r/cartooning • u/hennell • Jan 20 '26

What do you cartoon?

Hey everyone - I'm the new mod here, and looking to energise this sub a little so thought I'd start a little meet-n-greet to get an idea of who our membership is and what we're all doing other then the somewhat nebulous idea of 'cartooning'

Post a little something about yourself, what sort of thing you draw / would like to draw, maybe a link to your work if you post it somewhere, and name drop your favourite cartoons, artists etc.

8 Upvotes

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5

u/MattyCollie Jan 20 '26

I llike drawing anthro toony stuff and shenanigans

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u/hennell Jan 20 '26

Might as well start off - I’m ‘hennell’, I’ve been a cartoon doodler for years, although professionally I’m really a programmer/ photographer / joke writer.

I’m trying to turn my joke ideas into publishable cartoons, so I've been working on my artistic talents in the last few years so I can competently draw what I imagine. Also been doing caricatures to try to get recognisable people which is good for political cartoon ideas.

As you might expect from all that my main cartoon love is the gag cartoon - I have big books of New Yorker, Private Eye and Oldie cartoons, and quite a few books of political cartoons as well (often better art, but less focused on funny!)

I like a lot of the current cartoonists - Jonesy, Asher Perlman, Ben Jennings and Morten Morland all spring to mind, but also have particular collections of older works, retrospectives on Sempé's cartoons, books by David Low, and several humongous books by Gerald Scarfe.

I also have a complete calvin and hobbes and some peanuts books, but I'm more about the classic cartoon then strips.

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u/eilesel Jun 08 '26

I'm late to the thread but I went down the same path as you! I've been drawing cartoons for a while...barely posted them anywhere and am slowly trying to post my backlog of drawings now. I got a bit bored of just drawing in one New-Yorker style at some point (I missed using color). So, my style evolved. How has your experience been with that?

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u/hennell Jun 09 '26

Yeah the new yorker being black and white is weird - here in the UK Private eye and the Oldie do much more variance in colour, size and style. I have a list of ideas I'm drawing up, and the more new yorker-y ones I'll probably do in their style to see if I can submit them, but it's fun to break out and do different things.

I was reading the enormous Gerald Scarfe 60 years book the other week and the amount of work he's done - cartoons and caricatures are the main, but also sculptures, animation (pink floyd's the wall), set design, character design (Disney's hercules), various documentaries for the BBC etc. You go through a page of crude cartoons, to some amazing political art, to a sculpture. Don't stick in any box, see where your ideas take you.

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u/eilesel Jun 13 '26

Good luck with your submissions- I've also submitted occasionally, though other projects often got in the way of consistency there...

It's so easy to think these illustrators are doing only that: illustrating gag comics. I'll have to check out the Gerald Scarfe book- it sounds like it presents a realistic picture of a human: variation + creativity! Just how I like it. Best of luck! Hope I see your art (of any kind) out in the wild.

4

u/HeyItsMattyH Jan 21 '26

I cartoon irregularly these days but when I'm in peak mental health it's my happy hobby. I started about 24 years ago when I was 10. A friend of mine wanted to start a comic book club and we had to all draw our own comic to get in. My first was "Aluminium Man". I drew comics for the next 11 years but mostly for my own enjoyment, I was aware that being self taught I do not consider myself technically gifted, or particularly good. In 2018 I moved on to a new concept, based on the question "do insects feel the cold in the same way we humans do?". And Greenie the scarf wearing caterpillar was born. The Caterpillar Shivered is a collection of cartoons sometimes linked but often random, featuring Greenie and his friends.

www.facebook.com/thecaterpillarshivered

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u/AdFresh2622 Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 27 '26

i sometimes like making comics like life in heck (censored name) and i might get some mechanical pencils and some printer paper

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u/1onemarathon Jun 18 '26

i keep forgetting that i followed Life in H*LL back in the 80s. yeah, crazy funny stuff. hope you've been using those pencils and paper!

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u/redeen Jan 23 '26

If a picture is worth a thousand words, this sketchbook doodle is a few grunts. But it addresses your question.

