How best to record/digitize your sketches?

Tools
#1

So, when you’ve done a sketch or twenty on paper, and you want to keep them and share them, what works best: scanner, photos with phone? Into any particular program/place (e.g. Evernote, etc.)

Thanks!

#2

We’ve just started using Evernote at UX Mastery (literally last week, so I don’t yet have an opinion, but will keep you updated).

#3

Hawk—Are you taking photos of sketches…or using a scanner? Thanks!

#4

Matt is our sketcher and I think he usually photographs them. He’s away at UXNZ right now but I’ll ping him when he’s back and pull him into this conversation.

#5

Thanks. Photos make sense since we all have phones with us.

#6

Hi Doug. If I’m at a conference and sketchnoting the presentations and am keen to get those sketches onto Twitter in real time so that they contribute to the conference back channel, I use my phone. I used to use the free CamScanner app for iPhone, as it does a great job of applying a filter to whiten the whites, darken the blacks, and adjust any distortion in the framing of the image that you photograph. However I recently uninstalled the app as it was revealed that it contained some code that left the phone vulnerable to a remote attack. So I’m on the hunt for a replacement phone scanning app (there are probably a dozen out there, I just haven’t looked yet). For the conference that I attended this week, I just used the standard camera app: https://twitter.com/mattymcg/media

However I always scan my sketches using a flat bed scanner when I get home from the conference. The phone camera is OK but there’s no substitute for a high res flat bed scan of your image, especially if it’s going to be shown to a client or something.

In terms of where I scan them to, I don’t use anything fancy like Evernote or Adobe Bridge. I just have a methodical naming convention for the folders that I store files in, so that’s where they go.

Hope that’s helpful! :slight_smile:

#7

Matt—Thank you for the great real world examples. :slight_smile:

#8

Flatbed scanner all the way! I have an A3 size one that is fantastic! :slight_smile:

#9

scanner can be nice, cellphone if you are on the go :wink:

#10

An update @visualbug: I bought an iPad Pro with the Apple Pencil stylus, and have been doing lots of sketching using the Procreate app. I’m really enjoying this combo, and as a bonus it’s very easy to spit out an Instant Replay video of your sketch coming to life. Examples here: https://twitter.com/sketchvideosau