• 70 ideas

Pop Art Ideas for Dots, Comic Words, Repeats and Packaging

Three pop art exercises per press, with the number of flat colours each needs and how many minutes it takes.

Pop Art Ideas for Dots, Comic Words, Repeats and Packaging

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  1. Sunglasses times 8, lenses a new colour each4 colours, 30 minutes. Two rows of four. Frames stay black throughout, so the lens colour is the only thing that moves.
  2. Soup tin with a label you invent3 colours, 30 minutes. Curve the top and bottom of the cylinder. Split the label into two colour bands and name a soup.
  3. Dial telephone with a coiled cord2 colours, 30 minutes. One flat colour for the body, black for the dial holes. The cord is a row of equal loops.

Next step Repeat a shape in cut paper insteadMore bold subjects for flat marker colour

All 70 ideas

Dots and halftone 14

  • Ball shaded with dots that fatten toward one side 1 colour, 15 minutes. Trace a cup. Pencil a light grid, then ink dots on it: pin-sized near the light, fat in the shade.
  • Banana with a halftone shadow underneath 2 colours, 20 minutes. Flat yellow fruit, black outline. The shadow is dots only: fat under the curve, tiny further out.
  • Bubble wrap dots printed behind a cut-out star 2 colours, 15 minutes. Brush paint on bubble wrap and press it down for an even dot grid. Glue a flat paper star on top.
  • Cloud shaded with ruled stripes instead of dots 1 colour, 10 minutes. Printers' tints came in lines as well as dots. Rule even parallel lines across the shadow side.
  • Comic eye close-up with one falling tear 2 colours, 25 minutes. Crop tight: one eye, one brow. Dotted skin, flat blue iris, a tear left white with a dark rim.
  • Explosion cloud with a dotted core 3 colours, 20 minutes. Spiky outer burst in flat yellow, a smaller burst inside in flat red, and a dotted white centre.
  • Face split down the middle: half dots, half flat 2 colours, 30 minutes. Same colour both sides. The dotted half looks lighter, as white paper shows between the dots.
  • Leaf turned green with only blue and yellow dots 2 colours, 20 minutes. Alternate blue and yellow dots in tight rows, no green pen. From across the room it goes green.
  • Magnified corner of a comic panel 3 colours, 25 minutes. Draw a 5 cm patch as if under a lens: huge dots, a slab of black outline and part of one letter.
  • Red lips with a dotted pink shine 1 colour, 15 minutes. Flat red, thick outline. Leave the shine white, then fill it with wide-spaced red dots: pink.
  • Self-portrait with a dotted face and flat hair 3 colours, 40 minutes. Skin is rows of even red dots on white, hair one flat yellow, outline thick black. No blending.
  • Sunglasses reflecting a dotted beach 3 colours, 30 minutes. Each lens is a tiny scene: a flat sun, dotted sky, striped sea. The frames are solid black.
  • Sunset sky graded from big dots to small 2 colours, 30 minutes. Halftone: keep the rows evenly spaced and shrink the dots as they climb, so the orange fades out.
  • Your pet as a dotted poster 3 colours, 35 minutes. Trace a photo into three shapes: flat dark, dotted mid tone, bare paper. One loud background.

Comic words and bubbles 14

  • BOOM with letters that swell toward you 3 colours, 20 minutes. Rule two guide lines that fan apart, so the B is small and the M is huge. Fill each letter flat.
  • CRASH cracked down the middle 3 colours, 20 minutes. Block letters, then a jagged white crack through the word. Shift the two halves out of line.
  • Four balloons: speech, whisper, thought, scream 1 colour, 15 minutes. Smooth oval, dashed oval, cloud with a circle tail, spiky burst. Letter one word inside each.
  • Invented sound word for a dull noise 2 colours, 15 minutes. Spell the fridge hum or a pen click and letter it big. Wobbly letters for hums, sharp for clicks.
  • One-panel comic with a caption box 3 colours, 30 minutes. Thick panel border, a yellow caption box top left, one figure, one balloon. All flat colour.
  • POP in bubble letters with a shine on each 3 colours, 15 minutes. Inflate the letters until they touch. A small white window high on each one makes it look glossy.
  • POW in block letters inside a spiky burst 3 colours, 15 minutes. Letters first, burst second, so the word fits. Yellow letters, red burst, a black drop shadow.
  • Shout balloon that breaks the panel border 2 colours, 15 minutes. Draw the panel frame first, then let the spiky balloon overlap it and rub out the frame beneath.
  • SPLAT dripping off the bottom of the letters 2 colours, 15 minutes. Round, fat letters. Pull three or four drips down from the lowest edges and end each in a blob.
  • Thought bubble holding one small object 2 colours, 10 minutes. A cloud outline, three shrinking circles for the tail, and inside it one flat-colour sandwich.
  • WHOOSH leaning forward with speed lines 2 colours, 15 minutes. Slant every letter the same way and trail ruled lines off the back. Stretch the Os into ovals.
  • Your own name as a comic title logo 3 colours, 25 minutes. Arch it over a curve, add a thick outline and a block shadow, and tuck a burst behind one end.
  • YUM above a bitten biscuit 3 colours, 20 minutes. Three fat letters with a bite taken from the M to match the biscuit. Crumbs are flat dashes.
  • ZAP with the Z drawn as a lightning bolt 2 colours, 10 minutes. Make the Z a bolt with sharp corners. Tilt the whole word uphill and outline it twice.

