 | This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Stick figure" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(March 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Astick figure (also known as astick man,stick woman, orstick person) is a very simple drawing of a human or other animal, in which thelimbs (arms and legs) andtorso are represented using straight lines. Thehead is most often represented by acircle, which can be filled or unfilled. Details such ashands,feet, and aneck may be present or absent, and the head is sometimes embellished with details such asfacial features orhair. Simpler stick figures often display disproportionate physical features and ambiguous emotion.[1]
The stick figure is a universally recognizable symbol, likely one of the most well-known in the world. Drawings of stick figures transcend[peacock prose] language, location and demographic, and the stick figure's roots can be traced back to over 30,000 years ago. Stick figures are often drawn bychildren,[citation needed] and their simplicity and versatility have led to their use ininfographics,signage,animations,storyboards, and many other kinds of visual media.
Following the advent of theWorld Wide Web, the stick figure saw prominent use inFlash animation.[citation needed]
The stick figure long predates modern civilisation. Stick figures were a feature ofprehistoric art, and can be found incave paintings andpetroglyphs. Stick figure depictions of people, animals, and daily life have been discovered in numerous sites all over the world, such as depictions ofMimi inAustralia or theIndalo in Spain.[citation needed]
As language began to develop,logographies (writing systems that use images to represent words ormorphemes) came to use stick figures as glyphs.[citation needed] InMandaeanmanuscripts,uthras (celestial beings) were illustrated using stick figures.[2]
In 1925, Austrian sociologistOtto Neurath began work on what would become the International System of Typographic Picture Education (ISOTYPE), a system of conveying warnings, statistics, and general information through standardized and easily understandable pictographs. Neurath made significant use of stick figure designs to represent individuals and statistics. In 1934, graphic designerRudolf Modley founded Pictorial Statistics Inc., and brought ISOTYPE to theUnited States in 1972.[citation needed]
The first international use of stick figures[dubious –discuss] dates back to the1964 Summer Olympics inTokyo. Pictograms created by Japanese designers Masaru Katsumi and Yoshiro Yamashita formed the basis of future pictograms.[vague][3][4] In 1972,Otto "Otl" Aicher designed round-ended, geometric, grid-based stick figures to be used in thesignage, printed materials, and television broadcasts for the1972 Summer Olympics inMunich.[5][6]
In 1974, theU.S. Department of Transportation commissioned theAmerican Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA) to develop theDOT pictograms, 34 (later 50) symbols for use at transportation hubs, public spaces, large events, and other contexts in which there may be great linguistic variation among those required to understand the signage. These pictograms featured stick figures heavily, drawing on previous designs, such as those made for the 1972 Summer Olympics. These symbols, or symbols derived from them, are widely used throughout the world today.
.svg)
 | This section has multiple issues. Please helpimprove it or discuss these issues on thetalk page.(Learn how and when to remove these messages) (Learn how and when to remove this message)
|
Tom Fulp began to produce 2D stick figure animations on hisAmiga computer for entertainment purposes in the early 1990s.[citation needed]
On April 19, 2001, Chinese animatorZhu Zhiqiang uploaded a 75-second-long video titled "Xiao Xiao" on the newly formedNewgrounds animation portal, inspired byHong Kong martial arts films.[7] The series included stick figures fighting each other, and took on a variety of formats, including animation and video games.[8]
In September 2005, American NASA engineerRandall Munroe debutsxkcd, a webcomic which uses stick figures in humorous contexts, often relating toScience,Philosophy,Technology,Computer programming, andInternet culture.[9][10] Randall has since authored 6 books in relation to the comic.[11]
Created by animator, YouTuber, and artistAlan Becker, the first episode ofAnimator vs. Animation premiered on Newgrounds on June 3, 2006,[12] usingflash animation. It showed a stick figure fighting to break out of the animation program it was created in. The video has garnered almost 80 million views since its publication.[13] As of October 2025, the series contains twelve main episodes and a number of spin-offs, among them include the video "Animation vs.Minecraft", which has gained over 305 million views as of March 2022.[citation needed] Season 3 in the series of episodes features multiple styles of stick figures, including a cave painting character, a stickman similar to the one in Stickman vs. Wall, a figure seemingly from Pivot Animator, and a figure based on those inDOT pictograms. In total, all of Alan Becker's animation videos have been watched over four and a half billion times,[citation needed] with the vast majority of them being centered around stick figure animation.
Pivot Animator (formerly Pivot Stickfigure Animator) was created in 2005 by software developer Peter Bone. The program was specifically geared towards stick figure animation. Unlike Adobe Flash, which had grown into a highly complex 2D animation environment, Pivot Animator, with its simplicity allowed virtually anyone to create stick figure animations without requiring any form of expertise. This brought the ability to create and distribute quality stick animations to a much greater audience than before, and alongside Flash, Pivot Animator soon became another central tool for the countless Internet users who were caught up in the trend afterAnimator vs. Animation's success.[citation needed][peacock prose]
At some point between June 2008 and April 2009, an Internetcopypasta began to appear featuring a Unicode stick figure named Bob. There was an initial surge in popularity in April 2009, leading to a hostile response from the YouTube community wherein the community would flag the copypasta as spam. This spread of the copypasta would reach its peak in search interest around June 2010 before declining gradually. However, on September 24, 2013, YouTube announced that they would be integrating the YouTube Comments section with Google+.[14][better source needed] In response, the YouTube community brought back the Bob copypasta in a new form, with Bob "building an army" against Google+.[15]
As ofUnicode version 13.0, there are five stick figure characters in theSymbols for Legacy Computing block. These are in the codepoints U+1FBC5 to U+1FBC9.[18]
As ofUnicode version 16.0, there are stick figure characters in theSymbols for Legacy Computing Supplement block. These are in the codepoints U+1FBC5 to U+1FBC9.[19]
OpenMoji supports the five characters along withjoining character sequences to give the other figures a dress.[20] For example, the sequenceU+1FBC6 🯆STICK FIGURE WITH ARMS RAISED,U+200D ZERO WIDTH JOINER,U+1F457 👗DRESS (🯆👗).
| Codepoint | Name | Character | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| U+1FBC5 | STICK FIGURE | 🯅 | Not to be mistaken withU+1F6B9 🚹MENS SYMBOL[18] |
| U+1FBC6 | STICK FIGURE WITH ARMS RAISED | 🯆 | |
| U+1FBC7 | STICK FIGURE LEANING LEFT | 🯇 | Mirror images of each other. |
| U+1FBC8 | STICK FIGURE LEANING RIGHT | 🯈 | |
| U+1FBC9 | STICK FIGURE WITH DRESS | 🯉 | Not to be mistaken withU+1F6BA 🚺WOMENS SYMBOL[18] |
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)