February Meeting: Science-Inspired Comics and Storyboard That

Even though we didn't all finish the entire book this month, we had a blast talking through some of the funniest entries in What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions by Randall Munroe. Some group favorites were the comics in response to the question about crying so much you dehydrated yourself and the question about the number of cats needed to bring down a jet, assuming they can meow at the same resonant frequency as the plane. People submitted some VERY interesting scientific questions, and the author answered them with humor, smarts, and a good dose of sarcasm.

Since the comics were hilarious and looked so simple, we tried creating our own science-inspired comics. Some Bookshoppers took inspiration from the hypothetical science questions asked in the book, such as: What if a rainstorm dropped all of its water in a single drop?; and What if every day, every human had a 1% chance of being turned into a turkey, and every turkey had a 1% chance of being turned into a human? Our cartoons are below:

After hand drawing comics, we tried out the free online program Storyboard That, which has tons of different backgrounds and characters and props to help you create your own cartoons. It was super fun to play around with changing each character's clothes, body position, and facial expression so many Bookshoppers didn't get a chance to finish their comics. But it's a free web-based program, so I encouraged them to create an account with their own email addresses and keep playing around with it at home! Some of the Storyboard That scenes are shown below:

Made with Storyboard That

Made with Storyboard That

Made with Storyboard That

Made with Storyboard That

Made with Storyboard That

Made with Storyboard That

Our next meeting will be on Monday, March 26th. We will be discussing Cardboard by Doug TenNapel and using LittleBits to build something together as a group. See you next month!