My Lesson on How to Draw Cartoons

I wanted to make this article my third follow on from two of my other hubs Fairground and Funfair Games and Charity Events and Fundraising. The reason for this is because I have so many photographs of the signs I am working on and want to share them with my regular readers but also I like to go into more depth about how I achieve the quality. The characters I have been painting are fairly simple to me but to the unprofessional artist they may like to here some of the small tricks I used to get them as bold and exact as the original print off that I use as a reference.

This is a step by step guide and I will begin with how I draw a cartoon character on a blank board with pencil because it good foundation for me to have a strong 'blueprint'.

Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/kyknoord/426480309/

Here is a photograph of one of my most recent signs for the Wilkinsons 'Open Day' charity event, I thought it was a good example of how to draw a funny cartoon because the rats features are over emphasized and he has a cheeky hands like he is grasping for cheese. When drawing cartoon eyes and expressions it is important that you get them right because they hold the most attention to the viewer, misinterpretations can often occur for example; one of my viewers thought that the rat looked happy considering he was going to get splatted but you can also consider that his eye brows are raised so it is also a nervous smile.

I designed the lettering fairly quickly but they are in suit with drawing cartoons because they are almost graffiti like and squashed to indicate a playful splat rather than making it appear gory.

I have included many photographs here of how I went about drawing cartoons which I documented in those previous hubs mentioned above, I did this to show how I added particular detail to improve the overall quality, however there will be more photographs uploaded in future hubs of more completed characters.

One way to add detail is to use prominent colors such as metalic paint, although this depends on which medium you are using and the surface to be painted. I have used these to give realistic effect to the trash cans in the Top Cat painting above.

Depending on which cartoons you require, a good resource to begin researching is on Google Image search, you can find easy to draw cartoons and obscure themes such as the 'Goalie Bear' which I have recently finished creating in the picture above. He is an easy character but when done properly can produce a impressive sign for the funfair game if you notice the scenery I have draw surrounding him such as the goal net and typography.

Remember it is important to get the symetry of his almost eliptical face right and if need be use a round object to draw around for the football.

As we can see in the above photograph; cartoons rely on block colors and bold lines to make them work, as long as you have the patience to create these with precise and clear brush strokes, any other details to improve how you draw cartoons can be added later.

It really is a matter of building layers and it is a process which a childhood TV artist called Neil Buchanan once taught us on his TV show 'Art Attack', he took the layering technique to extremes by creating large scale images using objects such as clothing folded and layered across areas such as football fields and tarmac surfaces.

If you found this article of mine useful you may like to checkout my other hub with 'Different types of Drawing', this explains more 'Drawing How To' lessons.