Join Emily this October for a ten-day ink challenge built on one idea: the line you commit to is the line that teaches you the most.

October

Draw with Confidence, in Ink

10 Sessions. One Line at a Time. A Medium Most People Are Too Afraid to Try.

Dates of challenge:
Weekdays - 5th - 16th October

Noon UK time. 


Available on REPLAY - JOIN ANYTIME!

The Ink Challenge

Most avoid ink for the same reason: you can't erase it. 

There's no undo, no softening a line with a rubber, no quietly correcting a mistake before anyone sees it. That permanence is exactly what makes ink so powerful to learn from, and exactly why so few people ever properly do.

This October, we're spending ten sessions removing that fear, one small, achievable drawing at a time.

No pressure to produce something polished. No elaborate scenes. Just a single object, a single principle, and thirty focused minutes to make ink feel like a medium you can trust, not one that's working against you.

The Core Challenges We're Addressing


Every session in this challenge is built to solve a specific, real problem drawers hit when they pick up a pen:

  • The fear of the first mark. Because ink is permanent, every line carries pressure to be right first time, so people hesitate, or don't start at all.


  • Value control in a single tone. Pencil habits don't transfer. You can't shade by easing off the pressure, so most people either stay too light and lose all impact, or can't build a convincing tone at all.


  • Drawing outline instead of form. Most beginners draw the edge of a thing rather than its weight, which leaves every subject looking flat no matter how carefully it's traced.

  • Copying lines instead of drawing with ink. Treating a pen like a tracing tool over pencil, rather than a mark-making language in its own right.

  • Stopping too soon, or overworking. Two opposite habits, the same root cause: not trusting your own judgement about when a drawing is actually finished.

  • Not knowing what to leave out. Trying to render everything in a reference, which is what makes ink drawings feel fussy and overworked rather than confident.

  • Never having practised the marks in isolation. Hatching, cross-hatching, stippling, and contour lines are usually attempted for the first time inside a "real" drawing, under pressure, rather than practised on their own first.

Here’s How It Works...

This isn't ten random drawings.

It's a stacked, step-by-step system, one skill layered onto the last, so that by day ten every principle is working together in a single piece.

Each session:

a short lesson, a small reference image, and thirty focused minutes.

No long sittings, no idealised free afternoon required (unless you want to.)

What You’ll Achieve during the challenge.

By the end of the challenge, you will:

 Have ten finished ink drawings, and a page of practice marks behind each one
 Understand, in your hand and not just your head, how to build volume, tone, and depth with a single value of ink
 Trust your own line enough to start a drawing without hesitating
 Have the judgement to know what to leave out of a busy reference, and why that matters more than adding detail
 Know how to recover from a "wrong" mark instead of abandoning the page
Write your awesome label here.

Who This Challenge Is For

  • Anyone who has avoided ink because the permanence feels intimidating
  • Those who are confident in pencil but want a medium with more presence and edge
  • Anyone who wants to stop relying on an eraser to feel safe on the page

No previous ink experience required. If you can commit thirty minutes, ten times, this is for you.

What's included?

Your investment includes:

Everything you need to get going.

All reference images and short video lessons across the full ten-session structure.

A supportive community.

Share your drawings, get feedback, and see how the same object looks in everyone else's hand.

A transformation you'll actually feel.

Not just ten drawings, but a working relationship with a medium most people never get past being afraid of.

If This Resonates

This challenge is one of a series run throughout the year inside the Annual Scratch to Sketch Hub, each one building on the last.

Upgrade to annual membership and you'll get access to every challenge as it lands across the year, including deeper dives into observational drawing, composition, and technique, and a full year of structured practice rather than a single reset.
Draw with Confidence, in Ink

10 Sessions. One Line at a Time.

Dates of challenge: 5th to 16th October

Noon UK time. 


Available on REPLAY - JOIN ANYTIME!