3. General Information
• A cartoon is a form of two dimensional illustrated visual
art.
• Modern use of the word ‘cartoon’ refers to a typically non
or semi realistic drawing made for humour purposes.
• Cartoons can be used in all types of contexts such as
journalism, humour, fine art and politics.
• The cartoon industry is very well known for their strips
inside newspapers and magazines, these days they have
moved online as well.
4. Fine Arts
• Cartoons are usually full sized pieces of work which are made
in fresco, oil, mosaic, stained glass or tapestry.
• Italian Renaissance painters made very complete cartoons,
for example Raphael’s cartoons for the Sistine Chapel are
considered masterpieces.
• They are what you would expect from an older age of
cartoons, very subtle jokes but the artist is more concentrated
on the image.
• No two, three or four panel works are done here - only one
panel pieces of art.
5. Journalism/Print Media
• These types of cartoon started in 1843 when Punch magazine
added historical frescoes to their magazines.
• Modern panel style gag cartoons generally consist of a single
drawing with a typeset caption - many people consider
cartoonist Peter Arno the father of modern cartoons.
• Editorial cartoons often include speech balloons and sometimes
multiple panels, they usually appear on news publications and
websites - they usually convey humour in a ironic way. The art
usually acts as a visual metaphor to illustrate a point of view or
social topic.
• Comic strips are found daily in newspapers worldwide, usually
found in a short series. Humour is the most prevalent subject
matt, adventure and drama are also represented in these types
of cartoon.
6. Political Cartoons
• By the mid 19th century newspapers in many countries featured cartoons
commenting on the day to day politics.
• Thomas Nast brought realistic German drawing techniques to boost
American cartooning - he did over 160 cartoons around this period.
• Political cartoons can be humorous or satirical although the target may
complain he does have the right to fight back but lawsuits have been rare.
• A lot of political cartoons appeared between WW1, WW2 & the Cold War.
7. Animation
• Due to the similarities between cartoons and animation in
drawings the world ‘cartoon’ started to represent the
word ‘animation’.
• ‘Animation’ designs are just a style of illustrated images
seen in rapid succession to give the impression of
movement.
• Animation is made by images being played straight each
other really quickly, those images are slightly different
from one another so it creates the illusion that it’s moving.
8. Charles Schulz
• Charles Schulz, nicknamed Sparky was an American cartoonist who was best
known for the comic strip Peanuts - he is widely regarded as one of the most
influential cartoonists of all time.
• Schulz learned his trade by doing serval on and off jobs such as doing lettering
for a Roman Catholic magazine, he then moved to a school where he developed
his career as a comic creator until he had enough money to do it full time.
• Schulz was a keen drawer as a child and after the war he began to have regular
one panel cartoons printed of by the St Paul Pioneer Press - it was here where
he used the name Charlie Brown for the first time - these cartoons were dropped
in 1950.
9. Peanuts
• Peanuts came about after his series ‘Lil’Folks’ was cancelled by the St Paul
Pioneer Press, he approached the United Feature Syndicate with idea and they
became interested.
• Peanuts made it’s first appearance on October 2nd 1950 in seven newspapers -
after this slow beginning Peanuts started making the weekly Sunday page debuted
on January 6th 1952.
• Peanuts eventually became one of the most popular comic strips of all time, as well
as one of the most influential.
• Peanut was published daily in 2,600 newspapers in 75 countries and in 21
languages - over nearly 50 years that Peanuts was published Schulz drew nearly
18,000 strips.
• The strips themselves, plus mercy and product endorsements; produced revenues
of more than $1 billion annually.
10. Charlie Brown
• Charlie Brown is linked to Schulz as they both
have fathers which are barbers but where as
Schulz’s story is full of success, Charlie’s is full of
failure.
• He first appeared in 1947, three years before
Peanuts started in a comic strip called ‘Li’l Folks’ -
he is considers the main character in the strip.
• Charlie is always referred to as ‘Charlie Brown’, his
usual catchphrase is “good grief” and started off at
age four in the first few comics, he then aged to six
a year after and he was eight and a half years old
by 1979.
11. Snoopy
• Snoopy is the cartoon dog in Peanuts who is Charlie Browns
pet - Snoopy began as a fairly conventional pet but then
evolved into one of the strips most dynamic characters.
• Snoopy is recognised all over the world, the original
drawings were inspired by Schulz’s childhood dog ‘Spike’.
• Snoopy made his appearance in the strip on October 4
1950 - his name was originally meant to be ‘Sniffy’ but that
name was taken in another comic strip.
• Snoopy started off as a silent character for the first two
years but later on Schulz made him into a normal dog and
would often give him one word phrases like ‘FOOD’.
• Snoopy also became ‘Joe Cool’ when he put on sunglasses
and leaned against the wall doing nothing.
12. Spin Off’s
• Peanuts had a few films whilst the famous comic strips were on; films
such as “A Boy Named Charlie Brown” which was aired in 1969 and
“Race For Your Life, Charlie Brown” which was aired in 1997 were big
hits at the time.
