Want to Improve You Sketch? Try a Drawing Challenge!

5 Fun Drawing Challenges That’ll Help You Improve Your Sketching Skills

By Sara Barnes on January 1, 2019

If you want to get better at drawing, there’s a simple way to do so. Just start drawing! You’re only going to improve with many hours of putting pen or pencil to paper. And in all this time spent sketching, one of the most important things you can do is make mistakes. It’s in these blunders that you truly understand how things look and ways to fix them. In the process, you develop your own visual language and sketch in a style that’s unique to your hand.

Finding the motivation and inspiration to draw on a regular basis can be difficult. If this is something you struggle with, know that there are many other artists who do, too. To help keep you inspired (and accountable) in making art, there are many drawing challenges in which you can participate. Some require you to sketch daily, while others are more open-ended and can be done at your own pace. Regardless of what you choose, be sure to look to others for inspiration and encouragement—and know that you too can successfully complete the challenge at hand.

Here are five drawing challenges that’ll spark your creativity.

A drawing challenge is a great way to boost your sketching skills. Here are five challenges to try!

Draw It Again

A post shared by Kaylani Juanita (@kaylanijuanita) on Aug 24, 2018 at 8:18pm PDT

This is a drawing challenge that’ll make you feel good about how far your skills have come. Find an artwork from years ago (the earlier, the better) and redraw it using what you’ve learned since then. You’ll be astonished at the changes you’ve made and the confidence you’ve developed since you created that piece. (For even more inspiration, check out more examples of the draw it again challenge.)

Inktober

A post shared by Inktober (@inktober) on Oct 24, 2018 at 10:35am PDT

Inktober is one of the most popular drawing challenges around. Every October, Inktober creator and illustrator Jake Parker releases a prompt list that corresponds to each day of the month. While many people work off those 31 suggestions, Parker stresses that it’s not necessary to do so. “What ever you decide,” he says, “just be consistent with it.” If you do participate, make sure you tag your work with #inktober!

Doodle Addicts

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Doodle Addicts is a platform that celebrates “our incessant need to draw, sketch, and doodle with anything and everything.” They host drawing challenges with specific themes and art prompts intended to get you out of your comfort zone. When you’re done, share your creation with their community and enter for your chance to win prizes.

A Drawing a Day by Sketchbook Skool

A post shared by Sketchbookskool (@sketchbookskool) on Oct 27, 2018 at 10:07am PDT

Coming up with drawing ideas can be one of the hardest parts of the creative process. To ensure you won’t miss a day of sketching, the e-learning website Sketchbook Skool has posted daily drawing prompts for every day of the year. Visit their Pinterest to find the current month, or use some of their past ideas! Either way, you’ll be sketching—which is the goal of this challenge.

The Sketchbook Project

A post shared by The Sketchbook Project (@thesketchbookproject) on Sep 29, 2018 at 11:56am PDT

The Sketchbook Project doesn’t bill themselves as a drawing challenge, but as a global art project that anyone can participate in. You simply order a sketchbook, fill it up, and send it back to them. You’ll then be part of the world’s largest artists sketchbook collections.

There are no official guidelines for what goes in your sketchbook, but there are a couple rules—one of them being that you can’t send back a blank book!