Christopher Hart - Modern Cartooning: Essential Techniques for Drawing Today’s Popular Cartoons

Copyright 2013 by Cartoon Craft LLC

All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Watson-Guptill Publications, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com
www.watsonguptill.com

WATSON-GUPTILL and the WG and Horse designs are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Hart, Christopher
Modern cartooning: essential techniques for drawing todays popular cartoons / Christopher Hart. First Edition.
Includes index.
1. Cartoon characters. 2. CartooningTechnique. I. Title.
NC1764.H377 2013
741.51dc23
2012013977

eISBN: 978-0-8230-0715-8

Book design by M.80 Design
Covert art by Christopher Hart

v3.1

DEDICATED TO ALL ASPIRING
CARTOONISTS EVERYWHERE!

This is the first cartooning book specifically designed for the person who has never drawn cartoons before. With carefully crafted, clear step-by-step drawings and an amazing abundance of hints and tips, youll gain the confidence and skill needed to draw cartoons the way youve always wanted to.

Ill show you how to draw great-looking characters right away. The trick is to learn how to draw the basic head shapes and apply facial features from a wide selection of the most popular types in cartooning today. Youll start with a circle, then discover new shapes. Ill show you how to mold the head into new and unique shapes to convey humorous and highly entertaining attitudes.

For this book, I created the Universal Body Shape. Ill also show you how to use a basic rectangle to create the foundation for just about every type of character. How easy is that?

Youll learn all of these secrets and more. Ill also show you how to take established art techniques and tweak them to create humorous and often clueless cartoon characters. Youll amaze your friends. Youll crush your enemies. Hey, how many cartooning books can promise all that?

Welcome to the world of cartooning. The chapters ahead are funny, cute, and crazy. So take out your pencil. Wait. That was a little slow. Try it again. Okay, ready? Now! Oh, almost! Oh, what the heck, lets get started.

First, lets examine the various theories of cartooning from a contextual standpoint. Just kidding! Lets just start drawing instead!

You may wonder if its possible to create stylish and contemporary cartoons by beginning at a basic level. You foolish, foolish mortal. The faces youre going to begin with are easy to draw, but theyre also character designs of a high level that are entertaining and stuffed with personality. You can achieve these results by the creative use of a few simple head shapes, combined with the right types of facial features. But theres more to it than that. My approach to cartooning stresses the construction of the head shape (in this case, a circle). Head shapes should remain conspicuous, even in the final character design. This technique causes the outline of the head to appear as a primary feature of your cartoon character, like cartoon eyes or noses. The basic head construction does not just serve as a guideline for the finished drawing; it becomes a caricature of a regular head.

It used to be that the initial foundation of the head was there to simply get the drawing started, and was later forgotten. Oh, how young and innocent cartoonists were back then! But enough of this forced walk down memory lanelets get started!

Many cartoonists start cartoons with a circle, but then modify it at their first opportunity. Why? The circle is a pleasing shape. Roundness is an appealing element in many character designs. But the simplicity of the circle can also become a liability. The circle is such a common shape that it does not always command the viewers attention.

But you can create excitement for your circle-based characters by making them so simplistic and round that they look amusingly absurd. And you dont have to start with a perfect circle! A sloppy hand-drawn circle is fine. You wont get a bad grade for not doing everything perfectly. At least, not a really bad grade.

The circle works best for boys, girls, and female teen characters. You can also create older characters with this starting point, but it takes more inventiveness to pull it off. Circles tend to make everyone look young.

Heres a cute kid with mpd (mischievous personality disorder). Please dont leave any weapons-grade nuclear material near himjust to be extra cautious. You dont want to know what almost happened last time someone forgot to put away the plutonium.

Draw a circleany circleneat, sloppy, lopsided, it doesnt matter.

Divide the head in half with the center line.

Place the eye line low across the head, and use guidelines to keep the eyes evenly aligned.