How To Scan Drawing Into Your Computer

Are you an illustrator only beginning your adventure into creating digital art? Sometimes it's tough to know when a sketch is ready to go full-blown digital and how to make it and then, quickly and painlessly. Fearfulness non, it's very simple to modify the sketch you lot've been groovin' on into a digital illustration in four simple steps. FINE designer, Michelle, is hither to have you through them.

Step 1: Prep it
If your sketch is in pencil, draw over it with a pen to provide dissimilarity. This saves time and prevents headaches equally nosotros motility through the rest of the process.

Pace 2: Scan it
At present that you lot have your illustration traced in pen, information technology's time to take information technology into the digital realm via a little magic machine called the scanner. Information technology'south important to prepare upward the scan correctly. The most of import detail is setting the resolution for at least 600 dpi. Call up, y'all tin can always calibration down but you can never scale up.

Hither's a screenshot for how I set mine upwardly:

screen shot of scan set up

Step 3: 'Shop it
What a beautiful scan you have! Now, it's ready for a fiddling TLC from the male monarch of image manipulation, Photoshop. Fifty-fifty though the drawing already has contrast, we actually demand the black to be as black as possible and the white to be as white as possible.

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At this point, y'all will conform the dissimilarity by playing effectually with the adjustment layers. I tend to stick with just the essentials: Black & White, effulgence/contrast, and exposure (usually in this order). Often, that'due south plenty, merely each illustration is a unique snowflake so experiment to get what you want.

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This is also the time to make clean up your drawing if y'all have any devious ink or pencil lines. I like to add an additional layer on meridian and use the brush tool to add and decrease from the illustration if need be.

Step 4: Isolate information technology
Tadah! Isn't it beautiful? At present, depending on what you lot're trying to do with your sketch, it can be really helpful to isolate the blacks and turn the background transparent.

Numero 4 To do this, y'all go to Select > Color Range and utilise the eyedropper tool to select the black of your drawing (simply click in the black).

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Now you lot take a selection of just the blackness line art, hooray!

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Y'all tin use this selection to add a fill so your lines are even more clean and night. You now accept your black line drawing isolated and you tin can play with it yet you want!

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I hope this helps those of you in demand to go a handle on turning your sketch into digital artwork. Accept fun!

Note: Photoshop and Illustrator are peachy and mighty tools and in that location are numerous strategies to get the same result. This is simply the most useful and easy way I've come up upwardly with. At that place are even apps like Adobe Shapes that can turn your sketch into a vector just by taking a picture of it with your phone. The method I've shared is only my favorite and reliably produces a high-quality illustration every time. What other strategies take you tried? Share!