Vectorize your sketches: with your iPad

1. Hello: Hi, I'm Kirsty from PRC-Saltillo designs. I'm here today to teach to you how to vectorize your art by just using your iPad. Nothing too fancy, nothing too flash. Just a simple iPad Pro with an Apple pencil using Adobe Capture and Adobe Illustrator. Throughout my class, I'll run through from start to finish how I achieve this. By hand drawing my elements to taking a photo through Adobe Capture, then importing it into Adobe Illustrator, and then finally the fun part and vectorizing my work. If you have any questions or queries, feel free to put a little question in the discussions. The end of this class, I would love to be able to see the new skill that you've taken on while taking my class, please upload them to the project section. It'd be great to be able to see what you've created and how my classes being able to help you throughout your journey and creating. So let's proceed and starting the first module. 2. Tools: To get started in my class, the one thing that we're going to need is some drawing motifs to be able to scan then vectorize. To complete this class, I have a few tools laid out which is just wanted to show you what I'll be using throughout this class. I'll also note them in the description section. So you can reference to yourself if you wanted to purchase these items for taking the class, or if just for reference and the track you'd like to get them. As a description says, I'll be using my iPad Pro with Apple pencil. On here. I have my Adobe Illustrator software already installed in it, along with Adobe Capture, which we're going to utilize in scanning the artwork into our iPad so that we can then put it into Adobe Illustrator. For my class, I'm going to be using just a standard A4 notebook. Nothing too fancy. It's about 110 GSM. Not ideal for watercolor or anything like that. But for my sketch work, it's perfect and notebook for wanting to be using today. Throughout this drawing section of my class, I have for drawing items that I'll be utilizing. One is just in a standard academy sketching HB pencil. Nothing too fancy or flash about this. Just, it's mainly for me to get a real baseline all of the design I'm going with because then the truck I will be erasing this and then going over with one of the pens a half. Now for the pens, I have three different versions. Now, I have the 0.8 you depends which I do really love. I've never had a bad issue with these. And they just draw very honestly when it comes to doing any of my sketch working, creating my motifs by hand. I have two here I will be utilizing within this class. One is 8.81 is a 0.3. The reason I really like these is the nibs are very nicely rounded. So find the glider the nicely on the paper. I've chosen 0.8.3 because then I get a good differential difference between the two when I actually sketch with them, I tend to use a smaller nib if I'm going to be using very fine detail. And then point EGD for obviously the larger things like stems, outlines of leaves, that sort of thing. One thing to note when you're using the pens is that you really have to make sure there's enough element of the pending on your paper so that when you do vectorize, especially when you scan and then you'd put it into Illustrator there. There's enough there for the computer to pick up, which I'll go through within the drawing section of my class. Last but not least, all my pens. I have a Tombow. It's water-based, so I don't use it with any of my watercolors, but I really love that. It has two different sides. We have a brush stroke. Then on the other, it's just a simple rounded end, which is really just a bigger version of the quantum state. Just really nice see glides and it's just a pen favor of mine. Then the only other thing I've got here is my eraser. I used to use a white eraser, just a standard thing that obviously taught at school. And I thought I'd try one of these black ones and never looked back. The one thing with the white ones I really like because you have to give them a good clean before you do raise on your paper. Whereas these have never had that issue. I have not looked back. That's a selection of tools I'll be utilizing for drawing within my class today. Any of these items that you're interested in getting for yourself, please check out the description section. And even in the project resources will have a list of the items I'll be utilizing threat my class. 