If you want to get better at something, you should practice it daily.
No matter what it is, daily practice will make you progress much quicker and make you stand out from everybody else who is not doing it.
And it doesn’t have to be good every time you do it. In fact, it is going to suck most days. You need to embrace the sucking part and understand that failure means progression. We learn through failing, so by failing faster, you learn faster.
If you have read Atomic Habits by James Clear, you probably remember a story about photography class.
Students were split into two groups. One group was scored on one perfect photo, while the other group was scored on the number of shots they took.
In the end, the group with a shit ton of photos had way better results than the group with just 1 “perfect” image.
You probably also heard a similar story about the potting class. But this time from Art & Fear by David Bayles and Ted Orland – The origin of the story.
Photographer Jerry Ulesmann conducted this little experiment with his Photography Beginner Class at the University of Florida. So even though it’s not actual research conducted by scientists, it’s based on true events.
You have probably noticed that you grew most as an artist after you had to draw every day for some time.
At least, that is what happened to me. Skylly July, inktobers, and daily drawing at work were the biggest drivers of my growth.
To grow, you don’t have to spend hours and hours daily on top of your other life obligations. That is the fastest way to burn out.
Actually, it’s enough if you do quick 30 min studies or sketches. It’s much more sustainable than 2-4 hours every day. Most likely, you can keep it up for a long time.
Set a daily minimum and try your best to stick to it. Because, as I said, it doesn’t have to be good. It just needs to be done.
To draw daily with the least friction, you have to decide what you are doing to draw every day, so you can jump into it.
It can be some kind of challenge like skully july, inktober, mermay, etc… or you can sketch from imagination daily.
But I recommend deciding what area in your art to improve and doing daily studies in that direction. It can be hard to see your own errors, so asking another artist for feedback is the best way.
Prioritize 1-3 areas (depending on how busy you are), pick exercises you can do every day with minimum friction, and try your best to do at least 15 minutes a day or your own daily minimum.
Sometimes it can be hard to write your art study plan like that, so I can help you out in my mentorship program. If you are interested, read more and apply here.
I’m also currently writing and filming a youtube series about studying art and different practices, exercises, and drills you can do for every drawing fundamental. So subscribe to my channel to not miss it.
I promise you if you draw every day (or almost every day), no matter how badly, you will improve immensely!
Now go and do a quick 10 min sketch of whatever object is in front of you 😀