Animation styles for AI: 15 looks, with the real prompts from real films
An animation style, in an AI prompt, is a short description of the look: brush or line quality, shapes, shading, texture and palette. Most of the filmmakers below wrote theirs once and reused it at the start of their prompts; three locked it with a Flick style preset or a Midjourney style reference code instead. Here are 15 styles, from 14 films and one tutorial made in Flick, each with the filmmaker's own prompt, plus how Happy Souls Alive found its hand-painted look.
How to Make AI Animation That Doesn't Look Generic, with Simay Ezer Pekcan (Flick on YouTube)
Featured workflow and film: Happy Souls Alive by Simay Ezer Pekcan
Make your own style in Flick
Sign up free, start a canvas and paste one of the style lines below.
The 15 styles
Every prompt below comes from a film or tutorial made in Flick, quoted in the filmmaker's own words.
1. Hand-painted storybook
Film: Happy Souls Alive by Simay Ezer Pekcan (Flick Residency)
The style
The look: Gouache-textured 2D with dry-brush strokes and flattened folk-art perspective, with faces kept low on detail so they hold steady in motion.
You've seen it in: Cartoon Saloon's Song of the Sea and Wolfwalkers, and old gouache picture books.
Use it for: Fables, folk tales and period stories that should feel handmade and a little dark.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "Painterly gouache texture" and "visible dry-brush strokes" set the medium; "flattened painterly perspective" stops added depth; "locked per location" holds each set's palette.
Rule out: "no jitter, no exaggerated performance".
Model: Seedance 2.0
Hand-painted 2D animated film. Painterly gouache texture with visible dry-brush strokes, flattened painterly perspective, warm folk-illustration character design. … Muted, earthy color palettes locked per location. …Watch for: Dense texture. Simay dropped style tests with busy walls that might drift once animated.
Try "Stylized Folk Illustration" in Flick
The same style block opens 18 of her video prompts.
2. Painted 2D with cel-shaded characters
Film: Duro by Walter Mauro (Flick Residency)
The style
The look: Cel-shaded characters over painted gouache and watercolor backgrounds, animated on twos with line boil: lines that shimmer because every frame is redrawn.
You've seen it in: Disney's hand-drawn features such as The Lion King, and Michel Ocelot's Kirikou and the Sorceress.
Use it for: Warm, grounded drama where characters must read clearly against a rich world.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "animated on twos at 12 frames per second" sets the rhythm. "visible line jitter and boil" makes it look hand-redrawn. "not vector-clean, not stiff" keeps the linework loose.
Model: Seedance 2.5
Style: Hand-drawn 2D animation, richly painted gouache and watercolor texture, cel-shaded character over a highly detailed painted background, confident linework with painterly edge variation … natural daylight lighting, warm and soft, animated on twos at 12 frames per second, every frame independently hand-redrawn with visible line jitter and boil, no 3D render, no CGI smoothness, no motion blur, no literal camera lens vocabulary. …Try "Atmospheric Cel Animation" in Flick
3. Flat pastel cartoon
Film: Mila & Sasa by Katrin Ann Orbeta (Flick Residency)
The style
The look: Flat matte 2D with selective outlines: lines only where shapes meet, never inside a color area.
You've seen it in: Flat TV cartoons such as Hilda and Adventure Time.
Use it for: Comedy, children's stories and short loops where silhouette and color carry the read.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "Outlines only at joints and where different colors meet" is the signature. The character sheet fixes a "Tricolor blue yellow and red/orange palette", so the video prompt needs only one line (the second prompt).
Rule out: "no heavy interior outlines within same-color areas", from the full character sheet prompt.
Model: Nano Banana 2
Flat 2D illustration style, no glossy or shiny effects, matte colors. Outlines only at joints and where different colors meet…Model: Seedance 2.0
Keep the flat 2D pastel cartoon style. …Try "Soft Pastel Illustration" in Flick · Flick's AI cartoon generator
4. 90s anime
Film: Obsession x Perfect Blue by Hannah L. (Flick team)
The style
The look: Late-90s cel anime: flat shading and hard ink outlines under film grain, slight chromatic aberration and VHS softness.
