Scott McCloud

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This article is about the American comics creator and theorist. For the fictional character of the same name, see Space Angel. For the vocalist/guitarist of the same name, see Girls Against Boys.
Scott McCloud

McCloud, RISD, March 2007.
Born Scott McLeod
June 10, 1960 (1960-06-10) (age 48)
Boston, Massachusetts
Nationality American
Area(s) artist, writer, theorist
Notable works Zot!
Understanding Comics
Reinventing Comics
Making Comics
Awards Russ Manning Award, 1985
12-time nominee for
Eisner, Harvey awards[1]
Official website

Scott McCloud (born Scott McLeod on June 10, 1960) is an American cartoonist and theorist on comics as a distinct literary and artistic medium.

Contents

[edit] Biography

McCloud on the Making Comics Tour in Louisville, Kentucky

McCloud was born in Boston, Massachusetts and spent most of his childhood in Lexington, Massachusetts. He obtained his B.F.A in illustration from Syracuse University. McCloud created the light-hearted science fiction/superhero comic book series Zot! in 1984, in part as a reaction to the increasingly grim direction that superhero comics were taking in the 1980s.[citation needed] His other print comics include Destroy!! (a deliberately over-the-top, over-sized single-issue comic book, intended as a parody of formulaic superhero fights), the graphic novel The New Adventures of Abraham Lincoln (done with a mixture of computer-generated and manually-drawn digital images), 12 issues writing DC Comics' Superman Adventures, and the three issue limited series Superman: Strength.

He is best known as a comics theorist, following the publication in 1993 of Understanding Comics, a wide-ranging exploration of the definition, history, vocabulary, and methods of the medium of comics, itself in comics form. He followed in 2000 with Reinventing Comics (also in comics form), in which he outlined twelve "revolutions" that he argued would be keys to the growth and success of comics as a popular and creative medium. Finally, in 2006, he released Making Comics. Following publication, he went on a tour with his family that included all 50 U.S. states and parts of Europe.[2]

He was one of the earliest promoters of webcomics as a distinct variety of comics,[citation needed] and a vocal supporter of micropayments.[3] He was also an advisor to BitPass, a company that provided an online micropayment system, which he helped launch with the publication of The Right Number, an online graphic novella priced at US$0.25 for each chapter. McCloud maintains an active online presence on his web site where he publishes many of his ongoing experiments with comics produced specifically for the web. Among the techniques he explores is the "infinite canvas" permitted by a web browser, allowing panels to be spatially arranged in ways not possible in the finite, two-dimensional, paged format of a physical book.

His latest work is a comic book that formed the press release introducing Google's web browser, Google Chrome, which was published on September 1, 2008.[4]

[edit] Creator's Bill of Rights

McCloud was the principal author of the Creator's Bill of Rights, a 1988 document with the stated aim of protecting the rights of comic book creators and help aid against the exploitation of comics artists and writers by corporate work-for-hire practices.[5] The group that adopted the Bill also included artists Kevin Eastman, Dave Sim, and Stephen R. Bissette.[6] The Bill included twelve rights such as "The right to full ownership of what we fully create," and "The right to prompt payment of a fair and equitable share of profits derived from all of our creative work."[7]

[edit] 24-hour comic

In 1990 McCloud coined the idea of a 24-hour comic, a complete 24-page comic created by a single cartoonist in 24 consecutive hours. It was a mutual challenge with cartoonist Steve Bissette, intended to compel creative output with a minimum of self-restraining contemplation.[8] Thousands of cartoonists have since taken up the challenge.[9]

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Lambiek Comiclopedia. "Scott McCloud". http://lambiek.net/artists/m/mccloud.htm. 
  2. ^ MIT news (September 20, 2006). "'Making Comics' author decodes cartoons". http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2006/mccloud-0920.html. 
  3. ^ The Guardian (August 7, 2003). "Making the web pay". http://technology.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,1013313,00.html. 
  4. ^ McCloud, Scott (2008-09-01). "Google Chrome, behind the Open Source Browser Product". Google. http://www.google.com/googlebooks/chrome/. Retrieved on 2008-09-02. 
  5. ^ Coogan, Pete (September, 1990). "Creator's Rights". The Comics Journal p. 65-71
  6. ^ McCloud, Scott (2000). Reinventing Comics, New York: Paradox Press. Pg. 62
  7. ^ "Creator's Bill of Rights". 2006-10-13. http://www.scottmccloud.com/inventions/bill/bill_of_rights.html. 
  8. ^ Brattleboro Museum. "The 24-Hour Comic Book Challenge". http://www.brattleboromuseum.org/events/ComicChallenge.html. 
  9. ^ The 24-Hour Comics Index

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Sister project Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Scott McCloud


[edit] Interviews

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