Wednesday, 14 December 2011

comic video.

 Notes from the histoy of comics video.
This video was made in 2003 so this may seem slighty outdated. in 1938 superman was born. superman had become a national icon, but not many people belived in ti to become so big. comics came big in newspapers. all newspapers said no to superman,  in 1938 super man was finally published after struggle to get it published. unlike most newspaper comics superman could relate to the world of 1938, what made superman relate to people he was given an alter ego who is said to be the best american. fro. there superman went huge with videos and a daily comic strip in newspapers. the next superhero to be created was batman by two new writers but was completely different to superman having no superpowers and fighting crime with smarts. no dc had two huge comic superheroes. it wasnt long until other writers got into the super hero business. they had a huge competition froma company calls timely comics also known as marvel they where definatly better drawn. marvel came up with the 60 page comic which set the standard.  stan lee started working for marvel and wanted to create comics that where more suitable for older readers. dc came up with the irst sidekick robin giving batman a fater figure and then loads of sidekicks where created which doubled the sales.  marvel created a super hero called captain marvel which dc found a slight rip off of superman so after a while of elling better than superman captain marvel was stopped. comics where at war with each other to make the best comics and then the comics started to create comics with the superheroes fighting hitler giving people hope. later from that captain america was made with his first comic being the front cover of him punching hitler which got loads of hate mail. captain america was created by joe simon and jack kirby made captain and gave the hero and sidekick. the writers came caught up in political war problem. comic books where then sent over to the soliders in packages and they liked them. ww2 became the peak of comics ssales because people enjoyed reading about the americans winning the war. wonder woman was created by a psycatrist and was a form of facism, she was one of the first woman super hero,wonder woman showed [eople fighting back or lose. the female aspect was heavily played but the woman had quite a masciline look, the writers of marvel left to go to war and the publishers took over the super heroes and changed the way the looked and acted and made them more patriotic and changed there background story. after ww2 the super heroes faded and new comics where born such as teen comics horror comics and others. comic books became a said virus because prisoners where reading them and now comics where being attacked. after the publicity and goverment attackes the goverment came up with a comic code that gave authority to publish the comic.by 1951 most heroes where cancelled and the only ones left where batman,superman and wonder woman. in 1956 flash was remade and then so where others and made more up to date with new technology. fgroups of super heroes where becoming big with the first one being justice league and then stan lee from marvel made the fantastic four. this is when timely comics became marvel. comics started to increase in the age readers going from young kids to high schoolers.

Summary.
The video was very informative and really helped to see how these comics actually changed the way people thought about the war and how they changed peoples lives.

Wednesday, 23 November 2011

Game idea

Game idea
My game idea is based around the age of the viking i have research a vast amount about the viking and have learnt about what they wear and how they lived and how they fought. I want to concentrate my idea on the vikings who traveled to britain and the raids that began in ireland. I have sketched an idea of what my main viking warrior will look like. The main characters name will be named Thorlak and as hinted is his name is a decendant of the norse god Thor the god of thunder, he is the leader of the viking army traveling to britain, he is given the role of leader mainly because of his skill in battle and himself being aa demi god.
Story
Brief of beggining.
The story begins on the boat of the vikings and making your way towards England, vikings on the ship are drinking ale and shouting and roaring about England and how they want to take it. The main charcter Thorlak keeps to himself and waits for the battle (action happenes on the boat e.g mythical creature, or a boat attack). When the vikings reach England, the British are already waiting for them upon shore, this will seem similar to the attack on the beach in saving private Ryan.

 After Battle
After the battle is won by the vikings  there will be much fewer number the vikings. Throughout the game it will progress in time and it will show the year it is in when changing. The weather and scenery will change depending on the time of year e.g autum,winter etc. So after the battle, the vikings will have a series of raids throughout England and with special sequences includes raids in Ireland with some winning and some meant to be lost. Once the raids are finished the plot will thicken and have added a plot that does not relate to the history but is still in context.

The plot.
Once won all the territory they want Thorlak feels not fulfilled and wants more glory. So in doing so he wants to find the king of england and take his throne. This will begin a army building process, leading you to meet foreign people and English with the hatred of the king. These people will help you do find sources and better posts throughout the map and as you gain these posts and upgrade them you will increase in soldiers to fight for you. Although the game is concentrated on the Vikings I will give the opportunity after completing the first time to go back and play as the English defending there land from the Vikings like a slight resistance. Between the army building Thorlak will go through tricky paths and fight mythical monsters hidden in the land such as: grendel, a dragon, sea serpent, and even meet a ghost of Beowulf and have to fight him for a secret weapon which will include powers of Beowulf and also armour of Beowulf which will be the best armour in the game.
Thorlak
Thorlak will gain powers on the way in the element of lighting which will help him fight the mythical creatures and also the soldiers. He will also be sent back and fourth from the heavens by Thor to learn new powers and skills which will be individual levels in the heavens.

