Making Chalkboard Sketches

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Making Chalkboard Sketches

Do you like to sketch? Easily make your sketches look like black and white chalkboard drawings and/or word art.
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First, I have to admit I figured this out with a "light-bulb" moment while working on some basketball kits I'm designing. I just had to stop to share what I discovered.

Start with sketches on some kind of drawing paper (a paper that will have a bit more texture to it than regular white computer paper) or from a sketch book like I did. And, yes, I used one of my kids pencils. smiley
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Scan your sketches and save on your computer.

Open in Photoshop (for this tutorial I'm using Photoshop CS6).

Click on Image > Adjustments > Desaturate (this just takes color out of the image - but still keeps the file as RGB)
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Then click Image > Adjustments > Invert
This will turn what is white into black - and what is black into white.
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Last click Image > Adjustments > Brightness/Contrast
Play with the brightness and contrast to get the look you want.

Now your background looks like a black chalkboard and your pencil drawing looks like white chalk.

Bonus: even where I smudged the pencil - it looks like white chalk dust

I hope you are as excited about this discovery as I am! smiley

UPDATE regarding colored chalk:
after you've done the initial tutorial - use the wand selection tool and click on a white section.
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Then click on Select > Similar (from the top menu bar).

Make a new layer in the layers panel.

Fill your selection in the new layer with a color.

In the Layers Panel change the layer to Multiply.

Thanks to Lana for this help with anyone using PSE11:
Click Enhance>Adjust Color>Remove Color
Click Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Invert
Click Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Brightness/Contrast

So fun!!!

It is exciting! And so simple...once someone else figured it out for me. Thanks, Brooke. Now if I could just draw as well as you do.

Very cool! Thanks!

Loved it! Genius work! Thank you so much for the idea - I just loved, I need to try it!

Oh my gosh Brooke... how easy is that? Thank you for sharing this with us... I love chalkboard doodles!

Thanks Brooke so much! Already made a word document!

Thanks, everyone. I've searched off and on for awhile now on how to digitally create chalkboard art - but just wasn't completely happy with the outcome. I had played around with my own ideas on how to do it - but still wasn't satisfied. Then after I scanned in the basketball sketches, I had done the steps in the above tutorial - BUT for different reasons.

Then, after I had inverted the artwork and turned up the brightness - which brought out the texture of the paper - I sat back and looked at my screen and thought "chalkboard" - and was so excited to see that the smearing of the pencil, when inverted, looked like white chalk dust. Hmm, I'm wondering about colored chalk now...?? smiley

UPDATE regarding colored chalk: see above in tutorial

So awesome! thanks Brooke!

That's really cool, Brooke! smiley Down the road I may try to see if I can figure out how to do this in PSP...

WOW!!
This looks awesome!!!

OH MY GOSH!!! I've always wondered how to do this.

So awesome. Thanks so much for sharing!! C:

Thanks for sharing this! I'll have to try it soon.

Brooke this is sooooo cool! And you made it so easy! smiley

Brooke, I can't wait to play with this! Thank you so much!

Wonderful tutorial. Thanks so much for sharing Brooke.

Very very neat! Thank you, for sharing!

Awesome! Wow! What a Light bulb moment! Love it! xoxox Beth

Thanks for the great tutorial Brooke.....Sure wish I could sketch like you.

Thank you for sharing. Now I shall attend some sketching drawing lessons! smiley

Thank you for sharing, I would have never imagined that! smiley

Thank you!!

This is so awesome Brooke! For anyone with PSE11 I played around a little this morning because it isn't exactly the same as with Photoshop. Here is what I did after I scanned and opened it:

Click Enhance>Adjust Color>Remove Color
Click Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Invert
Click Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Brightness/Contrast

Hope this helps someone and thanks Brooke for the great tutorial!!

Lana - thanks for helping out the PSE11 users! I added your instruction to the bottom of the initial tutorial post.
smiley

Thank you for sharing your "light-bulb" moment! Chalk Board AND Chalk! So helpful!!!

Great tutorial, Brooke! Thank you for sharing. smiley

Your very welcome Brooke...that is why I love this site - it is all about sharing! smiley

Just tried this out. It´s so cute smiley

Chalkboard is my new favorite look - thanks for the great tutorial!

Wonderful tutorial! I never imagined it would be so simple to make chalk look so real!

Love it! I can't wait to give it a try!

Thank you for sharing this tutorial.

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