Manga Across MediaStyle Adapting to Form in the 1950s and 1960s and in the Digital Age Dalma Kálovics (bio) If one refers to manga as a form of media, most people outside Japan think of paperbacks or so-called tankôbon. Nowadays, however, manga looks exactly the same across all print media, be it in big magazines, small paperbacks, or in even smaller pocketbooks. This is because the visual style of manga has been finely tuned to the materiality of books: manga is graphically composed to suit individual pages, panels are arranged within frames that echo the rectangular spaces of the single page and the double-spread, and panels, speech bubbles, and drawings establish a visual flow that guides the reader’s gaze. However, while the paneling of manga and its other signature visual characteristics have been thoroughly researched in Japanese academia, and have been essential components of “how to draw manga” guides, the materiality of manga media is rarely discussed beyond the printed book. For many decades manga was bound to printed magazines and paperbacks of relatively unchanging size and format. As such, the materiality of manga was of secondary concern, but this has changed with the digital age. It is not an exaggeration to say that manga is currently standing at a crossroad. The print runs of manga magazines have been declining for some time, and several magazines cease publication or move online every year. In contrast, digital comics have steadily risen over the past few years, and upon entering computer and smartphone screens the format of manga started to change. Aside from digital comics that use traditional panel layouts taken from print manga, a new type of comics composed in vertical strips has also appeared—so-called webtoons. The smartphone-optimized nature of webtoons has made researchers once again conscious of the materiality of manga, and that media does in fact determine how manga is presented. Webtoons have been widely popular in Korea and China. And, although the manga industry in Japan is relatively resistant to big changes due to its sheer size and long-standing history, the popularity of webtoons, especially [End Page 102] among young readers of the smartphone generation, suggests that even in Japan a shift is inevitable. Ushered in by digital comics, this formal shift seems enormous. But, looking back in history one can see that these changes are in line with manga’s inherent ability to adapt to different types of media. To demonstrate this flexibility, I first examine manga across different media of the 1950s and 1960s, and then move on to examining the new comics of the digital age that show similar adaptability and publishing practices. This article focuses on how the panel layout of manga has changed due to different sizes and forms of publishing media in Japanese and Korean comics. I intentionally do not consider other aspects such as the reading experience for several reasons. Visual style is usually considered in relation to the narrative, while the materiality of manga is rarely taken into account. However, as I introduce here, the form of manga’s publishing media largely determines how panel layouts are structured. Also, I would like to avoid qualitative evaluation of the recent changes in manga style. It may be easy to interpret the recent shift toward vertical, scrolling formats as a “deterioration” of manga while ignoring the fact that this has been dictated by a change in the format of the media. For example, one might view the absence of double-spread compositions, which up until recently have been standard in manga, as a mark of inferiority, similar to what has happed in relation to Chinese comics.1 However, this judgment does not take other factors into consideration, such as media or the state of the industry. Furthermore, beyond personal preferences, one’s reading experience is largely determined by one’s literacy of the medium. There are those who might find a manga just as enjoyable even without being aware of its complex visual techniques as well as those who, without a basic level of visual literacy, may be at a loss to navigate difficult compositions. Terminology For the purposes of this article...
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Oct 31, 2020
Annisa Fitriana Lestari + 1