 This is the look i want for my main charcter. i kept to the history refrences adding a tunic and cape and also a bone brooch on his shoulder for better movments with the sword and also gave him a historically correct helmet because the vikings didnt actually have horns on their helmets.. i also added a brooch that has the symbol of lighting to relate him to Thor the god of hunder. Igave him the standard weapons for a viking solider but throughout the game you will be able to create and find better looking and better stats weapons.

Wednesday, 16 November 2011

Viking/Norse Warrior Culture.

What I already know.
Vikings came from scandinavian countries such as Norway and Denmark. They were known for for there mascaline features and reckless behaviour. Vikings love to fight and destroy cities and towns and collect and sell booty of either tresure or slaves. They are also famous for there notourious style of boat.
Research.
Most vikings who were swedish left and traveled east towards russia and down volgo and the black sea and the Norway and Denmark left and traveled south towards the British Isles and Ireland. the vikings settled on islands such as Russia, Britain,Ireland and France. The viking have many trading center in the Brithish Isles, they owned alot of the ports in Ireland and made York which thy called Jvorik a trading center.
I will concentrate more on the british isles vikings.
The viking age started around the year 700 and the raids in other parts of the world began in the year 800 to 900. So the vikings survived a long time. They where extremely proud and known to be very masiqaline because of there brute stregth and barbaric behaviour.


Both women and men both favoured long hair and the hair style was very important to them, also the men would have finely groomed beards and moustaches. the mens clothes would of consist of cloth trousers and a long tunic which was topped with a cape (both these items would be brightly colored), for his feet he would wear leather shoes or long leather boots. In bettle they wold be equipped with main chainmail, iron helmet and a sheild with an axe or sword.


Vikings from sourses are know for gothic pendant and oseberg tapetry and seem to fasten all clothes with brooches.
Brooches were very big in the viking age and the viking women the brooches would change in shape and size from time to time and several of them inspired the western european fashions and their ornament was constantly being changed to reflect the developing styles of the viking age. For the viking men furs,hides and shaggy wollen cloaks were worn by all men and would have required a huge brooch or pin to hold up such heavy material.
Smaller cloaks were worn with simpler pins of bronze and bone on the right shoulder so that the sword arm could be kept free for any emergency. A sibgle bead was used as a button to close the opening of the neck on the shirt and a knife would been as a purse was hung from the belt or on a cord around the neck.
Weapons.
Vikings used swords the most, the swords where one handed and the blades were doule edged and the finest seem to be impotered from rhineland and richly ornamated. The weapons that are most assosiated with the vikings is the axe and the spear. the principal means of defence was the sheild which consits of wodden board with a central iron boss to protect the hand.



















Mytholigies.
"Dragons are common in Norse lore; we associate viking raiders with dragon headed ships. However this is slightly misleading because Norse lore made no distinction between dragons per se and serpents. A serpent was simply a dragon without wings.

Dragons in Norse lore are usually a negative symbol, being evil bringers of destruction. Clearly this makes them excellent figureheads for Viking raiders!"
Famous Norse Dragons

"One of the most important Norse dragons is Nithhogr. This creature lives at the base of the world tree Yggdrasil and gnaws at the roots, attempting to destroy it. Nithhogr also devours the corpses of the dead.

The world serpent Jormungandr would also be classed as a dragon in Norse lore. Jormungandr - the Midgard serpent - lives in the waters curled in a circle round the world and biting his own tail.

Another well-known Norse dragon tale is that of Fafnir, who was turned into a dragon by his greed and who was slain by Siegfried."
Beowulf

"The hero Scandanavian hero Beowulf also fought dragons amongst other enemies. Some have classed his most famous opponent Grendel - along with Grendel's mother - as dragons, however they are more usually considered to be some form of troll or related creature."
My main viking in my game will look something like this. In the the drawing i have added the general weapons used by vikings and what types of armour.


Wednesday, 12 October 2011

Contextual influences.

