Design Sketching

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DESIGN SKETCHING CLASS

6 Lessons Beginner Level
Welcome to Design Sketching Class! Sketching is the primary skill of the designer. It's the best
way to quickly generate, iterate, and communicate design ideas to yourself and to others. In this
class, you'll learn the basics of how to sketch in 2D, 3D, and how to shade a drawing to add
realism. Grab some paper, pencils, and your big ideas. Let's get designing!
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Class Author:
JON-A-TRON
Jonathan Odom is a professional designer with more than 10 years of experience in set design, architecture, and product design.
He has designed architectural installations, industrial design prototypes, furniture, and lots of other projects on Instructables. His
work has been exhibited locally and internationally, published online and in print, and is enjoyed by friends, family, collectors, and
clients.
Design Sketching Class: Page 1

Lessons
Lesson 1: Tools & Materials

In this lesson, you'll get started with a list of tools and materials.
Lesson 2: Lesson 2: Drawing Technique

Learn how to draw a straight line without a ruler and a circle without a
template. It's easier than you think!
Lesson 3: Lesson 3: Drawing in 2D

This lesson covers multi-view drawing, a technique for understanding
an object through multiple 2D views.
Lesson 4: Lesson 4: Drawing in 3D

Isometric drawing is a way of representing an object in 3D.
Lesson 5: Light and Shadow

This technique will help you bring some realism to a drawing and bring
some clarity to the form.
Lesson 6: Case Study- White Noise Machine

This project will give you an idea of how these skills can be applied to
the design process. There are some additional techniques to learn in
this lesson as well.

LESSON 1: TOOLS & MATERIALS
Welcome to Design Sketching Class! If you want to come up with a new idea, design
something that's floating around in your head, or figure out how to make something,
sketching is the simplest and fastest tool at your disposal. Even if you think you’re no good
at drawing by hand, it’s a skill that helps communicate your ideas to others, and even
clarify your ideas for yourself!
Digital design tools (both 2D and 3D) are powerful, but they have a lot of constraints by
nature. But, if you can flesh out an idea with a pen and paper -even badly- you'll free
yourself up to explore options and make decisions before you get into the computer or the
workshop. Simply put, design drawing is a skill you need to take your designs to the next
level.
This class focuses on the skill of sketching as a tool to help you think. We'll start with some
basic hand drawing techniques to help you draw straight lines and other useful forms.
Next, you'll learn about multi-view drawings- studying an object as a series of 2D drawings
of the sides. Finally, you'll learn how to draw in 3D with isometric drawings. We'll also talk
about light and shade to help you think about shape.
This class isn't about presentation drawings that require a high level of skill. In this class,
you'll get used to design sketching as a tool to help you think and explore possibilities.

The Invention Class by Paige Russel is a companion class to this one. If you take them
both at the same time, you'll be well on your way to designing your own awesome
creations.
Tools & Materials
https://player.vimeo.com/video/213154954?title=0&byline=0&portrait=0
- This video has no sound -

There's an endless variety of professional drawing tools and materials on the market, but to
get into design drawings, you'll only need a few basic supplies. There are felt tipped pens,
ballpoint pens, fountain pens, and letraset pens. There are automatic pencils, clutch
pencils, wooden pencils, and lead holders. There are acid free markers, chisel tip makers,
brush markers, pointed nib markers, and blender pens. There are also dozens of choices
when it comes to drawing paper. Most of these tools are for fine artists and are not worth
your time or attention.
For this class, all you'll need is a ballpoint pen, a mechanical pencil, a gum eraser, some
gray Copic markers, and copy paper.

