Okay, so I decided to try drawing a stop sign today. Just felt like doing something simple, you know?
Getting Started
First thing I did was hunt down some paper. Didn’t need anything special, just grabbed a sheet from the printer tray. Then I needed something to draw with. Found a regular pencil, number 2 I think, lying around. And an eraser, definitely needed an eraser because I knew I’d mess up.
Drawing the Shape
Alright, the shape. It’s an octagon, right? Eight sides. Sounds straightforward, but getting it even is kinda tricky. I didn’t bother with rulers or anything fancy. Too much hassle. I just started sketching.
My first attempt was rough. I tried drawing a square first, then cutting off the corners. Looked wonky. One side was way longer than the others. So, I erased it. Second try, I went slower. Eyeballed the sides more carefully. Tried to make those angled corner cuts about the same size. It wasn’t perfect, like machine-cut perfect, but it looked like an octagon. You could tell what it was supposed to be. That’s the main thing.
Adding the Details
Once I had the basic octagon shape down, I made the lines a bit darker, more permanent. Felt better about it then. Next up, the border. Stop signs have that white border inside the red. So I drew another, smaller octagon inside the first one. Again, just eyeballing the distance. Kept it roughly parallel to the outer edge. Close enough.
Then came the letters. STOP. Big, blocky letters. Centered them as best I could. Started with the ‘S’, then the ‘T’, ‘O’, ‘P’. Had to make sure they filled the space inside the border but didn’t touch it. Spacing them out evenly was another little challenge. My ‘O’ looked a bit squished at first, so I erased and redid that part. Looks much better now.
Coloring It In
Last step: color. Needed red. Rummaged through my kid’s crayon box. Found a decent red crayon. Not too bright, not too dark. Perfect. Carefully colored in the main part of the sign, staying inside the outer octagon but outside the inner border and the letters. Tried to keep the crayon strokes going in the same direction, mostly. Makes it look a bit neater, I think. Left the border and the letters white, just like the real thing.
Final Thoughts
And that was pretty much it. Stood back and looked at it. Yeah, it’s clearly a stop sign. Maybe not perfectly symmetrical, lines aren’t ruler-straight, but it has that feel. Took maybe 15 minutes total? A simple little drawing exercise. Kinda satisfying, actually, taking something you see every day and just drawing it yourself.
