Thursday, July 26, 2007
SNP, CRCKL, PP!
Recently I was reading Kekkaishi Volume 9 and I noticed something interesting: many of the sound effects were actual words with the vowels completely removed. So, for example, "RUMBLE" was written as "RMBL." I went back and looked at the volumes I had on hand (6-9, all from the local library) and it looks like something that's been slowly building throughout the series. For example, in earlier volumes certain sound effects were fully spelled out (e.g., "RUSTLE") but in later volumes the same SFX was abbreviated:
Here are some of my other favorite consonant-only SFX from Kekkaishi:
Can anyone explain that last one to me? "GRMP" is used a couple times in the book in situations where one character is grabbing or gripping another, but I can't figure out if it's supposed to represent an actual word or if it's just a more traditional "nonsense" SFX creation.
And if anyone has earlier volumes of Kekkaishi, could you check to see if this has been going on from the book's beginning and it just took me until volume nine to notice? Also: has anyone noticed Viz (or any other publisher, for that matter) using similar SFX shorthand in any other series? Personally, I kinda like this method of transcribing sounds, as it make them look less like "real" words and more like "pure" sounds. 11:55 AM | |
Recently I was reading Kekkaishi Volume 9 and I noticed something interesting: many of the sound effects were actual words with the vowels completely removed. So, for example, "RUMBLE" was written as "RMBL." I went back and looked at the volumes I had on hand (6-9, all from the local library) and it looks like something that's been slowly building throughout the series. For example, in earlier volumes certain sound effects were fully spelled out (e.g., "RUSTLE") but in later volumes the same SFX was abbreviated:
 |  |
| RUSTLE | RSTL |
 |  |
| MURMUR | MRMR |
Here are some of my other favorite consonant-only SFX from Kekkaishi:
 |  |
| KLNCH | SKRTCH |
 |  |
| KRMPL | CHCKL |
 |  |
| RMBL | GRMP |
Can anyone explain that last one to me? "GRMP" is used a couple times in the book in situations where one character is grabbing or gripping another, but I can't figure out if it's supposed to represent an actual word or if it's just a more traditional "nonsense" SFX creation.
And if anyone has earlier volumes of Kekkaishi, could you check to see if this has been going on from the book's beginning and it just took me until volume nine to notice? Also: has anyone noticed Viz (or any other publisher, for that matter) using similar SFX shorthand in any other series? Personally, I kinda like this method of transcribing sounds, as it make them look less like "real" words and more like "pure" sounds. 11:55 AM | |