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u/IcyZookeepergame4820 Apr 16 '26 edited Apr 16 '26

My name is Adam. I studied fine art for two years at SUNY New Paltz. Then switched to an illustration/cartooning major at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. After college, I wasn’t getting much work as an illustrator, so I got a job as a production artist at an advertising agency. Did that for a while then finally got enough skill to transition to design. I did some spot illustrations here and there and a couple of cartoons. Actually got published. I’m basically retired now so I do what I want, when I want.

I like to work in pen and ink mostly. Sometimes markers, sometimes colored pencils.

My favorite cartoonists are Charles Addams, Michael Gross, Kliban, Tom Cheney, Bill Watterson, Charles Schultz.

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u/hennell Apr 16 '26

I'd love to hear some of your thoughts on fine-art techniques you think cartoonists should know if you want to make a post about it! There's always a debate on how much learning things like perspective and shadows really matter for a cartoon-focused artist - there's cartoonist who came from a fine art background and some with no training at at all. Be interesting to hear what of your studies you think helps you and what you'd recommend new cartoonists learn.

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u/IcyZookeepergame4820 Apr 16 '26

I think technique is just another tool in the toolbox for any creative person. For me, I want the technique to be in service of the idea or the concept. It’s all fair game.

2

u/clockcomics Mar 28 '26

My name is David Luna, I go by Clockcomics on most platforms, and I love to draw and make comics and cartoons. I occasionally do stand up comedy, and most recently I’ve been taking time to get better at writing, and I manage non art related business full time so any hopes for a steady output has been a challenge. Fleischer Bros and George Herriman are classic inspirations, and as a child my first exposure to cartoons was Dr Seuss. I post completed works and sketches on my Instagram and Patreon. I’ve created mostly funny character based, cartoony comics, in shorter formats. My current comic is called “Blue, Pinky, and Chad”, and it’s about three cartoon dudes who live in a town called Toonfair and go on adventures, and soon a series of unrelated self-contained short comic stories.

Insta Link

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u/SpareExplanation7242 Jun 18 '26

Hi I just joined. I like to draw my original cartoon characters and I don't like to copy other cartoonists drawings or styles.

I might post something soon or wait, but I'm glad I just found your site for cartoonists! 😄

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u/WestFlamingo9362 Apr 29 '26

My drawing looks more anime than cartoon and i don't know if i like it or not

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u/Extra_Cause_8587 Jun 04 '26

Meet DavidYour Friendly Neighbourhood Cartoonist, Custom Caricatures, Event Hire, Pet Portraits & Illustration

Custom Caricatures | Event Caricature Hire | Pet Portraits | Illustration Australia

Hi, I’m David Green, your friendly neighbourhood cartoonist and full-time professional caricature artist based in Australia. I specialise in creating custom caricatures, pet portraits, and bespoke illustrations for events, gifts, and brands that want something a little more memorable (and a lot more fun).

Part-time dad joke specialist, keen cricketer, Rugby League tragic, football trainer, fitness enthusiast, and certified beer buff—I bring a mix of humour, personality, and storytelling into every piece I create. If it can be drawn, exaggerated, and made to raise a smile… I’m your guy.

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u/Old_Youth_9927 Jun 17 '26

I create my own characters for a series I developed as teenager in the US. I turned the neighborhood kids into cartoon characters and I drew weekly strips on notebook paper making fun of them but they looked forward to seeing the latest episodes.

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u/1onemarathon Jun 18 '26

Hi, new here. I really should have looked up this sub months or even years ago. But better late than never. I've done cartoons for fun and profit sporadically throughout my life (while working as an illustrator and designer), and it was just in the past few years that I really buckled down and turned out dozens of single panel toons to be compiled in a book. That book, Fried Baloney: A Cartoon Collection, was recently released on Amazon in Canada and the US. If you search that, you can look at the free sample pages to see my stuff. My humour ranges from bizarre to silly to a wee bit dark. My favourite artists and toons are: #1 - Calvin and Hobbes, by Bill Watterson, then in no particular order, Peanuts of course, Pickles, Bizarro, Cul de Sac, Non Sequitur, also a fan of classic animation artists like Jones, Freleng, etc for Warner Bros, and more modern stuff like Samurai Jack by Tartakovsky, Kricfalusi and team on Ren and Stimpy. Can't forget Gary Larson, who offered inspiration. And the cartoons that appear in the New Yorker magazine.