Many learning artists believe that improving their drawing skills is about following tutorials. While learning how to draw a cat or a plant through step-by-step instructions can be helpful, it doesn’t necessarily teach you how to observe and accurately represent any cat or plant you see in real life. 

Tutorials focused on replication help in a limited way, but they don’t build the essential skill of observation, which is fundamental to developing strong drawing abilities.

Hey there! 👋 I’m Carrie. Here on Artist Strong, I help self-taught artists draw or paint anything they want. To date, thousands have joined the community.

👉🏽👉🏽👉🏽 If you feel like gaps in your learning hold you back from making your best art, sign up and watch my workshop, “How to Create Art from Your Imagination.” It’s completely free, and the link is in the description below.

The real key to improving your drawing skills lies in training your eyes to see the level of detail and information necessary to depict subjects realistically. This process isn’t just about looking harder; it’s about rewiring your brain to notice what it previously overlooked.

Our brains filter out an overwhelming amount of visual data every day to help us focus on what’s important for daily functioning. Unfortunately, that means much of the detail crucial for artists is easily ignored, unless we train ourselves to see it consistently.

The Science Behind Learning to See

Training your eyes to see more details takes time because it involves forming and strengthening new neural pathways in the brain. Anders Ericsson, a psychologist known for his research into expertise, found that developing high-level skills requires deliberate practice. His studies, which form the foundation of the “10,000-hour rule” (though often misinterpreted), emphasize that expert-level ability isn’t just about time spent practicing, it’s about how you practice.

Ericsson identified five key elements essential to mastering any skill:

1. Deliberate Practice – Engaging in highly focused and structured practice designed to push you beyond your comfort zone.
2. Immediate Feedback – Receiving regular, constructive feedback from a knowledgeable mentor or coach.
3. Mental Representations – Developing an internal visualization of what you want to achieve before executing it.
4. Repetition with Refinement – Repeating a task while making incremental improvements, rather than just repeating for the sake of practice.
5. A Growth Mindset – Understanding that effort and strategy, rather than innate talent, are the keys to improvement.

For artists, this means that casually sketching for hours without intention will not be as effective as targeted practice that challenges and refines your observational skills.

The Role of Discomfort in Learning

A crucial aspect of skill development is the willingness to embrace discomfort. Learning should feel slightly challenging: this “sweet spot” of discomfort is where the most growth happens. If a task is too easy, you aren’t improving; if it’s too difficult, you may become frustrated and discouraged.

However, this type of focused, intense learning is mentally taxing. You only have so much stamina to engage in deep, uncomfortable practice before exhaustion sets in. Short, deliberate sessions, perhaps 20 to 30 minutes of targeted training, are far more effective than forcing yourself to sit and draw for hours without direction.

Drawing Warm-Ups: Your Artistic Scales

Musicians don’t start playing a complex piece without first warming up. Scales, arpeggios, and technical exercises prepare them for the more demanding work ahead. Similarly, artists can create their own version of “warm-ups” to build skills efficiently.

What should these warm-ups look like? It depends on your strengths and weaknesses. Take time to reflect on where you feel most and least confident in your skills. Ask yourself:

• Do I struggle with proportions?
• Am I able to capture value and shading accurately?
• Are my lines too stiff or hesitant?

Once you’ve identified areas for growth, design exercises that specifically target those weaknesses. Some possible warm-ups include:

• Blind contour drawing to improve hand-eye coordination.
• Gesture drawing to capture movement and form quickly.
• Value studies using only black and white to train your eye in seeing light and shadow.
• Negative space drawing to strengthen compositional awareness.

To support this kind of specific, focused learning I’ve created Sharpen Your Skills: Understanding Value to help those of you struggling with shades/tones complete a focused practice activity you can use again and again to train your eyes to better observe changes in value. This absolutely helps bring work to life, especially those of you working to achieve a level of realism in your work.

As a thank you for watching this, you can grab that lesson for only $37 with the code YouTube at checkout. I’ll be sure to link it here and below.

The Importance of Feedback and Mentorship

One of Ericsson’s key findings is that experts have coaches or mentors who provide valuable feedback. No matter how advanced someone is in their field, they rely on outside perspectives to refine their skills.

Artists often reach a point where they can no longer objectively evaluate their own work. This is where mentorship, whether through an instructor, peer critiques, or even an online community, becomes invaluable. A skilled mentor can pinpoint areas of improvement that you may not notice and suggest strategies to fast-track your progress.

Have you ever worked on a drawing and felt something was off but couldn’t figure out what? That’s when a mentor’s trained eye can help you see what’s missing or what needs adjusting. Regular feedback accelerates your learning and prevents you from developing bad habits that can be difficult to unlearn later.

Growth Aligned with Your Goals

Ericsson’s research focuses on what it takes to be the best in the world, but you don’t have to aim for world-class mastery to benefit from these strategies. The goal is to enjoy your art and feel confident in your creative abilities.

Ask yourself: What strategies will help me grow while aligning with my values and the life I want to lead? Do you want to draw realistically? Do you want to loosen up your style? Do you want to improve your observational skills for urban sketching? Your goals should shape how you apply these principles in your practice.

I’d love you to start acknowledging what next steps you can take to help you make the art you dream of making. I’m here to cheer you on.

Conclusion: Take Action

By training yourself to see, embracing deliberate practice, welcoming discomfort, using targeted warm-ups, and seeking mentorship, you’ll create a roadmap for steady and lasting improvement. Instead of relying on one-off tutorials that teach you how to draw a specific image, you’ll develop the skills to confidently draw anything you observe.

Now it’s time to take action. Pick one aspect of your drawing practice that needs improvement and commit to a focused, deliberate practice session. Set a timer for 20 minutes and challenge yourself with an uncomfortable but targeted exercise. Share your progress with a mentor or artist community for feedback.

What’s the next step you’ll take to level up your drawing skills today?

As always, thanks so much for watching. Please like and subscribe if you enjoyed today’s video.

Remember: proudly call yourself an artist.

Together we are Artist Strong.