Practice · the Americas
Canada
How to draw the flag of Canada
The flag of Canada is a white square between two red vertical bands, with a red maple leaf at the centre.
Colours used
- red —
#d80621 - white —
#ffffff
You do not need to match these hex values exactly. Scoring allows a generous margin on shade because nobody remembers the precise navy of a flag; what it does not forgive is putting the right colour in the wrong place.
How to draw it well
The bands run vertically, which is exactly where people slip: it is easy to draw the right three colours in the right order and still place them as horizontal stripes. Fix the orientation in your head first, then fill from the hoist (left) outwards.
Nobody draws the eleven points of the maple leaf accurately from memory, and you do not need to: scoring looks at the red mass in the centre of the white band. Get the leaf roughly the right size and centred, and the white band flanked by two red bars of equal width.
- Fill the whole canvas with the background or the first stripe — an unpainted margin costs you points.
- Lay in the remaining bands with the rectangle tool, keeping the divisions level.
- Add the central detail last, checking its size against the height of the flag.
- Press Check my flag to see your drawing next to the real one.
Where people lose points on this flag
- Leaving a white margin around the edge of the canvas. Unpainted area is scored as wrong colour, so fill right to the borders.
Proportions
Canada flies its flag at 2:1 — noticeably wider than the 3:2 most countries use, so leave room. The drawing canvas is a fixed shape and scoring compares regions rather than absolute measurements, so you do not need to reproduce the ratio exactly; what matters is that the internal divisions land in the right relative places.