Draw a Pig From Memory

The pig is on screen for a couple of seconds, then it is gone and the canvas is empty. You draw it back from memory - the round head, the two ears folding forward at the top, the small eyes, and the big oval snout with its two nostrils. Your line is scored against the target and laid over it afterwards, so you can see which parts you kept and which ones drifted.

Everything about a pig hangs on the snout. It is bigger than it feels and it sits lower on the face than memory puts it, so the most common miss is a neat small oval floating in the middle of the head. The ears are the other one: they fold forward as triangles rather than standing up as points, and people who remember them as points draw a cat instead.

This is a practice round: played and scored for real, and it changes nothing in your game - no coins, no best score, no unlocks - so you can take it as often as you like, whether or not you have reached Animals in the Shape Challenge.

How the scorer reads a pig

The pig is eight separate parts, each given a share of the 128 comparison points in proportion to how much line it has. The head outline carries 42%, the two ears 27% and the snout with its nostrils 24% - while the eyes, the part people usually take most care over, are only 8%.

The snout is a quarter of the drawing on its own. When it is the wrong size or in the wrong place it becomes the worst-matching tenth of the attempt - and the scorer's contour check holds the whole shape-match score to that tenth.

Each part's share of the line, and of the scorer's comparison points
Part	Share of the line	Comparison points
Head outline	42%	53
Ears	27%	34
Snout and nostrils	24%	31
Eyes	8%	10

What a small, high snout costs

Drawn with a slight, even wobble and nothing else wrong, the pig scores 88. Shrink the snout by 40% and lift it towards the eyes - the way memory tends to redraw it - and the same pig scores 61. Shape match falls from 86 to 47, and coverage from 98 to 91.

The pig target in grey with a freehand pig drawn over it in blue, its snout visibly smaller and higher on the face than the target's — Snout 40% smaller and higher on the face, over the target. Scored by the game's own scorer: 61 / 100.

Scored by the game's own scorer, out of 100
Attempt	Total	Shape	Coverage	Smoothness	Scale
The same hand, no mistake	88	86	98	66	99
Snout drawn 40% smaller and higher on the face	61	47	91	71	99

Three drills for the pig

Half the head. Draw the head, then the snout as an oval exactly half the head's width and about a third of its height. It will feel too big; it is not.
Low on the face. Put the snout's centre about two-thirds of the way down the head, so its lower edge ends close to the chin rather than in the middle of the face.
Ears to the edges. The ear tips lean outwards until they line up with the widest points of the head, and rise above it by about a quarter of the head's height. Draw them leaning, not straight up.

Questions people ask

What happens after the shape disappears?: You draw on a blank canvas with no guide underneath, in one attempt. The outline comes back afterwards, laid over your drawing so you can see the difference.
How is my score worked out?: Shape match, coverage, smoothness and scale, combined into one score shown with a star rating and a tip. Shape match counts for the most, at 70%.
Can I play with other people?: Two ways. 2 Players passes one device back and forth, alternating who draws first each round. Multiplayer opens a live room for 2–8 players over 5, 10 or 15 rounds, joined with a six-character code.
How many shapes are there?: 276 shapes across 12 categories, from geometry and letters to animals, food and fantasy.

Browse Every Shape Challenge →

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