Repeats in colourways 14

  • Flower with its outline slipped off the colour 2 colours, 20 minutes. Paint the flat shape and let it dry. Then draw the black outline a few millimetres to one side.
  • Foam stamp printed in a row of 5 2 colours, 30 minutes. Cut a shape from craft foam, glue it to a block and print a row. Keep the patchy ones too.
  • Goldfish repeated until it becomes wallpaper 2 colours, 35 minutes. Make a card template and draw round it in staggered rows. Turn one fish to face the other way.
  • Houseplant in a day panel and a night panel 4 colours, 25 minutes. Same drawing twice. Day: yellow ground, green leaves. Night: dark blue ground, pale blue leaves.
  • Light bulb repeated, one panel switched on 3 colours, 25 minutes. Six identical bulbs on grey. In one panel only, flood the background yellow and add short rays.
  • Nine-square grid of one banana 3 colours, 40 minutes. Rule a 3 by 3 grid. Same banana each time; only the background changes. Leave one square blank.
  • One apple in the three complementary pairs 6 colours, 30 minutes. Red on green, yellow on purple, blue on orange. Side by side, opposites make each other brighter.
  • One mug repeated in 4 colourways 4 colours, 30 minutes. Fold the sheet in four and trace the same mug into each. Rotate four colours so no panel matches.
  • One shape cut from 4 papers and swapped 4 colours, 25 minutes. Stack four coloured squares, cut a heart through them all, then swap the hearts between squares.
  • Row of 5 ice lollies, one bitten 5 colours, 20 minutes. Same outline five times, a new flat colour each. Take a clean bite out of the fourth.
  • Sunglasses times 8, lenses a new colour each 4 colours, 30 minutes. Two rows of four. Frames stay black throughout, so the lens colour is the only thing that moves.
  • Traced portrait in 3 flat tones 3 colours, 35 minutes. Squint at the photo until it sorts into dark, middle and light. One colour for each, hard edges.
  • Your face traced 4 times and recoloured 4 colours, 45 minutes. Trace a photo on a window. Each panel gets one face colour and one background, never real ones.
  • Your house key in a 2 by 2 grid 4 colours, 25 minutes. Draw round the real key four times. Swap key and background colours in diagonal panels.

Bold-outline food and objects 14

  • Burger built from stacked flat layers 5 colours, 25 minutes. Each layer is one flat colour with a wavy lower edge: bun, lettuce, cheese, patty, bun.
  • Clothes peg drawn as large as the sheet 2 colours, 20 minutes. Let it touch all four edges. A dull object at giant size with a loud background does the work.
  • Dial telephone with a coiled cord 2 colours, 30 minutes. One flat colour for the body, black for the dial holes. The cord is a row of equal loops.
  • Doughnut with sprinkles as flat dashes 3 colours, 15 minutes. Seen from above: a ring, wavy icing edge, and sprinkles as short dashes pointing every way.
  • Fried egg on a flat blue background 2 colours, 10 minutes. A wobbly white shape, a yellow circle off centre, a white shine on the yolk. Blue to every edge.
  • High-top trainer in side view 3 colours, 30 minutes. Outline the sole thickest. Flat colour on the canvas, white toe cap, laces as a ladder of bars.
  • Hot dog with one zigzag of mustard 3 colours, 15 minutes. Two bun shapes and a sausage poking out both ends. The mustard is one yellow zigzag, outlined.
  • Ice cream cone with three scoops 4 colours, 20 minutes. Three flat circles overlapping, a criss-cross cone, one drip. Darkest scoop at the bottom.
  • Lipstick with a slanted tip 2 colours, 10 minutes. A gold tube made of two rectangles, a red bullet cut at a slant, a white stripe for the shine.
  • Pizza slice with a drooping point 3 colours, 15 minutes. A long triangle whose tip sags. Flat red discs on flat yellow, and one string of cheese hanging.
  • Portable radio with a dotted speaker 3 colours, 25 minutes. A rounded box, two dials, an aerial. The grille is a tidy grid of dots, the only dots in it.
  • Slice of cake with a thick black outline 3 colours, 15 minutes. A wedge from the side: two sponge stripes, one icing stripe, a cherry. Outline it twice as heavy.
  • Table lamp with a flat cone of light 2 colours, 15 minutes. The light is a hard-edged yellow triangle from the shade to the table. No glow, no fading.
  • Watermelon slice with teardrop seeds 3 colours, 10 minutes. A red semicircle, a thin white band, a green rind. Seeds are black teardrops aimed at the middle.