• ‘Peanuts’ is a movie coming out in late 2015.
• Television specials have been licensed by many different companies
through the years such as Paramount, Karate, Warner Bros and 20th
Century Fox.
• Specials were christmas shows, halloween shows, summer shows but
they didn’t come weekly - once a year or two years they appeared.
• A mini series called “This Is America, Charlie Brown” aired through 88
to 89.
• It doesn’t stop there - musical shows, video games, commercials and
musical influences has come out of the Peanuts series.
13. Producing
• Schulz decided to produce all aspects of the strip himself from the script to the
finish art and lettering.
• The strip was able to be presented with minimal tone, this was Schulz’s style -
to have minimal tone.
• Backgrounds weren’t common within Peanuts, Schulz preferred to put frazzled
lines round them so his readers could focus on subtle changes rather than
sharp transitions.
• Schulz had a routine in making Peanuts, he would read through the days mail
with secretary before sitting down to write and draw the days strip in his studio.
• After coming with up an idea which could take any time between a few minutes
or hours - Schulz didn’t use an inker or letterer for his work as he said “it would
be equivalent to a golfer hiring a man to make his putts for him”.
14. Influences
• Schulz’s work was influenced by Milton Caniff (Terry and the Pirates) and
Bill Mauldin as key influences on Schulz’s work.
• Schulz included his influences into his own strip where he regularly
described Snoopy’s annual veterans day visits with Mauldin.
• Schulz said “It would be impossible to narrow down three or two or even
one direct influence on my personal drawing style. The uniqueness of
Peanuts has set it apart for years.. that one of a kind quality permeates
every aspect of the strip and very clearly extends to the drawing”.
• Schulz watched the movie ‘Citizen Kane’ forty times, the character Lucy
Van Pelt also expresses a fondness for the film, and in one strip cruelly
spoils the ending for her younger brother.
16. Planning & Initial Ideas
• The plan is to create a 3 to 4 panel comic strip to go in either
a newspaper/magazine or online.
• Like Schulz, I like simple and basic strips which are funny in a
way.
• Political or celebrity based strips aren’t my thing, i’m not that
interested in what their doing in their lives - plus the comic
strip only appeals to a certain market who know the public
figure.
• The main subject will be a boy named ‘Harlie’ who is skinny,
wears glasses and has a sense of humour.
17. Structure: 3 Act Story Structure
• A basic lesson in cartoon studies consists of the three act story structure.
• It works in three to four comic panels and helps tell a story - if theres a conflict and a
character reacting to that conflict then you've got a story and can easily fit it within three
or four comic panels.
• ACT 1 is the beginning, where information is setup to provide context for the story.
• ACT 2 is the middle, where characters attempt to achieve goals and encounter conflict.
• ACT 3 is the end, where there is a resolution to the conflict and there character’s
character is revealed.
18. Structure: 5 W’s
• Where are we? A white space. It may be outside or inside, it doesn’t
matter - the rest of the strip should make sense without that
information.
• When are we? Day or night would not specified, so it shouldn’t
matter for the rest of the strip to make sense.
• Who is involved? All we need to know is the main character, Harlie
and that everything will be in context from the first box.
• What are they doing? (their goal) - I’m not sure on the goal that
Harlie’s trying to achieve yet but more thought and i’ll have an idea.
• Why are they doing that? Still, need a ‘what’ in order to find the why.
19. Inspiration
• Schulz’s inspiration for ‘Snoopy’ came from
his dog ‘Spike’ which he had when he was a
child.
• The character idea ‘Harlie’ came from my
best friend who is called Harlie - Harlie is very
witty and his appearance complements it,
the glasses, spots and being skinny.
• Harlie is linked with the old singer Buddy
Holly a lot, appearance wise they are similar -
it could lead to a scene idea.
• I would like to show glimmers of Harlie’s
personality in my own character version of
Harlie - this would lift the age group past
children and on to more adult humour.
20. Script For ‘Harlie’
Strip Name - Buddy Holly
1. EXT. STREET - AFTERNOON
Harlie goes for a walk down the street minding his own business around 2:45; he finds a sign to the
Buddy Holly museum and decides to have a look.
2. INT. MUSEUM - AFTERNOON
Harlie makes his way through the museum, briefly looking at displays as he has no real interest in
Buddy Holly. He stops in a amazement when he comes across a huge statue of Buddy, he stops are
stares for a while.
3. INT. MUSEUM - AFTERNOON
Harlie is still standing next to the statue in confusion, no one is around and he has a moment of self
reflection.
4. INT. MUSEUM - AFTERNOON
Still standing in the same position, Harlie breaks from silence and confusion and makes the remark
‘father?’ due to the resemblance between the two characters.
22. Client
• My client is ‘Go Comics’ which is an online comic strip
website.
• The website stores thousands of comic strips from new to
old strips.
• They have Peanuts, Calvin & Hobbies, Garfield,
Doonesbury, Poptropica and etc.
• As well as uploading these comics onto ‘Go Comics’, the
Harlie series would try and reach editorial products such
as magazines, newspapers and flyers.
