Cartoon Painting

Classic is the old-school way of drawing cartoons and is often drawn in black and white. If you remember early versions of Mickey Mouse or Betty Boop, you’re already familiar with this style.

Also known as the “Fleischer style” after the animation studio that helped develop memorable characters like Koko the Clown and Popeye, this style features bigger heads and shorter bodies drawn in clean ink outlines. Moreover, the characters’ bodies are never fully straight and seem to move as if they have no bones in their bodies (hence the name “noodle style”).

This is a more current style of drawing cartoons prominent in the television and digital space. The main features of this style are bold outlines, geometric shapes, and dominant colors.

Most cartoon programs on animation TV channels are drawn in this style. This is because simple shapes and colors save time and money.

This is an unusual style of drawing cartoons. It attempts to represent reality in the cartoon format. This means the cartoonist doesn’t alter or add flourish to a character’s shape or color, but rather renders the character’s look with as much detail as possible.

While other styles attempt to simplify, this style favors realistic depictions of characters and settings. The cartoon drawing in the show “Archer” best illustrates this style. For example, Archer’s face and body are drawn in a lot of detail, even featuring wrinkles and textural detail on his clothes.

The popular Japanese cartoon drawing style, manga, is mostly found in serialized comics, graphic novels, and anime television shows. The manga drawing style developed in the late nineteenth century and features characters drawn with large and expressive eyes, long legs, small mouths, distinctive hair, and lean bodies, often depicted in black and white.

This style is usually well detailed and attempts to render human qualities and movements into the art. Popular examples include “Dragon Ball” and “Hellsing.” Dragon Ball is the second-most best-selling manga of all time, featuring characters with innocent and big eyes and muscular bodies.

This type of drawing keeps stylizing to an absolute minimum and attempts to convey meaning and stories through simplistic line drawings. Vector art, based on mathematical formulas, is often used to aid in creating cartoon characters. This style is typically characterized by straight lines, geometric shapes, pastel colors, and disproportionate and unrealistic limbs. The immensely popular xkcd comics are drawn in a minimalist style with basic stick figures.

This drawing style can usually be seen in video games, since simple artwork can quickly convert into animation. A great example of minimalist cartoon drawing is the video game Thomas Was Alone, which uses block figures to deliver clever dialogue.