3. Drawing: To get started in my class, the one thing that we're going to need is some drawing motifs to be able to scan then vectorize. Now before I start drawing my hand-drawn motifs, the one thing I'm just going to make sure is that when I'm sketching, I really want to make sure that I'm not pressing too Tegea on the paper. The reason for this is I am going to outline with one of my pens. But I will be looking to erase any of the outlines that I may not exactly go over with the pen. So we're really using the pencil as a guide for when we finished with the pencil, will then trace with the pen. And then at the very end, arrays any markings left from the pencil so that it doesn't confuse or really mess up your scan or what Adobe Illustrator really finds or tries to read when it tries to vectorize, it makes sure that you just lightly enough that you were able to see for yourself to trace. But at the end we will be erasing them out. So don't go too heavy. I'm just gonna go ahead and start sketching and feel free just to copy as I go or just do your motifs as you follow. Now I've just created a range of different motifs, choosing different styles, different textures. Now what I'm going to do now is I'm just going to go through my whole entire design and I'm going to utilize the three different pens. I have. Mainly going to plan out that for the stems items that I wanted to be more dominant, I'm going to be using this thicker 0.8 or the Tombow. Then for the more finer details like the dots, spots, that sort of thing, I'm gonna be using the 0.3. Now, I'm going to try and aim to be on top of all my pencil work. But any parts that I'm going to miss or by Excellent, I accidentally miss. I'm going to be erasing them out so that when we come to scan, it's not going to be picking up enough pencil work. So I'm just going to go ahead and do that now. Now I've outlined mine time motifs. I'm not going to go ahead and erase any pencil marks that I can currently see within my paper. So that all it should be evident on there is mod pan outlined motifs. Now erase that all minorities and are ready to be scanned. 4. Capturing: To proceed with us to proceeding capturing the elements from my notebook into my iPad. The first thing I'm going to do is I am going to shut off the light to my studio, mainly to stop any reflections from my light above my head reflecting on the screen here. I'm just going to do that now. The first thing for us to do is to go into Adobe Capture. This is the logo here. This is my library of things that I've touched and worked on the past. Yours will look completely different, so don't worry here. The next thing that I want us to do is to go to the camera, which is on the bottom left here on your iPad. Just click on the camera. Straightaway. When I open mine, it takes me to shapes because that's the main one I use. If this is the first time that you have used capture, you may find it opens you up and materials or type or one of these other ones on the right. But don't stress, just make sure you click on shapes. Now for me, I'm just going to move my notebook sort of the top-left section of the screen. Mainly because my iPad camera is on the top left. I'm just having to make sure that it's directly underneath there. If you're doing this class as I do it, just make sure that you've got all your elements when you do this for all your elements are within the screen, within the camera. You can do this and turn your iPad that way. But just because I'm actually recording for this class, I'm just gonna leave it that way round that landscape view. Now, the next thing I do, which is actually in a way, quick way to do it. For me, for the way it captures my elements, is an amazing way to do it. So I'm gonna stick with what I know. On the left here you've got these different tools, the little magic wand tool. Just when you press on that, what that does is it literally freezes the page and gathers the information that's on there. Now for me, I don't need anything on the left. I just need these elements. I'm quite happy what it's collected. So what I'm gonna do is I am just going to select the magic wand off. Just switch it back on again just to see what it's gathering. Isn't really much difference on my elements apart from the background. So I'm gonna leave it off. This bar allows you to gather in the excess black, the dark shades. I'm just going to reduce it slightly. Apart from that, I'm quite happy with that. So I'm just going to click with Tick button. Now. What I'm gonna do now is I'm just going to get move out then my notebook because I don't need that anymore. I'm just going to drop the iPad down. The next thing I'm going to do is I'm just going to rechange my screen. I can bring you in closer. You don't miss anything. I'm just going to turn my light back on just so that you can see around the screen. Grab my pencil. Now. I'm just gonna run through the different things that Refine, crop and smooth do with refine, were given the option of erasing anything. So arrays, I just do an example. I can get rid of anything around here, which is actually really good. Click Done here. You also have the option of drawing as well. And then obviously undo here. I haven't erased all of this because I'm gonna go to crop. And as you can see here, crop allows me just to crop her anything I don't want brought in pretty much a lot of the excess. Just going to hit pretty happy. Then next thing I'm going to click on as smooth. I'm just going to turn it