Scanning a drawing into a computer lets you preserve your drawings, which might otherwise erode on their original media, especially for newsprint and other acidic papers. Scanned drawings also make it easy for artists who prefer physical media to share their work with others via email or other digital means. The general steps for scanning drawings are adjusting parameters in the scanner’s software, initiating the scan from that software and then cleaning up the scanned image in an imaging program.
1. Wipe out any lint or dust from the scanner’s glass. Place the drawing on the glass, aligning the paper’s edges with the borders of the glass or with guidelines on the surface that borders the glass. For example, if your drawing is on letter-sized paper, place the paper’s corner so it aligns with the arrow labeled “LTR.”
2. Close the scanner’s door if possible. If you’re scanning a drawing from a book, place another book atop the scanner’s door to press the book’s pages against the scanner glass, which will minimize light leakage. Such leakage reduces the contrast and sharpness of scanned drawings.
3. Press the button on your scanner that opens your scanning software. Use the software’s controls to set the parameters you want for the scan. For example, your software might have a folder icon that lets you specify the output folder for the scanned image.
4. Press the “Scan” button of the scanner software to initiate the scan. Use Windows Explorer to navigate to the folder indicated in the software's interface. Right-click the scanned image and then click “Edit” to load the image into an image-editing program.
5. Run your imaging program’s tools to increase contrast for color and black-and-white drawings. For color drawings, use the program’s controls for adjusting hue, saturation and brightness until the drawing looks sharp and its colors authentic.
6. Use the imaging program’s rotation tool to rotate the scanned image until it has the orientation you want. Use the crop tool to cut the canvas into a shape that produces a pleasing composition.
7. Use the program’s eraser tool to remove any superfluous imagery and then save the edited drawing with a new filename that describes the drawing’s content. This is necessary because scanner software typically assigns the scanned image a generic filename like “img001.JPG.” If you want to be able to edit the image in a later session, save the image as the file type that’s native to your imaging software. For example, for GIMP save the image with the XCF extension, for Photoshop save with the PSD extension and for Paint.NET use the PDN extension.
- Image-editing software like GIMP, Photoshop or Paint.NET.
- If you’re scanning a drawing that someone else made, such as a drawing from a book, observe copyright law. Use the scanned image only for personal use.
- Dick Luria/Photodisc/Getty Images