How to Find Your Manga Art Style the Easy Way
Direct Answers
What is a manga art style?
A manga art style is the unique visual fingerprint of an artist that makes their work instantly recognizable. It is a combination of specific elements that dictate how characters and environments look on the page.
How refined the art appears depends entirely on the artist's level of practice. A complete manga art style consists of three core components.
- Shape language for building character foundations.
- Line weight to add depth to flat drawings.
- Theme to establish the mood and feeling of the art.
How does shape language affect manga character design?
Shape language uses simple shapes to build the foundation of a character and instantly communicate their personality. These foundational shapes apply to bodies, heads, and heavily exaggerated features like eyes and mouths.
While not strict rules, these shapes act as powerful tools for character design.
- Square shapes create characters who look strong, brave, solid, and powerful.
- Circular shapes make characters appear friendly, kind, positive, and lighthearted.
- Triangular shapes often indicate a villain or a dangerous character due to their sharp points.
What are the common shading methods used in manga art?
Manga artists typically use a mixture of four specific shading methods to create depth, shadows, and mood in their themes. These techniques rely on precise ink application rather than blended colors to convey light and darkness.
- Hatching utilizes lots of straight, parallel lines.
- Cross-hatching overlaps crisscrossing lines to make darker shadows.
- Stippling layers small dots together to build depth.
- Solid blacks fill entire areas with black ink for intense and dramatic panels.
How do you find and create your own manga art style?
You can build your own manga art style by learning from artists you already admire and mixing their techniques to create something new. Before starting this process, you should practice basic drawing skills like perspective, anatomy, and shading.
The easiest method involves breaking down the work of other creators.
- Find three different artists you like.
- Study only shape language from the first artist.
- Study only line weight from the second artist.
- Study only theme and shading from the third artist.
- Mix all three elements together and practice drawing using real references.
The Basics of a Manga Art Style
Every legendary manga artist has one thing in common, a recognizable art style. Think of an art style as your fingerprint.
Similar to a fingerprint, an art style is so unique that it does not matter if the character is brand new or one you have known for years. If it is drawn in that style, you will know exactly who the artist is.
That unique look is forever connected in your mind to its creator. An art style is a combination of three things: shape language, line weight, and theme.
How refined your art looks just depends on how much you practice.
Using Shape Language for Characters
First is shape language. Shape language refers to the simple shapes that create the foundation of your characters.
Square shapes are often used for characters who are strong, brave, and tough. A character with a square head or body looks solid and powerful.
For example, look at the way Batman is drawn in the animated movie The Dark Knight Returns. Circular shapes are used for characters who are lighthearted, positive, and good.
The soft, round edges make them seem friendly and kind. Triangular shapes are often used for characters who are villains or dangerous.
The sharp points can make a character look evil or mean. These are not hard rules, but they are a great tool to help design your characters.
Shape language also applies to eyes, mouths, and faces. Eyes and face shapes are the most commonly exaggerated in manga.
The anime style is known for its cat-like way of drawing eyes and faces. Mouths of characters are also a good example.
The author of One Piece, Eiichiro Oda, draws huge, wide mouths when characters laugh or yell. The mouth takes up a large portion of the face and is key to his cartoonish expressive style.
Mastering Line Weight and Theme
Next is line weight. Line weight is how thick or thin your lines are.
By using thicker lines for parts of the drawing that are supposed to be up close and thinner lines for parts that are far away, you can make a flat drawing look like it has depth. Great manga artists are experts at manipulating line weight.
Third is theme. The theme is the mood or feeling of the art.
The theme is created by the colors an artist uses, the way they shade, and the things they choose to draw. For example, look at the art from the manga Centuria.
You can tell the tone is dark, dangerous, and twisted. Based on the art alone, you would assume it is a darker shonen story or even a horror manga.
On the other hand, if you look at the art from a manga like Nisekoi, you can see the feeling is light, happy, and cheerful. Based on the art, it is likely a romance or slice of life story.
Core Shading Methods in Manga
Manga artists typically use a mixture of four types of shading methods. Hatching utilizes lots of straight lines parallel to each other.
Cross-hatching involves crisscrossing those lines to make darker shadows. Stippling is created by layering lots of little dots to create depth.
Solid blacks fill in whole areas with black ink for a very dramatic look. This is commonly reserved for the most intense panels.
The Steps to Create Your Own Style
The famous artist Pablo Picasso once said that good artists copy, but great artists steal. This does not mean you should trace someone else's work and call it your own.
It means you should learn from the artists you like and mix their styles to create something new. Before you start, it is a good idea to practice the basics of drawing like perspective, anatomy, and shading.
Step one is to find three artists you like. First, find an artist who has a shape language that you like.
Second, find an artist who has line art that you like. Third, find an artist who has a theme that you like, paying attention to how they shade their art with hatching or cross-hatching.
Step two is to carefully study one thing from each artist. From artist number one, only study their shape language and do not worry about their lines or shading.
From artist number two, only study their line art and try to ignore their shapes and themes. From artist number three, only study their theme and shading techniques.
Step three is to mix the elements together. Try drawing a character, an animal, or anything else using the shape language from the first artist, the line art from the second, and the theme from the third.
This new combination is the start of your unique style.
Step four is to practice. Your new style will feel strange at first, and it will take a lot of repetition to get comfortable with it.
Draw everything you can think of. The more you use it, the more natural it will feel.
Always use references by looking at photos of people, animals, and places to help you. The more you draw from real life, the better your art will become.