The 15-Hour Weekly Drawing Schedule That Almost Made Me Quit

The sooner you make your first five thousand mistakes, the sooner you will be able to correct them. ~ Nicolaides, the author of “The Natural Way to Draw”

I bought the book The Natural Way to Draw about a year ago. At that time, I was learning from YouTube tutorials and some courses I purchased online. Many people recommended this book, so I ordered a copy.

At first glance, the language was not modern English. I often have to read several times to understand the instructions. The 15-hour commitment for each schedule is shockingly long. I was thinking: I can’t be doing all that, plus reading the book and preparing the reference photos. That’s a full-time job itself.

I never got past Schedule 1. I thought, who has the time to practice drawing 15 hours a week? Not even a retired person would want to do that. In this fast-paced modern world, it’s a luxury to find time for a drawing practice. Some days, I’ll be happy to draw for 20-30 minutes.

The Confusion of Schedule 1

The exercises in Schedule 1 were very confusing. I had no idea what I was doing and thought maybe I was just wasting paper. My partner acted as a live model for gesture drawings. He would change pose after a minute and did a pretty good job.

After 5-6 days, I had a stack of gesture drawings that looked like nothing serious—just doodles. My partner is supportive but also thought it was a lot of paper wasted. So, I stopped the exercises and went back to online tutorials.

The Epiphany

I always had the book in the back of my mind because Nicolaides’ writing resonates with me the most. He speaks my art language to my heart, like a good old friend. One day, I had an epiphany: reduce the 3 hours a day, 15 hours a week schedule to a more manageable modern schedule.

I started to redesign the first 3 schedules. Two weeks later, I was happy. The redesigned schedule was manageable and I could actually go through the exercises. Here I am, on Schedule 10. I am super excited about this journey and will keep documenting my findings.

My Thoughts on Weeks 1 and 2:

• Materials: I use the reference photos I shot specifically for the drawing exercises.
• The “Torture” of Contour: The contour drawing exercises are brutal, like a torture. A contour we can draw in a few minutes has to be dragged to an hour.
• My Recommendation: Use the recommended 15×20 inch paper size. Otherwise, you will draw much quicker.
• The Non-Dominant Hand: It’s a great opportunity to exercise your non-dominant hand. I didn’t feel this made my drawing slower, but it was a “fresh approach”.
• The Pace: I managed around 13-14 minutes per drawing. I drew 4 drawings to make up about 55 minutes. Please note: I am not following the original schedule exactly because I want to modify it to a modern version—The One-Hour a Day Drawing Challenge.

My Art Reference photos and Contour Drawings from Week 1

• Use a bigger screen: For contour drawing, I recommend a TV screen.
• The Zoom Method: On a monitor, you can zoom in so the figure size is similar to your paper. If the whole figure doesn’t fit, you can scroll the photo down as you draw. This helped me draw longer as I could see more details.
• Gesture Size: For gesture drawing, screen size doesn’t matter as much. The quick pace forces you to see the whole figure, so you will naturally enlarge or reduce the size on your page.

In the next post, I’ll be sharing with you my thoughts on Week 3 and week4 exercises.

Lili Amanda