Mechanical Pencil
You'll use mechanical pencils to draw construction lines, meaning lines you'll use to
control your drawings and to roughly measure features. You can also use a pencil for quick
shading if you don't want to bother with markers. You'll want a light line weight (0.5 or 0.3)
so that the lines are easy to erase. I like the pencil listed below, but you can get a 20-pack
of cheap mechanical pencils at the corner drug store for $5 and get the same results.
0.5mm Pentel GraphGear 500 Automatic Drafting Pencil: $3 each on Amazon
An eraser is also a good idea. I used a kneaded eraser, but a white eraser is probably better:
$6.00 (set of 4) on Amazon
Ballpoint Pens
Ballpoint pens are what you'll be using to draw hard lines, meaning the lines you'll stick
with to communicate your ideas. The pens listed below are my favorites, but you can take
this class with any cheap ballpoint pen and still get good results.
Light Weight (0.38) Ballpoint Pen
We'll get into line weight later, but the general idea is that the thickness of the line
communicates particular features and ideas. A light weight pen will be good for
surface features, contour lines, and roughing out shapes.
Muji Hexagonal Gel Ink Ballpoint Pen: $8 / 2-pack on Amazon
Medium Weight (0.5) Ballpoint Pen

Medium weight pens are good for drawing features with more depth (like holes on
surfaces) and interior edges.
Muji Hexagonal Gel Ink Ballpoint Pen: $8 / 2-pack on Amazon
Heavy Weight (0.7) Ballpoint Pen

Heavy weight pens are good for drawing the outside edges of objects and cut
lines in cross sections.
Moma Muji Gel Ink Ballpoint Pen: $9 / 3-pack on Amazon
Gray Markers
Markers come in every color of the rainbow, but for this class we'll only use gray ones for
shading and drawing shadows. There are lots of different marker brands, but I like Copic
markers the best because they're easy to draw with, they look great on paper, and they
don't emit nasty fumes. They're expensive, but they're worth it.
You can take this class without using markers at all, you'll just be using a pencil or pen
to of the shading and shadows.
Copic Sketch Set of 6 Sketching Grey Markers - $33 on Amazon
Tombow Markers (cheaper alternative) Set of 10 Grey Markers - $19 on Amazon
Copy Paper
Copy paper is great to draw with because it's smooth, manageable, and cheap. To draw
straight lines and have good control over line work, you'll be spinning the paper around as
you draw constantly (a skill we'll cover in Lesson 2), and copy paper makes this very easy.
US Letter (8.5X11 IN) or A4 are ideal.
You can get this paper at any drug store or office supply store, but here's an Amazon link
for your convenience:
AmazonBasics 92 Bright Multipurpose Copy Paper - 8.5 x 11 Inches, 1 Ream (500 Sheets): $8
on Amazon
Next Up
In the next lesson we'll go over some basic drawing technique. We'll learn how to draw the
straightest lines possible without a ruler, how to draw circles without a template or
compass, and how to make rectangles and squares that aren't too wonky.

LESSON 2: LESSON 2: DRAWING TECHNIQUE

As kids, many of us drew all the time. As adults, not so much. Drawing is like any other
skill- it takes practice to get good at it. It's time to harness your inner kid again and get into
the habit of sketching regularly - it’s the only way to get good at it!
Drawing can be uncomfortable in the beginning- it's very rare that a person can just sit
down and do it without a lot of practice. The curve for you might look something like the
diagram above. In the beginning your drawings probably won't look great, but with every
new drawing you'll notice them coming out the way you want them to more and more often.
After enough practice, the techniques you'll learn here will be second nature, and you won't
even have to think about them. In the meantime, follow the rules taught in this lesson and
you'll get better results earlier.
I can't stress enough how important this skill is to a designer. It will save your life. If you're
able to sketch out an idea clearly, even with a minimal level of skill, you're going to save
countless hours of work in the design and fabrication process later- not to mention having
the ability to quickly explain an idea to someone else! If you develop that habit of sketching
all the time as a way to solve problems and explore new possibilities, you'll be well on your
way to being a good designer.
Whether you move on to 2D drafting, 3D modeling, or do everything by hand, this tool is
always useful.

