Comic strip analysis

. Purpose 
○ Satire or political cartoons 

○ Aimed to ridicule 

○ May poke fun but tend to be gentler in the treatment of object 

○ Primary purpose is to entertain, and not to object/offend someone

or something 
5
. Structure 
○ Cartoons and comic strips are drawn in boxes called panels 

○ Panels are arranged in sequences, and read in a linear fashion 

○ Space between panels is called as gutter 

4
. Exposition 
○ Text that comes in speech bubbles 

○ Tells the story 

3
. Speech and Thought bubbles 
○ Used for internal and external speech and thoughts of characters 

○ Have a border 

○ Shapes of bubbles is important – rectangular, cloud, etc. 

2
. Artistic style 
○ Comics are drawn purposefully (with intention) 

○ Pictures are cartoony/realistic/heavy/light/bright/dark/crispy/

weighty 

○ Tool used to draw – Pencil, pen or brush 

○ Words describing mood and tine can be used for analysis 

1
6
○ Colours and meaning associated with them (symbols of different
colours) 

. Caricature 
○ People and issues can be simplified, distorted or exaggerated for

effect 

. Humorous tones 
○ Parody 

○ Sarcasm 

○ Irony 

. Emanata 
○ Items like dots, lines, exclamation marks, onomatopoeia 

○ Depict action or sound 

---- 
 
. Main purpose 
○ Satire: 
◆ Mock 

◆ Humor 

◆ Ridicule 

○ Irony 

○ Bring out global issue 

. Multimodal 
○ Different ways in which the author conveys ideas like 
◆ Text 

◆ Images 

◆ Graphs 

◆ Maps 

○ At least 2 of these should be in combination e.g. if there is text and

 ○

image in one cartoon, it implies multimodal 

. Spatial Mechanics 
○ Camera angle 

○ Gutter 

○ Spacing b/w characters 

○ Close ups on faces of characters 

○ What element is using more space – character 1 / character 2 /

speech bubble 
◆ If equal – equal focus on both 

◆ One bigger – dominating attitude (Authority) 

◆ Big text box – dialogue is important 

. Juxtaposed 
○ Contradictory ideas 

○ Fire and ice 

○ Through text or cartoon expressions 

. Display lettering (any text not in word balloon ort not used as a
caption) 
○ Character sitting with a book, title of the book is written, that title

is one example of display lettering 

○ Protestors have banners which have texts, that text is display

lettering 

○ Logo of the company, its text is called display lettering 

. Caption – Description outside the panel (Small text below an image in

newspaper, telling more about the image) 

. Word balloons – speech bubbles 

 
 
● PATMID 
●

● Language devices 

● Presentational device 

● Style 

● Organization 

● Tone 

● Mood – conveyed through language, images, color, etc. 

● Meaning – how it is brought out 

● Splash panel – acts like a title page 

● Gutter 

● Protagonist 

● Foreground 

● Background – less significant 

● Action 

● Expression 

● Close ups, camera angle 

● Emanate 

● Anthropomorphism – Animals depicting human traits like walk on 2

legs, speak 

● Speech bubble 

● Sound effects – onomatopoeia  

● Captions 

● Symbolisms 
 ● Punch line – main joke, at the end 
 

 
2nd: 
● Borderless panel –  So that attention goes directly at that 
 ●

● Wants to speak 

● Using the table to balance himself 

● Speech is enthusiastic 

● He and his speech occupy most of the panel, showing that it is

important 

 
3rd: 
● Teacher and her text bubble occupying most area – hierarchy 

● Calvin's only response is "Oh." 

● From enthusiastic to sad, immediate change of mood – hence, climax

of the 4 panels 

 
4th: 
● No longer enthusiastic, more sad 

● Contrast in 1st and 4th panel, seen through text and expressions 

● 1st and 2nd have a lot of text, but he speaks minimal in the 3rd and 4th