintin fucking dies

Your videos are all way too short !