You've seen it in: Satoshi Kon's Perfect Blue (named in the prompt), Cowboy Bebop and Neon Genesis Evangelion.
Use it for: Psychological thrillers, city nights and nostalgic stories.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "flat anime cel shading" sets the drawing; "grainy late 90s film texture" dates it.
Model: Nano Banana 2
Rendered in Satoshi Kon Perfect Blue style: flat anime cel shading, muted pink and teal palette, grainy late 90s film texture, uneasy naturalistic framing.Model: Nano Banana 2
…flatter hand-painted 90s cel animation with harder ink outlines, visible film grain and analog VHS softness…Watch for: A frame that looks too modern. Hannah fixed hers with a second "Regrade and restyle" edit (the second prompt).
Try "Classic 90s Anime" in Flick · Flick's 90s anime page
5. Pixar-style 3D
Film: Battery Boy by Adrien Bodson (Flick Residency)
The style
The look: Stylized 3D feature animation: rounded forms, tactile materials, restrained squash and stretch, and the depth of field and motion blur of a film camera.
You've seen it in: Pixar features, Toy Story above all.
Use it for: Family stories, objects that come alive and scenes carried by a face.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "physically convincing toy motion" sets how things move; "exceptionally readable faces" keeps emotion clear. Battery Boy opens almost every video prompt with the same first line.
Rule out: A score: the opening line asks for sound effects only.
Model: Seedance 2.5
Cinematic Pixar-caliber animated short, no music, native SFX only. …Model: Seedance 2.5
Use premium theatrical stylized 3D animation: appealing rounded forms, sophisticated lighting, detailed skin and hair, tactile fabrics, weathered metal, physically convincing toy motion, natural cloth and hair dynamics, restrained squash-and-stretch, cinematic depth of field, smooth motion blur, elegant composition, and exceptionally readable faces.Try "3D Animated Style" in Flick
6. Hand-drawn watercolor
Film: The Little Fox's Dream by Jaime Yao (Flick team)
The style
The look: Transparent watercolor washes with pigment that bleeds past the lines, soft glowing light and gentle motion blur once it moves.
You've seen it in: The painted backgrounds of Lilo & Stitch and Isao Takahata's The Tale of the Princess Kaguya.
Use it for: Dreams, memories, nature and quiet emotional moments.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "hand-drawn watercolor style" names the medium. "soft animation lighting" and "ethereal atmosphere" give the glow. "gentle motion blur" softens movement.
Model: Midjourney
…painted in a hand-drawn watercolor style with soft animation lighting, gentle motion blur, and an ethereal atmosphere.Watch for: Subject choice. Flick's watercolor page says calm scenes suit the bleeding, painterly look, so pick gentle subjects and soft settings.
Try "Whimsical Watercolor" in Flick · Flick's watercolor page
One variation from this Midjourney prompt became the film's most used reference, in 13 generations. Most other stills were made in Nano Banana, the motion in Seedance Pro and Wan 2.5.
7. Two-tone woodcut
Film: In Our Time by Jaime Yao (Flick team)
The style
The look: Relief-print linework in a strict two-color palette, with shading built from the density of carved lines instead of gradients.
You've seen it in: German Expressionist woodcuts and the woodcut novels of Frans Masereel and Lynd Ward (1920s and 30s).
Use it for: War stories, history and literary adaptations. In Our Time draws on Hemingway's postwar years.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "woodcut-like linework" names the medium; "strict two-tone palette of deep desaturated blue and off-white" names both colors, so no third creeps in.
Model: Seedance Pro
Locked camera, same composition and style as the source image: woodcut-like linework, strict two-tone palette of deep desaturated blue and off-white, no new details, no change in lighting, no extra textures. …8. Ink wash
The style
The look: Pen-and-wash illustration in motion: fine pen line over loose ink washes in blue-gray, with paper grain showing through the wash.
You've seen it in: Ernest & Celestine (2012), a hand-drawn French film in pen line and watercolor wash.
Use it for: Atmospheric scenes, mysteries and quiet stories where mood matters more than detail.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "hand-drawn European animation style" sets the tradition. "blue-gray ink washes" fixes medium and palette. "delicate pen lines" and "subtle paper texture" add the surface.