Packaging with invented labels 14

  • Cereal box with a made-up mascot 4 colours, 40 minutes. Box at an angle so two sides show. Big bowl, grinning animal, a NEW burst, a name of your own.
  • Crumpled crisp packet in flat colour 3 colours, 30 minutes. Draw the creases as hard-edged shapes in a darker flat tone. No smudging. You pick the flavour.
  • Fizzy drink can with an invented name 3 colours, 25 minutes. Curve the lettering round the can. One flat colour, one wave band, a white shine down one side.
  • Matchbox with a one-word label 2 colours, 15 minutes. A shallow box with the tray slid half out. Frame the label and give it one word and one picture.
  • Milk carton with a bold side panel 2 colours, 20 minutes. A box with a pitched roof top. One colour and white. Fill the front with a cow-spot pattern.
  • Poster selling an ordinary spoon 3 colours, 35 minutes. One huge spoon, a slogan in capitals, a burst in the corner. Sell it as if it were a sports car.
  • Price sticker burst with a silly price 2 colours, 10 minutes. A circle with a zigzag edge, slanted numerals, a drop shadow. Price something that has no price.
  • Sardine tin with the lid rolled back 3 colours, 30 minutes. A rounded rectangle, the lid curled round a key, three fish in a row. Every fish identical.
  • Sauce bottle with a blank label 2 colours, 15 minutes. Flat red, black cap, thick outline. Leave the label empty and white; the shape says what it is.
  • Soup tin with a label you invent 3 colours, 30 minutes. Curve the top and bottom of the cylinder. Split the label into two colour bands and name a soup.
  • Stack of three tins facing different ways 3 colours, 35 minutes. Same invented label three times, turned so you see its front, its side and its seam.
  • Sweet wrapper twisted at both ends 2 colours, 10 minutes. An oval with a fan of folds at each end. Stripes that bend over the middle make it look round.
  • Toothpaste tube squeezed from the middle 3 colours, 20 minutes. Pinch the tube in the centre and curl the flat end. A striped worm of paste sits by the cap.
  • Washing powder box with a starburst 3 colours, 30 minutes. Rays fan out from the centre in two alternating colours. A made-up name in heavy slanted caps.

How it works

Even dots, thick black outlines, flat colour, comic lettering and ordinary things repeated until they look strange: 70 exercises built from the style's own kit. Each one says how many colours you need beside black, how long it takes, and how to get that hard-edged printed look by hand. Nothing here asks you to blend.

Read the full guide

Dots that do the shading

Pop art borrowed its look from cheap colour printing. Ben-Day dots, a process from 1879, are one size and evenly spaced, so wide-spaced red dots on white read as pink. Halftone dots change size instead, and a row that shrinks will fade a sky. The pop art drawing ideas under Dots use both; one turns a leaf green with only blue and yellow.

Flat colour, thick outline, ordinary subject

The movement grew up in Britain and the United States in the mid to late 1950s and took its pictures from comics, product packaging and everyday goods. So the subjects here are a fried egg, a clothes peg, a soup tin. Every label under Packaging is one you invent, which keeps the drawing yours. Pick three colours and stop.

  • Choose the colours before you start and put the rest of the box away. None of the easy pop art ideas needs more than three beside black.
  • For even dots, pencil a light grid and put a dot on every crossing.
  • Do the black outline last, with the thickest pen you own. It tidies every wobbly colour edge underneath.

Questions and answers

What is the difference between Ben-Day dots and halftone?

Ben-Day dots are the same size and evenly spaced across an area, so the tint is flat. Halftone dots vary in size or spacing, which lets a tone fade from dark to light. Colour comics in the mid 20th century used Ben-Day tints, which is why they suit this style. From a distance the eye blends either kind into smooth colour.

Which colours work best for pop art?

Few, flat and loud. Red, yellow and blue with black and white cover most of the list. For extra punch use a complementary pair: red with green, yellow with purple, or blue with orange. Side by side, opposites make each other look brighter. The Repeats group has an apple in all three pairs.

How do I get flat colour without streaks?

Markers streak where a fresh stroke crosses a dry one, so fill each shape in one go with strokes running the same way. Poster paint goes on flatter in two thin coats than one thick one. Cut coloured paper is flattest of all and gives a hard edge for free.

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