23. Target Audience Profile
This slide is about the target
audience the comic strip ‘Harlie’ is
going to be aimed at. The profile is
a boy aged 16 - 19 who enjoys
artwork and comedy, someone
who can draw and likes illustration
themselves. A regular social
networker, a comic & animation
lover (marvel) - someone who
knows strips such as Peanuts.
24. Character Ideas
• All I really did is put my idea’s
on to paper - these were rough
ideas.
• The rough ideas covered a few
things I wanted to try out like
hair, body shape, head shape,
glasses and etc.
• I think they all look too emotion
like and I want to get away
from that look.
• The next step is to try a
different type of drawing and
see if it fits Harlie’s persona.
25. Harlie - Defined Sketches
• After the story board was
defined, I thought I should
define Harlie as a character
straight after.
• The glasses, hair and head
shape have all had a
completely different
approach than before.
• Harlie actually looks like a
cartoon rather than an
emoticon now.
• The body isn’t great but I
hope to tidy that up when I
go into designing him further
in the commuter programs.
27. Story Board
• This is the story board for the comic strip ‘Harlie: Buddy Holly’
- it’s a visual drawing of what the script was in the last slide.
• The characters shown are not the final drawings, this is only a
visual mock up of the story - character design will be more
detailed, both Harlie and Buddy will look different.
29. Cartoon Strip: My Buddy Harlie
• The comic strip is an exact representation of the rough copy, which is displayed in AO4.
• Colourful, vector art and mild humour strip acts well as a first piece!
• Feedback - “Colourful artwork works well, but the third slide isn’t really needed, comic would be
more funnier with only three slides”.
• “Backgrounds are a little plain, colours make up for them but if it was a detailed cartoon it would fit -
it’s the surreal theme and the involvement of Buddy Holly which makes you get away with the
colours”.
30. Final Cartoon Strip: My Buddy Harlie
• This version offer’s a more to the point look, three slides
instead of 4 and the strip still has the same joke.
32. Technical Quality
• The drawing is a vector so it would never be a detailed drawing - only an
image made up of little separate images.
• There are better vector images out there but as a first try for a comic strip
using the program iDraw instead of Illustrator I think I did alright.
• The main character ‘Harlie’ was used twice, both for him and for Buddy -
this was because I wanted to create the idea for the audience to link up
that the two look alike. Having a different person there, the audience may
have not of got the joke.
• The colours used was to try and bring it out and make it eye catching,
when choosing the original colours I wanted to make them
complementary like blue and orange so it would catch peoples eye - you
have to at least have some colours that work well together.
33. Creative Quality
• The idea of matching up Harlie and Buddy was pretty creative in my
opinion - using both figures to bounce of each other in order to make
some humour.
• The older generation and any one who knows Buddy will get the joke the
best, the older lot normally compare Harlie to Buddy in person these days.
• I wasn't going for a massive laugh out loud moment when thinking of the
strip, only a little chuckle from the way Harlie announced to himself
‘Father?’.
• The name ‘My Buddy Harlie’ is also a nice play on words, as Buddy’s last
name begins with a ‘H’ and so does Harlie’s so why not incorporate both
names together.
34. Professional Comparison: Jim Meddick
• Jim uses basic colours, and
lines when making his strip,
you can see the similarities in
the background as well.
• The comic is obviously aimed
at an older age like mine is, you
can tell this by the joke or funny
scene in the comic.
• Jim uses a lot more dialogue
than me, his strip rely’s on this
to create his humour where as
mine is mostly visual images
toped off with one word to
create the gag.
• Jim’s strip isn’t as detailed as
some others out there, he’s
kept it simple and used effects
like removing the background
on the second slide like i’ve got
rid of the mouth on the third.
35. Target Audience
• The target audience has a broad knowledge of creative subjects, they are
‘lefties’ so they should know who Buddy Holly is - if not they can see what he
sort of looks like in the strip.
• Background knowledge of the artist Buddy Holly is sort of key in this strip -
relating a person to another with only instant first hand knowledge isn’t fun and
the gag is ruined for that person.
• I think if the audience doesn’t understand it, they will try to understand it and
stay around for the other ‘Harlie’ strips to see if they are all this type of humour -
not all strips will involve Buddy.
• Even past the audience, I think the older ages will like the strip as they can
relate to it with the Buddy character - maybe the Buddy Harlie strip should have
been released a few stripe in so people understand the Harlie character more
and it will make the gag more funnier.
36. Resources
• With all my sketches, I start off with hand drawing my images as I
am a lot more confident with a pencil and rubber other than a
graphics tablet and Photoshop.
• Once I had the character design down on paper, I would scan it onto
the computer and work on it from there.
• Normally I would use Photoshop and freehand draw the image but I
chose to use vector art this time - vectors aren’t realistic but neither
are cartoons so I thought it would be a nice change.
• I used the program iDraw instead of Illustrator, iDraw is my personal
home version of Illustrator and works the same - anchor points were
the main tool I used to make my characters.
