How to Fill Your Sketchbook: A Quick Guide

When you buy yourself a new sketchbook, you’ll at first be intrigued by the weight and beauty of it. Perhaps you bought one with leather binding? Maybe a nice cover in wild colors and designs? The paper feels nice and stocky as you rifle through it, possibly?

But then that feeling begins to set in… Maybe it’s a hundred pages, maybe it’s thirty pages, or heck, maybe it’s seven hundred pages, but now you realize that you are faced with the enormous task of drawing in each and every one… It’s a fun but dreadful prospect. Fun because you love to draw, of course. But dreadful because you haven’t the foggiest idea how you’re going to fill that beautiful sketchbook you just bought yourself.

Maybe this article will help ease your new sketchbook dread. Read on, and find out!

Here are a few quick tips on how you can get the most out of your sketchbook.

1.) Stick with it! I know this seems like too obvious a point to make, but it bears reiterating as many times over as needed. You just made a commitment, and you will have to honor that commitment if you are serious about your art. It gets easier as you keep going, but that’s what you’ll have to do. This brings me to the next point, which is…

2.) Not all your sketchbook pages will be beautiful. If you want to make pristine, beautiful artwork, then you can reasonably expect it from your finished portfolio pieces, but not from your sketchbook. Your sketchbook is really more of a creative playground, and that means experimentation. When you experiment, things are bound to go haywire some of the time. I’m definitely not trying to suggest that you scribble all over it and call it a day, but I am suggesting that you don’t have to sweat the small stuff. If you get something wrong, it’s better to fail in a sketchbook than on a finished piece. And speaking of finished pieces…

3.) You can get some of the most awesome ideas for finished pieces in your sketchbook. This is really more of a benefit than a tip, but what I’m suggesting here is that you can and should use your sketchbook to draw a basic layout for whatever idea you have for a larger scale portfolio piece. If you don’t like the angle, or maybe you want to change some details here and there, your sketchbook is a perfect place to work out those kinks. As a general rule, you can expect to go through several pages of your sketchbook figuring out the right composition, layout, features, lighting, etc.

By the way, if you want more ideas to jump start your creativity, I’d like to briefly tell you about my free e-book: 29 Wild, Weird, and Wacky Drawing Prompts. You can get it by signing up here, and you’ll also get regular updates on my art, animation, illustration, etc. I promise to only send you the good stuff, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

4.) Is there anything about your art that you suck at? Practice it in your sketchbook! Remember what I said in point number 2 about not every page being a beautiful and pristine work of art? Well, this definitely applies here. Using myself as an example, my hand lettering needs improvement, so I’ve been taking the time to hone that skill using my sketchbook. In your case, it may be something different. Maybe you want to learn hands or facial features? Or maybe some complex perspective? Your sketchbook is your place to practice these elements, since nobody else will see (unless you want to show them, of course,) and will therefore not judge.

5.) If you’re planning a larger project, your sketchbook will help you plan it from start to finish. If, like me, you’re also an animator, your sketchbook’s potential use in character design, color palette selection, and even storyboarding, is equal to none! This will also hold true if you are drawing your own comic book, or illustrating a larger project where you have to make a plan and be consistent. It could be a brand identity for a client, or it could be a set of illustrations for a kids’ book. And the list goes on…

As we have just explored, the sky is the limit for how you use your sketchbook, and I would recommend that you put some or all of these tips into practice while working with it. With time, you’ll find that you’re never at a loss for how to fill your sketchbook. And right there, your sketchbook will no longer scare you, but will be your best friend forever…