Timm Style is a style of animation. Characters are drawn with fairly realistic, though somewhat exaggerated, proportions and small eyes all round (though villains' eyes may still be slightly narrower than those of the heroes). People are drawn with lots of straight lines rather than curves, which makes them look rather angular. From 1996 forward, male characters, especially those who are meant to be very muscular like Batman or Superman, tended to be drawn with large upper body mass while having rather thin legs.
This style tends to be used in action series, so characters and clothing will usually be drawn with just a few colours, simple shading and minimal textures to make them easier to animate.
Among the artistic influences Timm has cited for this style are Chester Gould's Dick Tracy (look at Batman's jaw!), and Dan DeCarlo's style of drawing pretty girls in Archie Comics as well as his less innocent pin-up style works. Alex Toth used a similar style during his days at Hanna-Barbera.
This wiki commonly misuses the term Animesque to refer to these, though there is occasional overlap. For a quick little reminder, think of faces. While Animesque may increase eye size, Timmstyle will choose simpler features (in fact, Skintone Sclerae and Black Bead Eyes are quite common in Timmstyle works). Pretty much faces are different, bodies are the same when comparing these two styles.
It is named for Bruce Timm, an artist and animator for DC Comics who uses this style. As a result, it's quite common in animated adaptations of DC properties, particularly the DC Animated Universe and occasionally DC Universe Animated Original Movies.
Examples:
Anime & Manga
- The Big O is a rare anime example of this trope; the character designs take a lot of cues from Bruce Timm's art style, and Roger himself greatly resembles Bruce Wayne. Fittingly, Sunrise (the studio behind the anime) was a subcontractor for Batman: The Animated Series, the most well-known example of the trope and a major influence on the series as a whole.
Comic Books
Animated Films
- The Direct to Video animated movie Turok: Son of Stone
- The Genął movie.
- When portrayed in a two-dimensional manner, such as during end credits, The Incredibles bear this style simplified.
- Hercules and Xena – The Animated Movie: The Battle for Mount Olympus was an early adapter of this style
- Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion's Revenge and its sequel use this style like the below-mentioned cartoon series, only they're much Truer to the Text.
Music
- Natalia Oreiro's video clip Tu Veneno has animated sequences with this style.
- Cami's music video Perreo Pa Las Nenas features animated scenes with this style.
Video Games
- DrakeOfThe99Dragons: the game uses an art-style inspired by Bruce Timm's.
- Code Name: S.T.E.A.M: Bruce Timm was explicitly named as an influence for the comic-book art style.
- MultiVersus: Superman and Batman are portrayed this way.
Web Original
- Internet artist Romil Ilagan applies this style (with Timm's work on Batman: The Animated Series cited as a specific influence) to The Phantom of the Opera at his website, Phantoons of the Opera
.
Western Animation
- DC Animated Universe:
- Other DC Comics adaptations:
- Marvel Comics adaptations:
- The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes and its predecessor Wolverine and the X-Men (2009).
- And related, being they shared a character designer, X-Men: Evolution features a similar style, though notably rounder and slightly more detailed then usual.
- The Spectacular Spider-Man
- The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes and its predecessor Wolverine and the X-Men (2009).
- Galactik Football
- Huntik
- Legend Of The Dragon
- Zorro: Generation Z
- Hellboy Animated
- Gargoyles
- Storm Hawks
- World of Quest
- Night Hood
- Captain Hero in Drawn Together is drawn in this style, as part of being a parody of Superman.
- The Legend of Calamity Jane
- Freakazoid! which was co-created by Timm but was abandoned after creative differences
- Roswell Conspiracies: Aliens, Myths and Legends
- Genndy Tartakovsky got one of his first jobs on Batman: The Animated Series as an in-between artist, and the influence shows in several of the works he contributed designs to:
- Star Wars: The Clone Wars (especially in its pilot movie and first six seasons) is a rare example of being CGI-animated with a mixture of animesque and Timm-influenced character designs.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003)
- Mortal Kombat: Defenders of the Realm
- Derrick J. Wyatt, one of the designers for the aforementioned Teen Titans, carried the influence to most of his other works, usually with skinny kids in addition to buff guys and curvy girls.
- Transformers: Prime, a natural consequence of mixing the art styles of the movies and the last cartoon.
- Extreme Ghostbusters
- Men in Black: The Series
- Godzilla: The Series
- Jackie Chan Adventures, which shared a character designer with the aforementioned The Batman.
- The Mummy: The Animated Series