on and see what it does. Unfortunately, with smooth, there is no ability to sort of in a way correct it. So you could have 50% smooth or 20% smooth. This either on or off. For me, I tend to not go with any smoothing mainly because I like the look of it. Like it has been hand-drawn and that's the sort of Luke, I go with my elements. Pretty happy there. I'm going to click Save here. Then I'm just going to go here and name it. Victor. Don, and save might come into my notebook sketches where I've saved it. See, that's the elements. Now for us here, for us to get this into Adobe Illustrator. Now the next method here, for us to be able to get this file into Adobe Illustrator, we have to actually do a few things. One is going up to the share icon on top right, clicking there, clicking Export to export it as an image. Then for me, I tend to go save to files. Then on my iPad I've got a folder, it's called Illustrator. I tend to save it in there and then click Save. 5. Vectorizing: Now the next state for us is to know, since we've captured our elements and put them into Adobe Illustrator. And then next part is to put them into Illustrator to allow us to vectorize them. Now to do this, I'm just going to show you what the icon looks like for Adobe Illustrator. Right here. I'm just going to click on that and it's going to open up to what I've been working on currently. Now for us to open up the file that we have, there's two ways to go about it. We could go import and open. What I like to do is I like to dive straight into an art board. So I'm just going to click and one of the standard ones. So I'm just going to click A4. That'll automatically throw me into an art board that is A4 size. Then I'm gonna come over here and on the left and the tools you're gonna see this little picture icon. I'm just going to click on that and go go file, sorry. In here, see this a selection of different items that I'd been working in in that folder, Illustrator. Let's see where I saved it. There's the one I'm after vector. I'm just going to click on that straightaway. It'll open up. Now if I click on it with Adobe Illustrator, just make sure you're on the Selection tool here to select it. With Adobe Illustrator here we've got this toolbar that comes on the bottom of it, any sort of object you have an Adobe Illustrator that you're selected on. We'll have this toolbar. Now on the left here, this little symbol here is to vectorize it. You can also come over to this little icon here and you can collect, but you can actually select vectorize here. For me, I'm just going to select it there. That's nice and easy. What happens in this process right now is illustrators reading what it can gather in that image. And this is what it spits out. This right here. This is how it's basically tell me basically what it thinks is in that image that I've supplied. Thinks it's a line art, a black and white, which is correct. There's no color in it. That puts going to be strokes. And we've got a few additional controls here to mess with. Straightaway, I'm going to tell us that it is actually a sketch. See, it does change it there. I'm also going to keep it as fills. Then here I'm able to adjust the threshold is how much it's pulling through. The bigger number you have a bigger value number you have in threshold, the bigger your file is going to be. If you've got a very intricate elements are trying to vectorize and for some reason your iPad keeps crashing. It's probably because your threshold number is really high. If I drop the threshold down, you'll see it removes a lot of detail that it was reading. I'm just going to keep dropping that down a little bit. I'm just watching here. And here the elements are missing. And it's just a really fine line between how much you have your threshold, how little you have your threshold. I'm just gonna leave that for a second because what I'm gonna do is also burn drop noise done. Let's see what happens there. Now with noise. What noise does is noises, what it thinks it is, thinks it's just dirt. Something that shouldn't be there. Yes. A lot of the time it helps increasing the noise. But as you can see a lose a lot of detail, a lot of the leaves shading that I had here. So I'm gonna make sure my noise is down to one pixel. You can see here I get a lot of this info, Beck, the next one I've got his path in corners. Now, paths is illustrator works in number values and it also basically calculates in certain line mark by adding a path. Now, Illustrator is a fantastic software, but when you're trying to vectorize, it can actually really mess with how you style. As you can see here. If I drop passed down, you can see it seemed to reduce a lot of detail here, especially here on these leaves here. But bring that back up again. You can see it's got more of a hand-drawn work ahead. But if I drop it back down again, you can see it's a More jagged and the reason being is it's got less paths. So the lower the percentage, the