how to turn a drawing into a vector photoshop

Plow your sketches into digital vector images.

Turn Your Sketches & Doodles Into Vector Art – I love to doodle and honestly, I don't do information technology enough. On the list of everything I have to do in my life, doodling ranks pretty low (shocking, I know) but at that place'due south something about doodling… it helps me relax, focus and simply exist in the moment. Fortunately, from fourth dimension to time in my task, I demand to draw something and turn it into a vector image. I wanted to share this technique with you then that you can turn your works of art into astonishing vector graphics likewise. This tutorial requires a scanner, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator (I use CS6).

Create the sketches that you lot'd like to convert into digital vector art. I similar to use Pigma Micron pens because they come in various thicknesses, are a rich black colour and they write beautifully but use whatever y'all prefer. I too like to use tracing newspaper to sketch on – it's cheap and there'south a smooth quality to the paper that'due south actually nice.
Browse your sketches with a flatbed scanner. Scan at a high resolution of at least 400 dpi while using the greyscale setting.
Open your scanned sketch into Photoshop and brand sure your file is in the RGB colour mode.
Go to IMAGE > ADJUSTMENTS > SELECTIVE COLOUR. Toggle the colour to WHITE and using the slider, move to -100% black with the Accented radio button clicked on. Then toggle to Blackness and using the slider, mover to 100% blackness.
Go to Paradigm > ADJUSTMENTS > CURVES. Grab the tiny black square at the tiptop correct of the graph and slide it over slightly towards the left (not down at all) so catch the tiny black foursquare at the lesser left of the graph and move information technology slightly to the right. You'll have to eyeball this a flake and see what looks best. The goal here is to make the white every bit white as possible without washing out whatever black while making the black very nighttime without turning any of the white to grey.There are many ways of adjusting colours in Photoshop also SELECTIVE Color and CURVES. You tin can also use BRIGHTNESS/SHADOWS as well as LEVELS to attain your desired outcome. Feel free to utilize what y'all're comfortable with.
In one case y'all're satisfied with the color settings, crop your folio to select the part of the image you want for your design. You lot may too bring in the entire page into Illustrator if you take multiple sketches, convert them all together and so just selection out the selections y'all're after… whatever works all-time for you lot. Save your image.
Select the unabridged image and copy or apply CTRL+C then open a new page in Illustrator and paste in your sketch onto the sheet. Feel free to enlarge the sketch slightly (think to hold SHIFT + ALT to constrain the proportions).
Select your image using the Choice tool (black arrow) and yous'll find that in the properties bar at the summit, a Live TRACE button volition announced (or Epitome TRACE depending on which version you have). Click on the LIVE TRACE or Epitome TRACE button. (If you're not super happy with the results, you tin click on the white arrow to the left of the IMAGE TRACE button and play around with the various settings – I notice the Black and White Logo setting can piece of work well also). Once you've clicked the LIVE TRACE or IMAGE TRACE push you'll detect that it now says Aggrandize. With your image still selected, click on the EXPAND push.
With the prototype selected, right click your mouse and toggle down to UNGROUP and click on it. Now, click on a white area of the drawing so that information technology's selected and and so become to SELECT > SAME > FILL COLOUR and all the white in your image will be selected, hit the DELETE push. You lot want to become rid of all the white sections of your image.
Select all the black items on the canvas, correct click your mouse and toggle down and click on group. Now your sketch is all grouped together. (Don't carp with this step if you'd like to move the various elements of the prototype effectually on the page or change them individually).
At this point you tin get creative, add colour and use the vector on meridian of backgrounds, photos, etc. Utilize your vector to create or enhance your very own work or art.

Gratuitous printable

Feel free to download this printable here. Savor!