Drawing Lines

Design sketching is different than what you probably learned in art class. Manmade objects
require a different kind of line work to describe them than natural objects do. With design
sketching, we don't use "sketchy" lines (as shown in the image above on the left). We use
deliberate, clear, continuous lines (as in the image above on the right). This is because
manufactured objects have smooth surfaces, crisp edges, and contours that almost never
have organic texture. Using the right kind of line to describe the object in your head makes
a big difference to your audience.
People always say "I can't draw a straight line". Like every other skill known to man, no
one is born being able to do this. A successful drawing is made by applying a handful of
rules and techniques that anyone can learn.
Use Proper Posture:The position your body's in when you draw makes all the difference
in the world. Keep your back straight- don't crouch and get too close to the paper. Your
arm should be able to move freely- don't rest your wrist on the table unless you're doing
finely detailed work (small lines).
Find your Straight Line Motion: The way your arm moves determines the kind of line you
draw. When I draw a vertical line on the paper from bottom-to-top, my lines aren't very
straight. It's hard to keep them parallel to each other which means I don't really have
control over the direction and consistency of the line. The same problem occurs when I
draw them horizontally from left-to-right, but when I draw them at a 45º angle from bottom-
to-top, they come out much better.
Try it yourself and see which direction works the best for you.

My vertical lines from down to up don't come out very straight.
My horizontal lines from left to right aren't great either.

My 45º lines from left to right are the straightest.
Move the Paper: Because my best straight lines come out when I draw a 45º line, I draw
every straight line using this motion. I move the paper to get the line in the right place
instead of moving my hand and changing the motion.
Once you've found your straight line motion, practice moving the paper and keeping
your strokes in the same direction every time you draw a straight line.
Drawing (Almost) Perfect Circles

Circles are notoriously hard to draw. Use the pivot trick demonstrated in this video to get a
perfect circle every time!
This is a great trick if you're starting the drawing with a circle, but it can be hard to control
the exact location and size of the circle. In the following lessons, I'll demonstrate another
way to draw them by making a crosshair and drawing arcs around the center.
Line Weight

Line weight is an important aspect of any drawing to communicate shape and depth. You
can do any drawing with a single line weight and get the point across, but applying different
line weights makes a drawing more lifelike and can make it much easier to understand,
especially if the geometry is complex.
1. Extra Light (pencil or light weight pen): This weight is used for aspects that should either be
secondary to the overall form of the object or almost disappear entirely. It's good for
construction lines, surface features like textures or patterns, and seams between parts that
don't have much depth (like the edge where a fender touches a hood on a car, for example).
2. Light (+/- 0.3mm): This weight is most often used for contour lines (lines that follow a surface
to express its 3D shape) and planar corners (edges between two planes in which you can see
both planes in the view).
3. Medium (+/- 0.5mm): This weight is generally used for spatial edges (the edges of surfaces
where only one surface is seen in the view).
4. Heavy (0.7mm+): Heavy lines are reserved for the perimeter edges of an object and for the
cut edges of a cross-section drawing.
In general, you can think of line weight as a scale from light to heavy based on the depth of
the edge you're drawing in relation to what's behind it. In the example above, you'll see that
the extra light lines (the pattern on the side) are for an edge that has essentially zero
depth to the surface behind it. The light lines have a greater difference between the depth
between the edge and the surface behind it because the surfaces are angled away from or
towards each other. The medium lines have a greater depth between the edges and the
surface behind them because the only surface behind that we can see in the view are the
ones on the indentation. The heavy lines are reserved for the edges with the most depth
(there's nothing behind them).

Practice!
Now that you've got the general idea of how to draw certain shapes and straight lines, it's
time to practice. A lot. There's no need to draw anything specific, just grab some paper and
your drawing tools, and start making shapes. The sheet in the picture above is just me
practicing lines, construction lines, contour lines, shading, and making form. We'll get into
all these techniques later in the class.
In the next lesson, we'll get into sketching 2D views of a design.