Model: Midjourney · Note: Jaime's spoken description from the video, not his pasted prompt
hand-drawn European animation style with blue-gray ink washes, delicate pen lines, and subtle paper textureSet it once: Jaime pastes his full style description into Flick's agent memory and asks the agent to include it whenever it writes a still image prompt. He makes the stills in Midjourney, his go-to for stylized assets.
Try "Expressive Ink and Wash Illustration" in Flick
Source: Jaime Yao in The Easiest Way to Control AI Characters & Cameras
9. Construction-paper cutout
Film: Embedding Valley by Jaime Yao (Flick team)
The style
The look: Cutout animation: flat construction-paper shapes with rough cut edges that slide and pivot instead of bending.
You've seen it in: South Park, which the film's own prompt names, and Terry Gilliam's cutouts for Monty Python.
Use it for: Comedy, satire and fast episodic shorts.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "construction-paper animation throughout" names the medium. "simple, restrained, and cutout-like" keeps motion stiff. In edits, "cut-paper edges" and "simplified shape language" hold the look.
Model: Seedance 2.0
…construction-paper animation throughout. Keep all character movement simple, restrained, and cutout-like.Model: GPT Image 2
Paper texture, cut-paper edges, simplified shape language, and color treatment remain 100% unchanged.Try "Textured Paper Illustration" in Flick
10. Paper stop motion
Film: Boxing at the Opera by Hannah L. (Flick team)
The style
The look: Stop motion with real paper, moved a frame at a time: the stutter of frame-by-frame motion, film grain and a surface you could touch.
You've seen it in: Lotte Reiniger's cut-paper films, such as The Adventures of Prince Achmed.
Use it for: Transitions, title cards and moments that should feel crafted by hand.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "stop motion video" names the technique. "paper strips being woven into the image" gives the model a physical action. "film grain physical media" makes it read as shot, not rendered.
Model: Seedance 2.5
aesthetic stop motion video of paper strips being woven into the image. aesthetic film grain physical mediaFlick's tip: Name the material. Flick's stop-motion page suggests felt, clay or paper cut-outs.
Try "Textured Paper Sculpture" in Flick · Flick's stop-motion page
11. Miniature diorama
Film: The Herder by Jaime Yao (Flick team)
The style
The look: Tilt-shift miniature: one thin plane of focus with heavy blur above and below, so real places read as tabletop models and people as figurines.
You've seen it in: Tilt-shift photography and the miniature model shots of The Grand Budapest Hotel.
Use it for: Fables and stories about work. Jaime chose it because it makes labor feel physical.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "miniature diorama / tilt-shift macro look", "shallow DOF" and "warm late-afternoon haze" set lens and light.
Model: Seedance 1.5 Pro
same miniature diorama / tilt-shift macro look, shallow DOF, warm late-afternoon haze. …Model: Nano Banana Pro
…all background people must match the protagonist's toy/figurine proportions … Keep them as miniature diorama figures, not realistic humans. …Watch for: Life-size extras. Jaime's edit shrank them to about four to five heads tall. In his Flick post he adds that the blur absorbs small AI inconsistencies.
Try "3D Miniature Illustration" in Flick
12. Hand-painted wooden figurine
Film: Guard by Zoey Z. (Flick team)
The style
The look: A carved, hand-painted wooden figure, like a toy soldier, shot as a tabletop diorama with wood grain and brush paint visible.
You've seen it in: Nutcracker figures and painted wooden toy soldiers.
Use it for: Whimsical character pieces, toys and small comic stories.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "carved miniature officer figurine" names the object; "hand-painted wooden miniature style" sets the material.
Rule out: "Do not change his age, expression or style; do not repaint his face".
Model: Nano Banana Pro
Keep exactly the same carved miniature officer figurine: same face, nose, moustache, eyebrows, colors and paint style … in the same hand-painted wooden miniature style. …Watch for: The face changing between edits. Zoey's prompts name every feature to keep, as in the prompt above.
