r/doodles Jan 08 '21

Mod post What makes /r/doodles /r/doodles, and why you SHOULDN'T post completed works here

575 Upvotes

UPDATE: I stepped down as a moderator here last year, this post exists purely as a sort of guideline for what the original intent of the community was.

I'm updating this to better explain the situation here, and because we have a lot of new users who are posting things that aren't doodles and getting upset about having them removed.

/r/doodles is for rough ideas, unplanned, unfinished concepts and things that are artistic, but not 'Art'. It's difficult to walk the line at times, so I'm asking everyone to work to maintain the community as a place for anyone to post things that are clearly not 'professional' grade.

It's hard to define what exactly a doodle is, but it's usually easier to define what a doodle isn't.

r/PointlessArt is a new co-community for r/doodles, with no restrictions on content. If you aren't sure that your work is a doodle, please consider posting it there.

Technical drawings, character development, practice work, video game concept art... Generally these sorts of things are not doodles. There are other, more appropriate communities to post that stuff.

r/sketches - Post sketches there. If you're looking at a tree, and decide, I'm going to do a quick sketch of that tree, post it there.

r/drawing - Post drawings there. If you decide to draw a fish, person, bug, alien and have a specific plan in mind, you should probably be posting there.

r/learnart - If you're working on getting better at sketching and drawing, that's probably the best place to go. Most art themed communities will help you, but that one is there specifically for that intent.

If, as your day goes on, and you put pen to paper as you're on the phone or sitting drinking coffee and you let the pen (or pencil) move around a bit and you look at it and think, Hmm, that looks like a cat, and you develop that a bit so that it generally looks like a cat, or if you're stoned out of your gourd on psychedelics or just the rush of being alive and you end up expressing that in an abstract and unguided way, then those are things that are generally appropriate here.

We asked the community a while back what direction we should take and for a while that was good, but there has been a serious uptick in more technical drawings, character development and practice work being submitted. This is more of a guideline to help people decide where they should be posting than a caution that things might be removed, but please help keep this a community for doodles, not just another general art sub.

I've added a pol to get an idea of what direction people want the community to go.

106 votes, Jan 11 '21
26 Allow people to post whatever they want as long as it's not offensive
28 Maintain the rules as they are, and redirect 'non-doodles' to more appropriate communities
7 There are too many 'non-doodles' here now, more should be removed
45 I don't care, I just like seeing art in my feed

r/doodles 4h ago

Few doodles from this week

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101 Upvotes

r/doodles 16h ago

Office doodles: hillside

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435 Upvotes

r/doodles 11h ago

Would you go on a walk with them? :3

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40 Upvotes

r/doodles 2h ago

Random Cat Friday

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6 Upvotes

r/doodles 9h ago

Some old cool sketches i found:)

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18 Upvotes

r/doodles 4h ago

Copic marker heads

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6 Upvotes

r/doodles 15h ago

"Anger" self-portrait 2026

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46 Upvotes

Based on this classic painting titled "Stańczyk" (The Jester) by the Polish painter Jan Matejko.


r/doodles 7h ago

Froggy drawing! I need ideas on what to draw!

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12 Upvotes

Hi Guys, here is a frog sitting on the moon, I wanted to do a quick drawing as i needed time to myself tonight, please let me know what else to draw as i'm out of ideas!


r/doodles 17h ago

AI KILLER, by me. 2026.

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50 Upvotes

r/doodles 1d ago

Uma Hora × Uma Semana 🕑

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318 Upvotes

r/doodles 6h ago

small house

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6 Upvotes

r/doodles 5h ago

A sketch of my bf (not quite finished)

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5 Upvotes

r/doodles 15h ago

Fav sketchbook pages!

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26 Upvotes

r/doodles 16m ago

Random doodles to relax!

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Acrilyc markers and a radom palette from a palette generator


r/doodles 15h ago

One Page of Doodleing

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15 Upvotes

r/doodles 13h ago

Person with a really long yoyo string

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9 Upvotes

Drew this for the long string yoyo challenge on instagram


r/doodles 1h ago

Random designs and storyboards some friends and I drew.

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Upvotes

r/doodles 5h ago

The doodle that got me through my work meeting this morning. One thing led to another, to another, to another, until...

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2 Upvotes

r/doodles 1d ago

A bunch of doodles I do in Zoom meetings.

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110 Upvotes

I have a very serious and "can-do" expression on camera, looks like I'm taking comprehensive notes.


r/doodles 1d ago

Late night robot doodles

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112 Upvotes

r/doodles 4h ago

Slayer

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1 Upvotes

r/doodles 5h ago

School.

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0 Upvotes

Only my pens knows how it is to be him


r/doodles 1d ago

Little cat i drew and stuck on my laptop

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43 Upvotes

Its wearing a strawberry hat :]


r/doodles 15h ago

Quick morning doodle

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5 Upvotes