LESSON 3: LESSON 3: DRAWING IN 2D

When developing a design through sketching, it helps to look at the object in separate
“orthographic” views, also known as multi-view drawing. Seeing the projected sides of an
object helps us understand proportions, scale, and relationships that are difficult to see in
3D.
To understand something complex, you have to look at it in pieces. This is as true in math
and history as it is in music and design. The way to break down a design and study it is to
use orthographic projection. Simply put, this means drawing an object straight-on from
each of its sides. The top, front, back, left side, right side, and bottom are separate
sketches. This kind of drawing is not done using perspective.
To create an orthographic drawing, imagine that the object you want to draw is inside a
glass box. If you look straight-on at any side of the box, what you see of the object inside is
its orthographic projection. By drawing the object from different points of view in this way,
we are able to make decisions and solve problems in a localized way. Trying to design
exclusively in 3D (whether by sketching or using 3D software) can often result in objects
that aren't well thought-out, as you need to see how each side relates to the other. This is
why it’s important to start with 2D drawing before moving onto 3D.

A Man-Made Object
To practice multi-view drawing, we will start with a simple manmade object that you
probably have at home. A remote control is a good example, maybe a phone, or a
bluetooth speaker. Avoid things that are too complex like a can opener at first, and void
things with a lot of curves, like a computer mouse.
I'll be demonstrating the process with a 9V battery.
Construction Lines

Construction lines are a great tool to control your drawings. They help to tell you where
hard lines (lines made in pen) should go, and help you make sure things have the right
proportions, help you make circles and other complex shapes, and keep different views
consistent. You can never have too many construction lines, especially if they're drawn
lightly in pencil.
Think of construction lines as a kind of cage that your drawings a built from.
Start by drawing a few construction lines to create boundaries for the different views of the
object. Try to get the proportions as close to the real object as possible by using your
fingers or your pencil to get a rough idea. Remember to draw parallel lines first, then draw
the crossing lines do get proper right angles. It's often helpful to use tick marks as targets.

Before going any further with construction lines, draw the primary shape of the object from
one viewing angle. In the case of the battery, that's the rectangular profile of the front.

To draw a rectangle with rounded corners (also called fillets in designer speak), it's
important to draw the parts individually. Draw straight lines, then rounded corners or vice
versa. If you try to draw a rounded rectangle in one continuous stroke, you're going to end
up with a potato.

Next, add whatever other features can be seen from that point of view. For the battery, that
would be the terminals on top. A couple of center lines will help keep the location of the
terminals correct (these represent the centers of the terminals, not the rectangle).
Side View

From the front view, the terminals just look like rectangles, one of them having an angled
base.
With one view done, it's time to move on to the next view. The construction lines are
projected from the first drawing, so the proportions and dimensions will be consistent.
This is the whole point of a multi-view drawing. When the views have dimensional
consistency, it's much easier to understand an object, and it's crucial in using sketching as
a design tool.
A centerline is used to ensure the terminal seen from the side is in the correct location.

From the side, the terminal looks roughly the same as from the front.
Line Weight

Line weight is an important aspect of any drawing to communicate shape and depth. You
can do any drawing with a single line weight and get the point across, but applying different
line weights makes a drawing more lifelike and can make it much easier to understand,
especially if the geometry is complex.
1. Extra Light (pencil or light weight pen): This weight is used for aspects that should either be
secondary to the overall form of the object or almost disappear entirely. It's good for
construction lines, surface features like textures or patterns, and seams between parts that
don't have much depth (like the edge where a fender touches a hood on a car, for example).
2. Light (+/- 0.3mm): This weight is most often used for contour lines (lines that follow a surface
to express its 3D shape) and planar corners (edges between two planes in which you can see
both planes in the view).
3. Medium (+/- 0.5mm): This weight is generally used for spatial edges (the edges of surfaces
where only one surface is seen in the view).
4. Heavy (0.7mm+): Heavy lines are reserved for the perimeter edges of an object and for the
cut edges of a cross-section drawing.
In general, you can think of line weight as a scale from light to heavy based on the depth of
the edge you're drawing in relation to what's behind it. In the example above, you'll see that
the extra light lines (the pattern on the side) are for an edge that has essentially zero
depth to the surface behind it. The light lines have a greater difference between the depth
between the edge and the surface behind it because the surfaces are angled away from or
towards each other. The medium lines have a greater depth between the edges and the
surface behind them because the only surface behind that we can see in the view are the
ones on the indentation. The heavy lines are reserved for the edges with the most depth
(there's nothing behind them).