Try "Stop-motion Sculpture" in Flick (nearest match)
13. Traditional 2D animation, set with a style preset
Film: To My Grandma by Zoey Z. (Flick team)
The style
The look: Painterly hand-drawn 2D (soft textured brushwork, visible linework, muted color), applied by a Flick style preset rather than by words.
You've seen it in: Studio Ghibli's quieter films, such as My Neighbor Totoro.
Use it for: Family stories, memories and slow, warm scenes.
How to get it
Words that do the work: None. The preset carries the look, so the prompt only describes the scene, and the video prompts add just "keep visual style".
Rule out: Style words in the prompt. Flick's docs: "Avoid conflicting style descriptions" when a style is pinned.
Model: Midjourney + Flick style preset "Traditional 2D Animation"
grandma and a little girl are walking together.Use "Traditional 2D Animation" in Flick
Animated in Seedance 2.5.
14. Painted anime, set with a style reference code
Film: Mouse Chef by Zoey Z. (Flick team)
The style
The look: Painted anime with soft, brushy backgrounds and simply drawn characters, set entirely by a Midjourney style reference code (--sref) instead of words.
You've seen it in: The painted food scenes of Studio Ghibli's Spirited Away, and cozy slice-of-life anime.
Use it for: Cozy stories about food, homes and gardens.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "--sref 541394247" carries the whole look, so the scene can stay as plain as "a chill afternoon". For motion, the Seedance 2.5 prompt asks for "really exaggerated, cartoony motion".
Model: Midjourney
a chill afternoon --sref 541394247Try "Painterly Anime Style" in Flick · Flick's anime page
15. Classic 2D cartoon, set with a style reference code
Film: Merry Christmas Lofi by Zoey Z. (Flick team)
The style
The look: Classic hand-drawn TV cartoon: bold outlines, flat color and rounded characters, held across shots by one reused --sref code.
You've seen it in: 1990s TV cartoons and animated holiday specials.
Use it for: Seasonal shorts, lofi loops, music videos and family scenes.
How to get it
Words that do the work: "--sref 1595834906" on both prompts keeps them in one look, so the scene line can be as loose as "dancing in Merry Christmas!". "warm vibe" sets the mood.
Model: Midjourney
Christmas day! family together, children play around, and giant Christmas tree. warm vibe --sref 1595834906Model: Midjourney
dancing in Merry Christmas! --sref 1595834906Try "90s Cartoon" in Flick · Flick's AI cartoon generator
Write the style once, or lock it with a reference
These 15 styles use two ways to keep a style steady.
- Write it once and reuse it. Styles 1 to 12 put the look in words, then repeat that block at the start of their prompts.
- Lock it with a reference. Styles 13 to 15 keep the scene prompt to a few plain words and let a style preset or a Midjourney
-srefcode carry the look. This is faster, and a good choice when you can't put the look into words.
Either way, the rule is the same: decide the style before you make anything, then don't describe it differently from shot to shot.
How Happy Souls Alive found its style
Happy Souls Alive is a fable about a town desperate to be seen, told through the tailor who makes everyone visible but herself. Simay says it won best AI film at the New York Focus Independent Film Festival 2026. In the video above, director Simay Ezer Pekcan walks through one shot, from testing the look to the final animation.
- Start from references, not a prompt. She wanted "a handmade, slightly dark story book feeling." 3D styles "looked too smooth and commercial," so she explored 2D. She gave Claude her references and the story, and asked it to describe the brush work, shapes, shading and texture, then turn that into one reusable style prompt.
- Test the style with motion in mind. Midjourney is her pick for testing stylized looks. She dropped versions whose dense wall textures might drift once animated, and kept the ones with "visible dry brush strokes, simplified shapes, and minimal facial detail."
One of the versions she dropped. The problem is the busy, cracked wall, the kind of dense texture she worried would drift once animated. - Keep a mood board and the text. The approved images went into a Midjourney mood board, used for every new character and place. She saved the text description too, and says she reuses it at the beginning of her video prompts. In the film's workflow, a longer style block opens 18 of them (style 1 above).
Her Midjourney style prompt is one short line; the mood board does the rest. - Make character sheets in the style. From the tailor design, she asked ChatGPT for front, side and back views, keeping the face, hairstyle and costume the same. The tailor's sheet then became the style reference for the next character.