I have chosen the comics of Thor. Thor is a fitcional superhero (god) the comics are about a god from a city called asgard and they are mainly about his life as a god and how he protects the world from various foes.

All the recorded writers of these comics are the following.

Stan Lee,
Gerry Conway,
Roy Thomas,
Bill Mantlo,
Len Wein,
Ralph Macchio,
Mark Gruenwald,
Doug Moench, Walt Simonson,
Tom DeFalco,
Ron Frenz,
Ron Marz,
Warren Ellis,
William Messner-Loebs
Dan Jurgens,
Michael Avon Oeming
J. Michael Straczynski,
Kieron Gillen,
Matt Fraction.

All the recorded pencillers, inkers andcolorist (artists) for the comics are the following.
Jack Kirby,
Neal Adams,
John Buscema,
Keith Pollard,
Bob Hall,
Mark Bright,
Walt Simonson,
Ron Frenz,
M.C. Wyman,
Mike Deodato,
Pasqual Ferry
John Romita,
Jr., Erik Larsen,
Andy Kubert,
Stuart Immonen,
Joe Bennett,
Paco Medina,
Scot Eaton,
Tom Raney
Oliver Coipel,
Marko Djurdjević,
Billy Tan,
Doug Braithwaite,
Pasqual Ferry
Pasqual Ferry
Joe Sinnott, 
Mike Esposito
Scott Hanna.

Influences that some of the writers had.
Stann lee- His influnce came from the civil and world war to try and keep peoples spirit alive by created these masked  heroes fighting back the enemies (germans). Thor came from the norse mythology and stan thought to turn into a more heroic icon and made the myth into reality through a comic book. Stan was born on December 28th 1922 in Manhattan making him 88 years old he began writing comics in the 1950's,60's. before then it was only Detective Comics(DC) but stan found that most of the superheroes either couldnt be killed or where millionaires. Stan realised that with superheroes they are needed everyday but under a mask they would have a alter ego such as spiderman and peter parker. Spiderman was his first comic featuring a geeky scrawny boy at school who has a tough live but then is bitten by a unique spider and is transformed into a muscular superhero with responsibilitys. Stan went on to create a load of over comics such as Fantastic Four, The incredible Hul, Captain America and Iron Man etc. Thor unlike any of his older comics was born with super powers but was rekless and also wanted to fight and did not think of consequens, thor is taught by his fater for years to become more like a man and less like a foolish boy.Stan creates thor to be alredy suited up and ready for batle whereas his other superheroes create there suits and weapons after they gain power.




The thor comic art work has change extremely since the first apperance of thor at first they was not much heavy armour really exaggerated with thor and himself seems to be quite thin for a mighty god the colors used are faded and boring.he still has the same long blonde hair and his mighty hammer (Mjolnir), nothing is changed about thor merely replenished and more extravegent colors are used to make him look more royal. the left image is the first thor and as you can see he looks pretty basic there is a basic color of orange used.
In this image on the right you can see that there alot more bold colors and glossy colors which makes thor look much better because he know has more of an outline and more of a design. They've added shiny chainmail of arms and legs and a much more heroic helmet. His hammer s definetly smaller and is concentrated more in the modern comics. the red cape i think must be to symbolise the kind of original heroic look e.g. superman.







 God Of War (Series)
God Of War 17544 Wallpaper God of War is based around the Greek Myths of the Greek Gods, in the game they include almost every God and Goddess. The game is about a spartan who is great in battle but is near the first defeat of his life and cannot withstand it and wishes help from the God Of War, the God answers and says he will help with one consequence that Kratos (the spartan) will do the Gods bidding and he will grant Kratos the Athena blades, Kratos accepts and beats the barbarian army and wins the war once again. With doing this promise the God Of War commands Kratos to go into his own village and kills everyone inside even his wife and daughter, after this souls of all the dead villagers latch on to Kratos and create a white coat over his making him pale and now named "The Ghost Of Sparta". After this Kratos is furious with the God Of War and plans to kill him long story short he defeats him and becomes the new God Of War. In the last two games the Greek gods began turn on Kratos and kill him but Kratos is saved and revived by gaia a titan of life. Whilst getting your revenge on the gods you meet the gods in battle one by one and learn a lot about the Greek myths and what they are and how they represented Greece.
The culture surroundings are based in the times of ancient Greece with the scenery of things such as stone pillars, large monuments and large amounts of nature. The influence on the Greek Gods are based around the natural view of them and then they have put in they own extras to make them look more of a warrior look.