/Case study (Consumer app, creative tools) (2026)

Doodraw

Draw. It moves. Instantly.

Client: Doodraw
Year: 2026
Sector: Consumer app, creative tools
Services: Product designMobile app developmentNative rendering engineDesktop appWebsiteLaunch
Stack: React NativeExpoNative engine in RustWindows desktop app

(Fig. 00)Doodraw, Draw. It moves. Instantly.

(01) Context

Doodraw turns strokes into living animation the moment they are drawn: no timeline, no keyframes, no animation skills required. It is our own product, co-founded by Alexis Chân Gridel and Élodie Mayade, built end to end by the studio and used by more than 86,000 people on iPhone, iPad, Android and Windows.

(02) Challenge

Animation apps usually make you choose: simple and toy-like, or powerful and intimidating. We wanted the immediacy of a doodle app with the output of an animation tool, running smoothly on a phone, with exports artists can post the same minute.

(03) Approach

Put the motion inside the brush. Every brush carries its own movement, so drawing and animating become the same gesture. That idea required a real-time engine, so we wrote one natively and wrapped it in a React Native and Expo interface that ships on every platform from one codebase.

(04) Chapter

The brush is the animation

Each animated brush has motion built into the stroke: subtle wiggles, living textures, variations that make a line breathe. Intensity, speed and behaviour are adjustable, and a motion tool enriches strokes after the fact. Boiling lines, a staple of 2D animation, happen without a single keyframe.

doodraw app screens (1) — (Fig. 01)The brush is the animation

doodraw app screens (2) — (Fig. 01)The brush is the animation

doodraw — (Fig. 02)The brush is the animation

(05) Chapter

A native engine under a cross-platform app

The drawing and animation core is a native engine written in Rust, with React Native and Expo handling the interface, accounts and purchases. One product logic runs on iOS, iPadOS and Android, and a Windows desktop version extends it to artists who work on a big screen with a pen.

doodraw on iPad — (Fig. 03)A native engine under a cross-platform app

(06) Chapter

Tools of an animator, without the weight

Layers you can animate independently, frame-by-frame with onion skin when you want control, per-layer intensity and speed, duration and smoothness settings. Power is there, but it never stands between the user and the first stroke.

(07) Chapter

Export everywhere

MP4, GIF and animated PNG up to 1080p, transparent PNG for compositing, and a progressive stroke-reveal export that replays the drawing as a timelapse. Everything is ready for TikTok, Reels, CapCut or After Effects, because the work only matters once it is shared.