September Icon Prompts

Build visual vocabulary with a month of back-to-school-themed icon practice in your illustrated journal!

I’ve talked before about doing “icon practice” in my illustrated journal. I try to fit in a bit of icon practice each week as part of my Illustrate Your Week project. It’s good practice and adds a bit of whimsy.

The goal of icon practice (which sometimes appears in the weekly prompt set) is to help build a visual vocabulary you can call upon to add simple illustrations (vs full-blown drawings) in your illustrated journal or sketchnotes.

As someone with almost zero visualization skills, I often find that I can’t sort out how to draw even a seemingly simple object from my head. I need a reference. It’s frustrating, and it’s often really confusing. I’m a smart person. I feel like I should be able to reasonably draw an apple or a chair or a paper airplane without a reference, but people with visualization issues often struggle with these seemingly simple drawings.

Being unable to draw simple objects on demand can be a real hindrance when keeping an illustrated journal.

When it comes to keeping an illustrated journal, simple icons and visual signifiers can help balance and supplement the text. This balance is part of what makes an illustrated journal something different than a sketchbook or a traditional written journal. But integrating icons and simple illustrations can feel out of reach if the icons are not readily accessible in your head.

Most sketchnote people recommend doing icon practice. While I’m not sure that this practice will result in an on-demand visual vocabulary (if you struggle with visualization), I have found the practice to be a lot of fun. I enjoy fitting in icons week to week in the margins of my pages.

In part, this practice encourages me to try out objects in a variety of styles. The goal, of course, is to sort out ways of drawing signifiers and icons that fit my visual voice and aesthetic. While there are thousands of icon sets online, when you draw your icons, they should look like you and fit your line. Practicing by drawing a dozen different ice cream cones, for instance, can be a good way to familiarize yourself with the basic contours of the object. Drawing a dozen, not just one, also lets you explore different angles, styles, and shapes.

I encourage this practice year-round, but with back-to-school season upon us, I thought a themed set for the month of September might be fun.

You can approach using this prompt set in any way you want. You can work the practice directly into your illustrated journal or dedicate separate pages to your icon practice. (You can always “tip” loose pages or index cards in if you want to add the record to your sketchbook.)

You can do them all, or you can do a few. You can decide you want to draw three of each or five or just one. It’s your practice! It’s your visual library!

The File

The linked file is a simple 2-page pdf. You can print it, view it on your device, or add it to a tool like GoodNotes so that you can annotate it.

The first page has 30 “things” to draw—30 simple and familiar “back-to-school”-themed icons to practice. The second page has a series of empty boxes. You can choose your own adventure!

• You might choose to draw your icons directly into these from the start.

• Or, you might want to draw the icons elsewhere (like in your sketchbook or journal) throughout the month. Then, at the end of the month, you could use the pre-printed grid as a self-test. After practicing some of these throughout the month, can you draw these objects from memory?

• Or, at the end of the month, you might draw one version from your practice pages into each block, creating a handy reference page you can use later when you decide you want to draw a calculator, for example. Instead of heading to the Noun Project, you will be able to look at your own page of icons for reference. (The Noun Project can be a great resource when you want to find examples of how an object can be drawn in simplified form.)

Have fun! I hope you’ll share your set at the end of the month and your thoughts on the process.

How Do You Get the Prompts?

This month’s download is automatically available below to all paid subscribers of Illustrated Life.

If you are someone who already uses the #illustrateyourweek prompts and shares your work at Instagram, I will email you the pdf upon request. (You won’t be able to comment on this post, but you can comment on another post or DM me at Instagram. Be sure to supply an email address. Please note that receiving the file won’t be instantaneous.)

(No, this is not a good reason to upgrade your subscription. Really. It’s not that special. You can always make your own list of back-to-school words and draw them.)

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