One of my most frequently asked questions and favorite tip to share is how to make hand drawn designs scan, render, and print wonderfully. I wish I would have known this a long time ago, so I thought I would make a tutorial that shows some crucial steps to ensure that your lovely drawings that you put your heart and soul into do not look like absolute dirt after going through the scanner (a problem that can and will occur if you’re not careful!).  Eliminating potential quality loss and overall frustration, we will now be able to incorporate confident, beautiful and functional hand-drawn elements into our designs with e a s e.

The standards for beauty I will be addressing here today are 1. crispness (no gray pixels and ugly selections), 2. smoothness (to hell with you, scratchy edges!) 3. designer and program friendliness (select, move, scale, color, etc, celebrate.)

*** Before we begin, the two images above are a before and after process from an instagram photo I took JUST NOW of permanent marker. (Yes, a crummy 72 DPI cell phone image.) ***

So let’s do this! You will need: hand drawn type or imagery that you yourself create, a scanner, photoshop, determination. Now let’s begin: it’s easy! Just follow these guides:

Your drawing:

+ For optimal results, it is probably best that your drawing / typography has been done in a dark black marker or pen on white paper.  Other options that are high in contrast are fine too (as the goal is to be able to make anything work with technology..) Bottom line, contrast is borderline absolutely necessary.

Your scan:

+ Please scan in your material at a high resolution (No brainer, you say!) we always work at 600 DPI.

+ Unless you are scanning in something that has interacting colors, scan it in at grayscale. (smaller file size, easier editing.)

Process it:

+ Now that you have your art appropriately scanned in, bring it on into photoshop in a document, making sure it remains at 600 DPI (you know the drill), size of your choice.

+ Adjust the levels (CTRL or apple + L), eliminating as much gray areas as you can, achieving  a balance in contrast.

+ Now, Threshold (image > adjustments > threshold) This will make your drawing one-hundred percent black and white.

(If you zoom up, you may see that the edges are still rather jagged or scratchy. Totally fixable! This last step is what really does it.)

Final Step: (remain zoomed in)

+ Gaussian Blur your drawing until the edges are just a little blurry, without compromising too much detail.  This will get rid of all of the jagged-ness and unwanted nuances that may have remained.

+ RE-Threshold.  This again sharpens the drawing to 100 percent black and white with crisp, yet smoothed out edges.

Viola! Your drawing is now ready to enter the world as a beautiful, clean piece of existence.

Add to poster designs, sprinkle on compositions, use as a texture, or even serve as is. I hope this was helpful!

Here are some examples:

See something that inspires you? Don’t just let it pass you by! I’m sure you’re up on the times, but having a phone that takes decent pictures can be a great (and sometimes forgotten) opportunity for documenting things that look awesome to you through your daily life.  Even if phones technically don’t take the most high quality images (they are getting a lot better though, I must say), using I my iPhone (and instagram) as a means for harvesting visual material from the outside world for me to make something out of, or be inspired by, has actually made me want to keep my eyes more open.  I think there is a lot of importance in gathering inspiration from real life, as opposed to a google image search.  Go outside!

Does that wood grain on the side of that building look profoundly awesome? Do the wholes in that machine at a cafe sort of look like an eyeball pattern if I tilt my head sideways? Does a pile of glitter make for a potential good texture?

Here are some examples of what I’m getting excited about.  Past, present and future images such as these will continue to be featured on our flickr in addition to other studio related photos such as process and printed materials (not to mention, pantone matching our smoothies.)

If you’re like me, you get emotionally hyped when you naturally become aware (and can describe to yourself) a new or evolved design process.  Right now I am me and I am hyped.  Lately I have been discovering the balance between the ultra-fun and importance behind a layered process.

What do I mean by a layered process? Mostly, I have been trying to NOT stick to one medium throughout the whole process.  Really, and I mean REALLY exciting things happen when you stop yourself in your own tracks, completely switch gears, and take a new approach to what you’re working on. Quick Tip:  An important thing to remember is that it doesn’t hurt to try something out, because if something doesn’t work, nothing is permanent! You might be surprised about what you discover naturally.

A simple example of this: not constructing a whole project in just one program – drawing something in illustrator and then manipulating it in a completely different (pixel-based vs. vector-based) method.  A more involved example: Start with a hand collage, making a color copy, scanning it in at a super high resolution, make edits, print it out, draw on it, scan the drawing onto the computer, remove things, add things, cut it apart again and put it back together.

I have been trying to explore all types of layers, and it’s extremely exciting. Visual layers (different styles in one composition),  layers of time (go to sleep, come back to it),  layers of approach (using different tools and techniques), and most importantly: medium.

The answer to my self-asked question “How am I supposed to design something unique and different if I keep sticking to the same process?” starts with the obvious: Do. Something. Different. It’s that easy!

xoxo – kristen