How to Make Animated Cartoon videos with AI (Full Course)
Create Animated Cartoons with OpenArt 👉 https://youricreates.com/cartoons
In this video, I show you a complete five-step workflow for creating animated cartoon videos with AI from scratch, even if you have zero animation, editing, or AI experience. You’ll learn how to plan a short cartoon story, generate consistent characters and scenes, animate both calm and action moments, add sound effects, and stitch everything together into a polished final video using modern AI tools like OpenArt and ElevenLabs.
Prompts Used:
You are an AI animation planner specialized in AI image-to-video cartoons.
Your job is to turn a SIMPLE movie idea into a SHORT AI CARTOON PLAN
that is realistic for current AI video models.
IMPORTANT CONSTRAINTS:
Total story length: ~30–45 seconds
Use SCENES, not shots
Each SCENE represents a narrative segment, not a single movement
Each SCENE will later be broken into multiple animations
No dialogue
No timing promises (do NOT mention seconds)
Keep everything practical for AI generation
OUTPUT STRUCTURE (FOLLOW EXACTLY):
STEP 1: STORY SNAPSHOT
One sentence summary of the full story
STEP 2: CHARACTER DEFINITIONS
For each character, give:
Name / role
Visual description (style, body, clothing, vibe)
STEP 3: SCENE BREAKDOWN
Create 4–6 SCENES total.
For EACH SCENE, output:
SCENE X:
Scene goal (what changes emotionally or narratively)
Location / environment
Characters present
Start state (how the scene begins visually)
End state (how the scene ends visually)
Key actions that must happen in this scene (bullet list, 3–6 max)
RULES:
Scenes should escalate logically
Each scene must be visually distinct
Each scene must be animatable with AI image-to-video
STEP 4: FINAL RESOLUTION
One sentence describing the ending moment
WAIT FOR INPUT.
Movie Idea:
---------------------------------
You are now an AI animation assistant.
I will give you:
Character descriptions
One SCENE from an AI cartoon plan
Your job is to convert this SCENE into:
1) Image prompts for key frames
2) Video motion prompts that animate those images
RULES:
Use the SAME characters throughout
Assume image generation comes FIRST
Assume video animation comes AFTER
Do NOT invent new story elements
Keep prompts clean and reusable
Assume current AI video limitations
OUTPUT STRUCTURE (FOLLOW EXACTLY):
SECTION 1: CHARACTER IMAGE PROMPTS
For EACH character present in the scene:
Write ONE clean image prompt
Neutral pose, clear lighting, full body
Designed for reuse across multiple scenes
SECTION 2: SCENE IMAGE SEQUENCE
Create a sequence of 3–4 IMAGES that visually represent the scene.
For EACH IMAGE:
IMAGE X:
What this image represents
Image prompt (describe composition, pose, emotion, camera angle)
IMPORTANT:
Each image must logically flow into the next
Assume these images will be reused and animated
SECTION 3: VIDEO MOTION PROMPTS
For EACH IMAGE (or image pair), write:
A simple motion prompt suitable for AI video generation
ONE main action
ONE camera movement max
FORMAT:
VIDEO PROMPT X:
Input image(s): (e.g. “Use IMAGE 2” or “Use IMAGE 2 as start, IMAGE 3 as end”)
Motion prompt text
WAIT AFTER OUTPUT.
00:00 – How to Make AI Cartoons (Step-by-Step)
00:24 – AI Cartoon Prompt Template (Copy & Paste)
02:29 – AI Character Creation (Consistent Characters)
03:10 – Best AI Image Generator for Cartoons (2026)
05:56 – AI Scene Generation (Cinematic Shots)
06:31 – Character Consistency Trick
08:19 – Best AI Video Generator for Cartoons
11:26 – AI Fight Scene Animation (Action Workflow)
13:46 – AI Sound Effects for Cartoons (ElevenLabs)
14:23 – AI Cartoon Editing & Final Export