As junior Lillian Zeng sat at her desk one evening in early October, she grabbed her trusty black ink pen and began sketching an outline of a koi fish. Her middle school cross country coach had asked her to design a koi fish tattoo — and Zeng immediately accepted the request as part of the Inktober challenge.

Determined to present a complex drawing to her coach, Zeng added an array of geometric shapes inside the fish’s body and used thick black strokes to accentuate its fins and tails. After hours of revising and perfecting her art, Zeng was excited to see her coach’s reaction when she presented her drawing.

“Instead of being just another random drawing, my koi fish piece had a bigger impact since it served an actual purpose,” Zeng said.

Inktober, a challenge for artists to create an ink drawing every day in October, started in 2009 as creator Jake Parker’s personal initiative to improve his own inking skills and develop positive drawing habits, but has since grown into a popular worldwide phenomenon. Artists post their works of art on social media accounts like Instagram and Facebook.

Several SHS students are part of the trend. This year, many have decided to take part in the hopes of improving their art skills and learning new art styles from their peers’ creations.

For junior Katrina Sung, who hopes to eventually major in art in college, devoting time for art is particularly difficult because of schoolwork. In order to ensure that she would continue making art every day, she decided to participate in the Inktober challenge.

Her inspiration stems from social media art accounts, where she saves pieces with interesting poses, different genres and various styles.

“I follow a lot of accounts because it’s fascinating to see what everyone can create,” Sung said. “Everyone has a different preference, so it’s a nice motivation for me.”

To create her art, Sung forms an image in her mind, scribbles her ideas on paper and describes her piece in a few bullet points to get the main message of the piece. Instead of starting her design with a pencil outline, Sung replicates her idea directly on paper using an ink pen.

One of Sung’s favorites is her “Westside Witches” drawing, a part of the WitchxInktober challenge that circulated the art community during the month of October. Sung typically creates realist art, taking after the French art movement that began in the 1850s, but this specific prompt encouraged her to step outside of her comfort zone.

“I really wanted to add some variety in my artwork and potentially develop a new style that I’m interested in,” she said.

For senior Emily Li, now a student in Art 4 Honors, Inktober is a way to relax during the stressful college application process and explore various styles of art. Because so many school-related assignments have specific prompts to follow, Li enjoys how open-ended Inktober is.

“Instead of feeling like a burden, Inktober is a creative outlet for me,” Li said. “There aren’t any strict rules so it creates a platform of opportunities for artists to showcase their inspirations.”

Though Inktober is carefree and allows artists freedom with their creations, it provides a list of prompts for all 31 days as inspiration. Prompts range from “fast” on Day One to “tree” on Day 14 to “one dozen” on Day 24.

On the third day of Inktober, Li decided to follow the prompt for that day: “collect.” As soon as she read the word, she immediately connected it with memories and things in the past.

Li took her imagination to the next level as she started out coloring an entire page black to represent time. She then used a gold marker to draw frame-like rectangles to represent memories.

“That drawing really related to me,” Li said. “To me, pictures in frames are a way to collect memories, no matter how far away they seem.”

Though Inktober is a challenge for students to make time each day to create a piece of art, it encourages students to express their feelings in a way outside of the classroom.

“Inktober is an opportunity for artists to demonstrate their fundamental art skills and creativity while expressing their thoughts and opinions through their artwork,” Sung said. “It brings the art community together and reminds everyone that art is still a valuable aspect of society and always will be.”