Practice · Oceania
New Zealand
How to draw the flag of New Zealand
The flag of New Zealand is a navy blue field with the Union Jack in the canton and four red, white-edged stars of the Southern Cross in the fly.
Colours used
- navy blue —
#012169 - red —
#c8102e
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.
Flags it gets confused with
New Zealand belongs to the Union Jack cantons. The canton is identical; the star arrangement in the fly is what you are actually being tested on. The others in this group are Australia and United Kingdom.
How to draw it well
There are four star groups to place. Get their arrangement right before worrying about the points — scoring reads the pattern of coloured areas, so a cluster in the correct position beats beautifully drawn stars in the wrong one.
The Union Jack in the canton is the fiddliest part and also the part people over-invest in. Block in the navy field and the canton first, add the two diagonals and the upright cross roughly, then spend your remaining effort on the stars in the fly — that is where this flag differs from its neighbours.
- 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
- Drawing a neighbour by mistake — Australia and United Kingdom share this layout.
- Leaving a white margin around the edge of the canvas. Unpainted area is scored as wrong colour, so fill right to the borders.
Proportions
New Zealand 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.