Time and Motion in Superman

DC Comics Presents: All Star Superman – Volume I

The most fascinating thing about comics to me is the way that movement and time progression is achieved. Looking through our library’s comics collection, I came across the DC Comics’ first volume of Superman which I would like to cover. I intend to look at a few instances where both time and action are seen by different techniques.

On page 29 of the first episode, Clark Kent is seen rushing to get to his office job after dealing with a certain incident. This panel depicts one of the earliest types of techniques used for portraying motion through an art style. Looking back to Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics (Chapter 4: Time Frames) he introduces us to the many techniques of ‘moving’ pictures. This style can be seen through the exploration of “motion [as] depicted by a single image on canvas” (McCloud 108). We see Clark Kent speedily walking across the office and the various transitions that get him to do so. This is a fine example of sequential art where time and motion are represented in one single panel.

In the following example found on page 59, there is a three panel sequence or syntagm depicting motion and time progression. Lois’s act of opening her birthday gift from Superman is a moment-to-moment type of transition which requires very little closure. Unlike film where the action is done quickly and right in front of you, comics as a multimodal medium progresses in a timely manner that is completely constructed by the way in which the reader proceeds through the text. In this case, the reader does not need much imagination in such a simple transition because we all know how the action goes, but it is interesting to see the images chosen by the illustrator as depicted in each panel to help move the eye along.

As for the third example that is found on page 28, the motion in this single panel is very quick. The truck behind the two figures in the forefront is blurred and when you look close enough there are lines that show movement towards the figures. Meanwhile, the boy and dog are in the motion of running right past the truck, which can be assumed is occurring very quickly. This technique is widely used by many action comic illustrators to portray the dramatic effect of action lines cutting across.