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Things to draw

The hardest part of drawing is deciding what to draw. These fifty ideas are grouped by theme so you can skim them: animals, nature, food, fantasy, vehicles, everyday objects, people and patterns.

Curated by Willa Fern

What should I draw?

Pick the first thing on this list that you can picture in your head, and draw that. Deciding is the part that stalls people, not the drawing, which is why the list is grouped by theme and why anything with a printable sheet says so.

Animals

Nature

Food

Fantasy

Vehicles

Everyday objects

Faces and people

Patterns

There are 50 ideas on this page, in eight groups. Animals is the largest with 15, from a frog mid jump to a fox with a huge tail. Nature is the smallest: a leaf with all its veins, a breaking wave and a tree. People is the hardest group, with your own face drawn without a mirror, your other hand and someone asleep in a chair. Each idea has a time beside it, from six minutes for a peeled banana to fifteen for your own face.

Of the 50, 23 have a download link to a step sheet built from the same drawing, mostly animals, fantasy creatures and vehicles. The rest, such as the castle on a hill, the old film camera or the maze with one way through, are for drawing from imagination or from the real thing in front of you.

This list leans towards subjects with a little more to them. For short, forgiving ideas, go to easy things to draw. For silly doodles that take a few minutes, try things to draw when bored. To add a twist to any idea here, such as drawing it underwater or without lifting your pencil, press the button on the drawing idea generator.

A class can use the list as a menu: each child picks one idea from a different group, draws it in the time shown, and swaps with a neighbour to guess which one it was.

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