lower the amount of passes within your work. Whereas if I actually increase it up, you can see it's a lot more smoother, a lot closer to the actual notebook sketch I did, which is really what I'm after. So but once again, remember with past, the more past there is, it's the same threshold. The more paths are, are the bigger your file is going to be. So just keep that in mind. Then again with corners, if our corners down, it really just sort of smooth out the edges a lot in the work. I put it down to not very much, not gonna huge amount of fact, but it might increase up the other side. Just tidies up a lot of the work. Now, looking through this, I have selected here to ignore white, which is correct. I don't want any white and white would be anything that's not black, if that makes sense. So this box, illustrators reading that as a square, trying to read the detail that's in here. But if I was to vectorize this ignoring white, then it would just pull through the black detail. So what illustrators reading that? If I was to unclick, Ignore White, what would happen here is it would pull this box here as a white box and it would out cut everything basically like penciling. If I was to trim around these elements with a pair of scissors, I'd be left this white box with these elements missing, which is not, I don't have had no need for it. So ignoring white, the only thing I want to pull out from this factorization is the black elements that are within this. The other method we're left here is the ability to retain these sections in the middle. Now what I'm meaning by there is if I click Ignore White and I click that. If I click this method here. What illustrators reading is that anything that has a closed path is to be a solid. Change that over. What I mean by see how this line joins up to here, this note gap was facing. What is basically reading bony selecting this is at once. I'm basically requesting this whole section be one solid item, which is not what I wanted all I want to be able to in my own, fill these sections in. If I want to do color this element in. Just note, it's quite nifty tool, but depending on what you're doing, pretty much 95% of the time, I have this one selected ignoring white. If you're happy with the selection here like I am with this, I'm just going to click here expand victory. But expand vectorization, sorry. Then I'm gonna come over here. The one thing that didn't do in capture, the reason I didn't do it is it's so much quicker in Illustrator is to remove any excess that was pulled through on the capture. What I mean by this is going to ungroup this by just removing this dashed line by clicking on it. That does is it releases that grouping. So now I can just select this section and so-forth. A good thing to do, and it's a good way to organize your work is once you've fixed her eyes, certain elements like these is to just group them individually. What I mean by that is just selecting those elements altogether and then grouping them again so that when you move them, they're all stuck together. If you don't do that, you'll find that you'll end up moving motif and losing parts. Just a little bit of housekeeping just to keep in mind what a meeting about cleaning up is this whole bit of information here, which capture pulled through and I didn't erase and capture. The reason being is I tend to once I get my vectorized work into Illustrator and I've finished the vectorization. I tend to just do this mainly because it's really quick and easy. Then the last thing I do is I just go around and group the individual elements. Mainly because I've just want to make sure that I am completely organized, mainly to ensure that I'm not losing any elements. When I go to move them. I can just come into the file and I can just grab everything. I need. Know that altogether and there's no parts missing. Just going to do that now. They have it. That's how you vectorize your elements in Illustrator. 6. Thank You: Thank you so much for taking this class today. I hope you've been able to pick up some new skills that you can utilize within your creative journey. If you've managed to my classic create a new piece of work, feel free to share it within the project section, I'd love to be able to see and also to share with the current students and the future students the work you've managed to create while doing this class. You've also enjoyed my class and they watched any of my others. Please feel free to follow me on my Instagram and Karski underscore Salter designs so that you can keep up with any of my new work that's coming out. An EDI releases, if any new classes though. Welcome. Once again, thank you so much and photo of my heart for taking the time and taking my class today. If you have any questions, feel free to pop them in the discussions board and love to be able to help and answer them. I love meeting new creators. Please don't be afraid to pump question in. Once again. Thank you so much. Stay safe.