Karma Chameleon: Return to the Boot Camp (You come and go, you come and go)

Previously on Ty Templeton's Comic Book Boot camp...
*we were introduced to story types
*circles, rectangles, cones and tubes can create anything in the world
*people can be broken into heads
*talent is a myth
*this class has no problem staying past 9:30

This week we entered the world of Karma. No, we didn't pass around a joint and contemplate the universe. Karma is a set of simple expectations. When a character is good and does good, we expect him/her to receive good in return. If the character is an evil bastard we expect him/her to lose out in the end. Sure, this isn't always how things go (in real life and in fiction) but understanding these expectations means we can turn them on their head later if we need to. I was skeptical. By reading this blog you can tell I'm a huge George RR Martin fan. In his books good things happen to bad people, good people get trampled on (or beheaded) and I love the story for it. The difference I think is that GRRM skews the balance of Karma deliberately. When SPOILER...Ned dies...SPOILER we're supposed to be left feeling clueless and upset. We're supposed to be outraged because it's not right.

(Didn't hear your wicked words every day)
Our assignment was to choose one of two scenarios
1. Cleopatra attempts to murder her son
2. Jack Space...something (I've misplaced my notes...) an intergalactic Space captain attempts genocide of an alien race

Create 3 different motivations
Pure: Family, duty, honour, or humanity
Selfish: Greed, power, or glory
Emotional: Revenge, or madness

Create an ending where the motivation balances

If Cleopatra kills her son for the good of the nation we expect the nation to survive and flourish by her actions BUT she does something terrible and needs to be punished for it.

If she kills him out of greed she does something horrible with a horrible motivation so we want something worse to happen to her. If she doesn't succeed in killing him she still needs to be punished for her intentions.

Emotional motivations aren't inherently good or evil, they just have to balance our in the end.

It was interesting to go around the class and bitch our ideas. The reaction was instant. If the Karma didn't work we could tell. We might not have known exactly why it didn't work (and Ty would explain it) but something was off. Something didn't sit right. Next time you read a book or watch a film and at the ending makes you tilt your head and squint your eyes, check the Karma of the story. People don't like to admit it but formula even in art makes us happy. If a character is treated badly we notice. If a character doesn't get the punishment they deserve, we notice.

(I'm a man without conviction, I'm a man who doesn't know, How to sell a contradiction, You come and go you come and go)

Art Lessons
*Tube and a ruler, a box with a roof and a rule = knees
*Middle panel tells information backwards and should drag the eye right to left
*Tall hats are funny

*Drawing attempts will be added when my scanner stops hating me...

Cheers...and now more Culture Club

Karma Karma Karma Karma Karma Chameleon
You come and go, You come and go
Loving would be easy if your colours were like my dreams
Red, gold, and green, red gold and green.

;)