How To Practice Drawing To Get Better Faster!

Do you sometimes feel like no matter how much you practice drawing, you’re just not improving? We all know the key to learning to draw is practice. But have you thought about HOW you practice?

Ask yourself these four questions to make sure you are actually improving as you practice!

1. Are you practicing the right skills?

Start by asking yourself what you want to be able to draw. What you need to practice depends on what you want to achieve.

If you want to draw portraits, well, you need to practice skills that relate to drawing portraits! But what many beginners forget is that you need to learn to crawl before you can walk. Instead of rushing into a full portrait, consider the basic skills that contribute to drawing a portrait. Those basic skills could include:

controlling your shading
knowing the standard proportions of the face
learning how to draw the individual features of the face

Decide what you want to be able to draw and if you don’t know what the basic skills you need are, find a tutor or course that can guide you on that subject.

Make sure what you practice is relevant to what you want to be able to draw.

2. Can you commit to practicing?

When it comes to learning to draw, consistency is important. Can you allocate a particular time of the day or week to commit to drawing? Make sure you choose a time that is doable. It’s better to practice 30 minutes once a week consistently than commit to an hour you’ll never actually get to!

Depending on your situation, you may be able to practice in short blocks, such as 3 x 30 minutes a week. It might be first thing in the morning, during your lunch break, or before you go to bed. If your time is more flexible, maybe you can give yourself two hours once or twice a week.

Start with a short amount of time that you know you’ll be able to commit to.

3. Are you using your practice time wisely?

How you practice is as important as what you practice. I recommend dividing your time into ‘study time’ and ‘fun time’.

Study time is when you practice the skills you need to improve.

Fun time is when you draw something you enjoy and challenge yourself to produce finished artworks.

Deciding what to do in your fun time should be easy. What do you want to get good at? Well, just have a go at drawing that! Deciding what to do in your study time takes a bit more reflection:

What are the basic skills you need to be able to draw what you want?
When you look at your drawings, what is lacking?
What is your biggest struggle at the moment?

Be honest with yourself and try to see the underlying issues – do you really need to get better at blending skin tones or is it something more fundamental you are struggling with, like how to control your shading? Choose one area or technique to improve and really focus on it during your study time. Keep it up for a month or so or until you feel more competent in that area. If you need help with a particular skill, find resources like YouTube videos that focus on that one thing.

4. Do you need to change your outlook?

Ask yourself what your biggest drawing struggle is.

If your answer is “everything”, it might be a sign you are overwhelmed. In that case, the best thing to do would be to find a good beginners course to follow along with for your study time.

Or, it might be a sign that you need to change your attitude towards drawing. Drawing is full of challenges, and if you want to improve, then you need to find a way to manage your expectations and how you feel about your drawing.

If you find yourself getting frustrated or too critical, try to focus on just ‘doing the work’ rather than how good you think it is. It’s better to do something, anything, than to do nothing. Even if you’re just showing up to your sketchbook and doodling for 20 minutes.

At this stage, it actually doesn’t matter how good you think your drawings are! What matters is that you continue to practice. Remember, practice makes progress!

So here’s the checklist to make sure your practice leads to progress:

Practice skills that are relevant to what you want to learn.
Set a time to practice consistently, make it doable.
Divide your practice time into Fun Time – drawing the things you want to draw and Study Time – focusing on the skills you are lacking. Focus on improving one skill at a time.
Manage your expectations and attitude towards drawing. If you can take judgement out of it and just do the practice, you will improve.

I hope these questions help you figure out the best way for you to practice, to achieve your drawing goals.

Check out the video below for a recap!