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I recently came across Sam's Instagram account, where he publishes his amazing product design illustrations, created completely on his iPad. I asked if he would be willing to share some workflow and general tips for sketching on the iPad and he kindly said yes!
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0:00
What's up guys, Steve here, and this talented guy right next to me is Sam Gwilt
0:03
I came across his Instagram account a few weeks ago where he publishes all of his product illustrations
0:09
done completely on his iPad. They're amazing. You'll have to check them out. But today, I've asked him to give us 10 tips for sketching on your iPad and managing your workflow
0:23
So the first rule that I always say when I get a new iPad is to always put a screen protector on it
0:28
Not because I think that the Apple Pencil is going to scratch the screen or anything like that
0:32
But when you're sketching on glass, the Apple Pencil actually starts to slide quite freely across
0:37
and you don't want that when you're sketching. So the screen protector's going to matte the surface and give you a little bit more extra texture
0:43
so you can get a nice smooth line. So I've just turned on Prodixio stroke as well, and that's going to give you some smoother lines in sketchbook
0:53
Second tip I have is to use the features in iOS itself
0:57
So when I'm sketching, I'll have a sketching app open here, and then I can always bring in my photos app
1:06
And that means I can sketch things side by side. It means that you're not tracing over the image
1:11
but you can start to sketch it a little bit more freely, and you'll get a lot more personality out of your sketches as well
1:17
Okay, so in image by image sketch, you can pull up the dock down here
1:22
bring in the photos app, and you can either have it alongside here
1:26
or pop it in there. And then from there, you can start to sketch really rough
1:34
And you get more of a flowing instead of tracing and you start to loosen character
1:41
So you're just going to really rough it in, box in the background. And I'll do an underlaylay lay like this really rough
1:47
and that's going to give me the bare bones that I can start to say, you know, this is slightly different here
1:52
Just so you get something on the page real quick. and then from that you can take it on to a more full sketch The third tip is to always back up your files in whatever format is best for using them later on
2:09
So not only saving them as JPEGs, but also using the native app files as well
2:13
so whether that's Procreate or the sketchbook files, it's always great to back those up as well
2:19
So for example, if I want to save this sketch as a Procreate file
2:23
if I want to pick this up later or I want to back it up. All I'm going to do is press the little tool up here
2:28
and you can see the Share tab here and then press Procreate
2:32
and then what I'm going to do is save that to files and then I can pick that up anywhere I want as well
2:38
So I've got to pop that in iCloud, press add, and I want to press key both because I haven't named it
2:45
But there we go. So this is a sketch that I did in Procreate
2:49
and I used the special Procreate brushes to get the steam coming out of this heater just to try and give the impression of some heat
2:59
And that's why I hop between Procreate and Sketchbook because they both have different tools
3:03
that I'll need to finish the sketch. So the fourth tip that I do is I always composite the iPad
3:11
screen onto a photo that I've already got existing. That's because when you try and take a photo
3:16
with an iPad with the screen on, you're either going to expose for the background or for the iPad
3:20
and they're not going to be quite right. So I always have a screenshot and I put it on top of an existing image
3:25
to get the two exposures perfect. So I always get this question a lot
3:30
when I post it Instagram because I think people also try and post the same sort of images
3:34
and can't get the exposure right. So this is the cheesing way of how to do it
3:38
So I've got the blank iPad in here and all I'm going to do is come down to your favourites
3:45
input a screenshot of the sketch, lower the opacity over here, and then I can use the move tool
3:57
really quick to put it in place bring up the opacity and there it is The fifth tip is to utilise airdrop as much as you can
4:09
It's so much quicker than emails, it's not going to compress your files in any way
4:13
So always air drop between your iPad or your phone and I always do that when I'm going to post to Instagram
4:19
So whenever I'm going to post Instagram, I'm going to want to get anything that I've been sketching onto my phone so I can post straight from there
4:26
To do that, I'm going to go up to the share icon over in the settings here
4:31
Just press my iPhone and then it will send it straight over there
4:38
The sixth tip is to make sure that your pencil is always charged. So to do that, whenever I'm starting to set up my art boards or get together images to sketch from
4:48
I always have the Apple Pencil charge in there. And as long as it's been on charge for a little bit, you can get a lot of sketching time out of it
4:54
So that's just going to save you a little bit of time when you're setting up. So while I'm setting up all of my art boards in sketchbook or somewhere like that
5:01
I'll always have my Apple Pencil charging and then by the time I press the buttons
5:05
to make a new art board, the pencil would have been charged in there for about 15 seconds
5:11
and I can get a good half an hour of sketching out of it. It's just going to save you time as you're setting things up
5:18
Number seven is to look through the whole of the app store to try and find as many
5:22
sketching apps as you can. They're all going to have different features and it's going to depend on what type of
5:26
of sketching you're going to want to do later on. So try and find as many apps as you can
5:30
and find the one that's best for you. So finding the best apps for you might take some time
5:35
but it's really worth it in the long run. You can see down here in the dock that I've got
5:39
sketchbook Procreate and also sometimes I use Skechers as well. And then also on top of that
5:45
I use this called Astropad and that's going to connect to your MacBook or Mac and then you can
5:51
use your iPad as a tablet for your Mac as well. So finding all the apps that's going to work
5:56
for you is really going to improve your workflow later on down the road When you found the apps that have the features that you need don be afraid to start swapping between the two different apps For example I tend to sketch a lot in Sketchbook and I also use Procreate as well so there
6:11
no problem hopping between those two different apps. So an example of when I'll swap between Sketchbook and Procreate is when I want to use the
6:18
different features in both apps. So here I've sketched a radiator for the weekly design challenge on Instagram and I want to add
6:26
in some heats coming out of the radiator. I know that Procreate has the brushes that I need, so I'll export that as a PNG file
6:35
and then I can import it into Procreate and use the brushes in there to add the heat effect
6:41
Tip number nine is using the Files app within iOS itself. That way you can export things to your desktop, or you can have it access on your phone
6:50
and you have all your files with you wherever you go. So now I've got the sketch here in Procreate
6:54
I want to think about backing it up so I can save it for future. So I'm going to press the button here and you've got the little share icon and you can press the Procreate to keep it in its native format
7:05
Save it to files. Save it to iCloud. Add. And there it is backed up on iCloud so I can use it wherever I want
7:18
And tip number 10 is to post the social media as much as you can
7:22
Whether you've got a finished sketch, a work in progress or you just want some feedback
7:26
posting to social media and asking for creative criticism can really help improve your sketches
7:31
That's what I did and I can only thank you guys for giving me feedback along the way
7:38
Well that's it for this video. Thanks a lot to Sam for giving us these tips
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I'll make sure to link his Instagram account where you can check out all of his product illustrations
7:46
They are absolutely amazing and also his YouTube account where I'm going to be doing a drawing challenge
7:52
I'm a little bit nervous about it but you'll have to go and check that out. If you enjoyed this video, please hit that like button
7:58
It really helps out. Subscribe if you haven't already, and I'll catch you in the next one
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