cartoon

Pluralcartoons

Formscartoons, cartooning, cartooned

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A piece of animated film, often though not exclusively humorous in tone.

   The studio released a short cartoon ahead of the main feature.

   Early cartoons were drawn by hand, frame by frame.

   Similaranimation

   Note

   Moving pictures took the word over. Traditionally these films were made from hand-drawn cels, and today they are often made digitally. In everyday speech a cartoon is assumed to be light and funny. The term still covers animated shorts and features of any tone, but for a serious feature, animated film is the more neutral phrase.

2. 2
   nouncountable

   A humorous drawing, often accompanied by a caption, or a strip of several humorous drawings in sequence.

   The magazine's back page features a single-panel cartoon each week.

   Editors rejected dozens of cartoons before choosing one for the issue.

   Similarcomic

   Note

   This is today's everyday sense, but it is not the original one. The humorous drawing is a later offshoot of the painter's full-size template. It covers both the single captioned panel, the gag cartoon of a magazine page, and the multi-panel strip, so a newspaper comic strip counts as a cartoon too. Its counterpart on screen is the animated film.

3. 3
   nouncountable

   An animated series; a television or streaming show consisting of animated episodes.

   The cartoon ran for nine seasons before the network canceled it.

   Streaming services now produce original cartoons aimed at adult audiences.

   Note

   Here the word names a whole program rather than a single film, so it is natural to say a cartoon ran for nine seasons. This sense extends the single animated film. In everyday use the name attaches to the show itself, not to any one episode of it.

4. 4
   nouncountable

   A drawing that satirizes current public figures.

   The editorial page features a cartoon skewering the senator's latest scandal.

   His cartoons of the prime minister earned him both fans and lawsuits.

   Similarcaricature, lampoon

   Note

   Usually a modifier sets it apart from the plain humorous drawing: a political cartoon, an editorial cartoon. It works through caricature, symbolism and topical reference, so its target is a named public figure rather than a type. The form has long served the press as a vehicle for commentary and dissent, and it belongs on the opinion page more than in the comics section.

5. 5
   nouncountable

   A full-sized preparatory drawing that serves as the template for a fresco, tapestry, or other large work.

   Raphael's cartoons for the Sistine Chapel tapestries survive in London.

   The museum displays the cartoon alongside the finished tapestry.

   Note

   The oldest sense, and the one the word's origin explains. Italian cartone means "cardboard" and is an augmentative of carta, "paper"; the word reached English through French carton and is a doublet of carton and card. The design was drawn full size on heavy paper, then transferred to the wall, loom, mosaic or stained glass by pouncing or tracing.

6. 6
   nouncountable

   A preliminary sketch made by an artist in preparation for a finished work.

   The gallery exhibited the cartoon next to the completed portrait.

   Several surviving cartoons reveal how drastically the composition changed before the final canvas.

   Similarsketch, study, draft

   Note

   Art historians use the word more loosely than the full-size template. A study made while planning a painting can be called a cartoon at any scale. In a gallery or catalog the word never implies humor. A cartoon hung beside a finished portrait is the plan for that portrait, and comparing the two shows how the composition changed.

7. 7
   verbintransitive

   To draw a cartoon, that is, a humorous drawing.

   He cartooned for the city paper throughout the 1990s.

   Artists who cartoon professionally often begin by selling single panels to magazines.

   Note

   Mostly intransitive and habitual. Someone cartoons for a paper, or cartooned throughout a decade, much as one writes for a magazine. The verb describes a line of work more than a single act of drawing; for one picture, "draw a cartoon" is the natural phrasing. Its forms are regular: cartooned, cartooning.

8. 8
   verbtransitive

   To make a preliminary sketch of a planned work.

   Renaissance masters would cartoon an entire composition before touching the wall.

   He cartooned the mural at full scale on butcher paper.

   Similarsketch, outline

   Note

   The studio verb behind the full-size template. To cartoon a fresco, tapestry or stained-glass window is to work out the whole design before the final surface is touched. Unlike the humorous verb, it is transitive and takes the planned work as its object: you cartoon a composition or a mural.

9. 9
   nouncountable

   A simplified diagram used to illustrate a scientific concept or process.

   Figure 2 presents a cartoon of the signaling pathway discussed in the results.

   The lecturer sketched a quick cartoon of plate movement on the whiteboard.

   Similardiagram, schematic, sketch

Showing meanings only. Show all 9