The animation, while feeling a little low budget, works fine but could be better. I find the art style extremely appealing. Verrrrrry 2000s moe cuteness with big eyes and simple designs that express the girls' character well. I love that this anime does the thing where it makes the characters all wide and chibi, but like cranks the WIDE factor to 100%! It's so silly, and I find it so funny and endearing xD.
Being a show set at an art school, Hidamari Sketch consistently has a plethora of inspired and unabashedly unique direction that studio Shaft is known for. The show makes heavy use of colorful abstract patterns, solid color as backgrounds as well as imitating Ben-Day dots, those polka-dot patterns on comic books, as backgrounds. Much of the direction of the show is very artsy and bizarre, especially in the dream sequences which happen occasionally. A lot of unconventional camera movement and framing is part of what I think makes Hidamari Sketch so unique. The constant use of real photos of objects in place of a more traditional drawing just adds to the slightly odd and artsy vibe I think the direction is going for. Almost like a collage!
On the other side, Hidamari Sketch is a goofy anime full of dumb gags and humor focused heavily on character interactions at heart. It's pretty standard slice of life silliness, and I love that kinda thing, though it doesn't innovate much on the character front. Still, the characters are all endearing if not a bit tropey and their interactions are fun to watch! Much of the humor is based around Japanese wordplay and puns, some of which I got and others I didn't fully understand. It could be a bit perplexing to those who don't know Japanese wordplay and culture very well.
In conclusion, Hidamari Sketch is a pretty run-of-the-mill yet still quite fun and charming anime with a lot of value to be found! Being a simple slice of life comedy anime about cute girls being silly and doing quirky school and art class things, there is no real overarching plot, and that's okay. If you're watching this anime you're just here for some good vibes and silly banter that is constantly a joy to watch! If slice of life anime is your thing, I think you'd get a lot out of the show and even outside of that, I find the striking direction reason enough to watch ;P
