Scan Your Art!
Use a phone or tablet to scan and digitize your artwork, crop and color-correct images, then organize and share a digital gallery.
Step-by-step guide to Scan Your Art!
Step 1
Place the artwork you want to digitize flat on the plain background.
Step 2
Turn on a bright lamp to light the artwork evenly and remove shadows.
Step 3
Open the camera or scanning app on your device.
Step 4
Hold the device directly above the artwork so the whole picture fits on the screen.
Step 5
Tap the photo or scan button to capture a clear image of the artwork.
Step 6
Crop the image so only the artwork shows and straighten the edges.
Step 7
Adjust color brightness and contrast so the image matches your original colors.
Step 8
Save the edited image with a clear file name that includes the title and date.
Step 9
Create a folder named My Art Gallery on your device or in your cloud storage.
Step 10
Move the saved image into the My Art Gallery folder.
Step 11
Repeat Steps 1 through 10 for other artworks to build your digital gallery.
Step 12
Share your finished digital gallery on DIY.org
Final steps
You're almost there! Complete all the steps, bring your creation to life, post it, and conquer the challenge!
Help!?
What can I use if I don't have a plain background or a bright lamp for scanning my art?
Use a large sheet of white or solid-color paper or poster board as the plain background and place the artwork near a window or outdoors in indirect daylight to replace a lamp for Step 1–2.
My photo has shadows, glare, or looks crooked—how do I fix that?
Reduce shadows and glare by moving the light farther away or diffusing it with a thin white cloth, hold the device directly above the artwork (Step 4) to avoid skew, retake the photo (Step 5), then crop and straighten the edges (Step 6).
How can I adapt this activity for younger kids or older children working independently?
For younger kids, have an adult help place the artwork on the background and press the photo button (Steps 1, 4, 5), while older kids can take charge of cropping, color adjustments (Steps 6–7), naming files (Step 8) and organizing the My Art Gallery folder (Step 9).
What are some ways to personalize or extend the digital gallery after scanning?
Enhance the gallery by adding descriptive file names with title and date (Step 8), creating themed subfolders inside My Art Gallery (Step 9), compiling a slideshow or printable photo book, and then sharing the finished gallery on DIY.org (Step 12).
Watch videos on how to Scan Your Art!
THE BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO DIGITAL ART (from an art teacher)
4 Videos
THE BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO DIGITAL ART (from an art teacher)
How to scan your art like a pro step by step
Digital Art ESSENTIALS For Beginners! (tutorial)
How to Scan and Digitize Your Art for Art Prints: A Step-by-Step Tutorial
Facts about scanning and digitizing artwork
☁️ Uploading your gallery to the cloud lets friends and family view and comment from anywhere, and keeps your originals backed up.
🗂️ Adding tags, dates, and short filenames helps you find the exact piece in a big digital collection in seconds.
📱 Many phones today shoot 12+ megapixels — that means a scanned drawing can be printed big and still look sharp!
🖼️ Scanning or photographing at 300 DPI is great for online galleries; 600 DPI catches tiny pencil or texture details (but makes bigger files).
🎨 White balance and simple color correction can make paper look true-to-life and bring faded colors back to life.
How do you scan your art with a phone or tablet?
What materials do I need to digitize artwork?
What ages is Scan Your Art! suitable for?
What are the benefits of scanning and organizing kids' artwork?
One subscription, many ways to play and learn.
Only $6.99 after trial. No credit card required