Her request: "Create front, side and back views of this character. Keep the face, hairstyle and costume identical." The hair bun, vest and apron line up in every view. - Give hard details their own reference. A customer's clothing has an arrow through it, which the video model couldn't place from text. She made a separate prop image of the garment with the arrow in place, fixed it as a still, then told the model that the clothing comes from the prop image and the face from the character sheet.
The prop with no person in it, saved in her Flick canvas as "arrow-jacket". With the arrow placement settled here, the video prompt only has to say where the clothing comes from. - Block the shot in 3D. In Flick's 3D Stage she placed simple cubes and a figure to match a layout she liked, used that view as the composition reference, and recorded an orbit move around the character, setting its duration, direction and distance.
Blocking, not styling: colored cubes and a posed mannequin stand in for the walls, furniture and characters. Only the framing carries over into the painted image. - Generate, telling each reference its job. In Seedance she added the character reference, the first frame and the 3D camera move. The painted image controls design, costume, lighting and style; the 3D video controls only the camera path: "one smooth clockwise orbit, keeping a steady speed and the same distance from the characters for the full 10 seconds."
A finished shot from the film. Compare the tailor with her character sheet in step 4: same bun, same vest, same face, now painted into the scene. - Hide the cuts. Pillars in the set pass in front of the camera, so she cuts between generated clips at those moments and the orbit reads as one continuous move.
Which AI model is best for animation?
It depends on the step. Across these 14 films:
- Finding and testing a look: Midjourney (Happy Souls Alive, The Little Fox's Dream, To My Grandma, Mouse Chef, Merry Christmas Lofi).
- Character sheets and edits that keep a style: Nano Banana and GPT Image (Mila & Sasa, Obsession x Perfect Blue, Guard, The Herder, Embedding Valley).
- Motion: Seedance 2.0 and 2.5 for most films; Seedance Pro and Wan for older ones.
| Model | Average credits | Average time |
|---|---|---|
| GPT Image 2 | about 9 | about 75 s |
| Midjourney | about 10 | about 40 s |
| Nano Banana Pro | about 32 | about 45 s |
| Seedance 2.0 with references | about 344 | about 5 min |
| Seedance 2.5 with references | about 550 | about 6 min |
Flick data, successful generations in the last 90 days, October 2026.
Testing styles on stills first is cheap. Every look you settle before you animate saves video rerolls.
Try these styles in Flick
Sign up, open a canvas and paste one style line into your first image prompt.
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More styles to try
- Flickpedia visual styles 916 styles across cartoon, anime, drawing, illustration, painting and 3D.
- Anime
- 90s anime
- Watercolor
- Claymation
- Stop motion
- Behind "Happy Souls Alive" Simay Ezer Pekcan's essay on the film.
About the author
Bilguun Bayarkhuu is a growth engineer at Flick. This guide collects the style prompts Flick's team and Residency filmmakers used in their own films.
Frequently Asked Questions
What art styles can AI do?
Almost any you can describe or show. The 15 above run from painted gouache and watercolor to woodcut, paper cutout, stop motion, miniature dioramas and 3D. Flickpedia has 916 styles to start from.
What are 20 different animation styles?
Common ones: hand-drawn 2D, cel animation, painted, watercolor, ink, cutout, paper stop motion, claymation, puppet, miniature, 3D, motion graphics, anime, rotoscope, pixel art, woodcut, silhouette, collage, flat vector and rubber hose. AI models can imitate most of them when the prompt names the specific traits: line, texture, shading, palette and how it moves.
What cartoon styles can ChatGPT do?
ChatGPT's image model (GPT Image) can render most cartoon looks from a written style line. In Embedding Valley, GPT Image 2 made 199 of the film's images, starting with each character's front view in a construction-paper cutout style (Flick's film breakdown). In these films it was used for character sheets and style-keeping edits, with a video model handling motion.
How do I keep the same style in every shot?
Write the style once and paste the same block at the start of every prompt, or lock it with a style preset or reference code. Then make character sheets in that style before you animate.