I decided to learn to draw. The goal is 50 hours in 2026. No pressure, just pen, paper, and a heatmap calendar to keep me honest.
Starting from near zero. I have a pen, a sketchbook, and this tutorial.
Day 1 - March 4, 2026
Watched the tutorial and another one that came up as recommended and drew. About an hour and a half total.
Rules I set for myself: pen only, no eraser. I don’t want to waste time second-guessing lines. Also draw big — I heard somewhere that you learn better drawing big because it forces confidence. Small drawings let you stay timid.
Shapes
The tutorial starts with shapes. Circles, ellipses, rectangles, triangles — just filling a page. Turns out I’m not bad at circles, which is apparently a good sign.
Then I copied a few cats just for fun. /ᐠ｡ꞈ｡ᐟ\
Source: not today cat
More cats (ﾐⓛᆽⓛﾐ)✧
Tried two more. One chubby kitten - shapes becoming cat, one detailed sitting kitten.
What I learned:
- big eyes = cute
- big nose = less cute
- You can in fact draw the rest of the owl
- Random lines make it look sophisticated but it is not true
Sources: fluffy kitten, chubby cat
Teapot from real life
The teapot was right in front of me. I tried drawing it as is - it sucked. ( ˇ෴ˇ ) Remembered the tutorial and tried breaking it down into shapes, you can see the attempts on the right side of the page. Still bad. (ಥ﹏ಥ)
Duck
Finally the exercise from the tutorial: build a duck out of shapes. Guess what - you have to think hard about the shapes you use to make a duck. Apparently, a wing is two triangles. That’s it.
Once I had the shapes on paper, drawing an actual duck underneath took maybe 5 seconds. I am very proud of it.
I have an original duck! ٩(◕‿◕)۶