In the case of the battery, the bezel edge gets a light line, the features on the battery
terminal surfaces get medium lines, and the outlines get heavy lines. This makes the
drawing pop, so to speak. It gives it presence on the page and makes it easier to read.
Practice!
Your homework for this lesson is (you guessed it) draw stuff! Find a manmade object,
break it down into construction lines, then hard line it and fill in the details. Remember, it's
not important that it's pretty, it's important that it's a decent representation of the thing.
In the next lesson, we'll take sketching to the next level and learn how to do it in 3D.

LESSON 4: LESSON 4: DRAWING IN 3D

2D multi-view (orthographic) drawings are very useful and easy to produce once you've
had some practice, but they only give you part of the picture. If you really want to
understand an object, you need 3D. After all, this is how we see the world!
The type of 3D drawing you'll learn in this class is usually called Isometric. Think of this as
a drawing where all the vertical lines of a cube remain vertical, but the horizontal lines of a
cube are skewed, and horizontal lines are parallel to each other on opposite sides.
This is based on the cartesian coordinate system where all points can be measured in
space in absolute terms. Any object, and I mean any object, can be drawn in relation to a
cube used as a bounding box. You'll learn how to do that in this lesson.
We're not going to get into perspective in this class, but if you're interested in drawing more
realistic representations, I would suggest learning this skill from the Design Sketchbook.

Constructing a 3D View

As with multi-view 2D drawings, the best way draw what you want to see is by using
construction lines. Building a kind of cage around the object you intend to draw will make it
much easier to realistically represent things like rounded edges and corners, will serve as
a tool to measure proportions and locations of features, and will help ensure that the
different faces of objects are consistent with each other.
Continuing with our 9V battery example, start by drawing 3 parallel lines in pencil. As
before, use your fingers or your pencil to place target tick marks to ensure that they're
parallel.

Draw a third parallel line for the back edge of the object. This line should have the same
spacing from the line on the right as the other one does from the line to the left.
Next, draw the two bottom face of the cube. The angle of these lines will determine your
view. Angles that are more acute to the horizon will show less of the top of the object,
emphasizing the sides. Angles that are more oblique to the horizon will show more of the
top. This will change the point of view of the object.

The point of view can be whatever you want, but a useful way to think about it is to imagine
what it would be like to view the object in real life. If an object is big, the sides will be more
prevalent in your view. If an object is small, you're going to see more of the top.

Make another skewed rectangle for the top of the box. These lines should be parallel to the
ones on the bottom, and their placement should be roughly based on the proportions of the
battery.
Circles in 3D
To draw the terminals on the top, we'll need construction lines. A center line is drawn on
the top surface by using tick marks at the midpoints of the short sides of the box.

Two other crossing centerlines will control the location of the terminals.
A circle in a 3D view is an ellipse. If you think of the circle as something bounded by a

square (remember, you can think of any kind of object as though it's bounded by a box),
you can see that the ellipse gets its shape because the box is squashed along one of its
diagonals.
Just remember these rules of thumb:
1. A circle will hit the construction lines at the same points in 3D as they will in 2D.
2. The curve along the obtuse corners of the box get longer and flatter.
3. The curve along the acute corners of the box shorter and deeper.
With a drawing this small, you can probably just make the ellipses in one stroke with a little
practice, but to get very clean ellipses it helps to draw them in segments.
Remember the rules of thumb, and you'll get good results.

The positive terminal has a hexagonal profile. In this distorted view it's basically the same
thing, just compressed vertically. There's no point in getting too technical with constructing
this feature, a rough approximation will get the point across.
3D Form

When you look at the top view of the battery, you'll see it has rounded edges. To draw that
in 3D, the sides will be offset from the boundary made by the construction lines. You'll see
why in a moment.

The rounded corners have small radii. To draw the boundary edges of the rectangle, small
gaps are left at the corners of all the intersections. Remember, it's best to draw arcs and
straight lines separately to get the best results.

Small fillets finish off the corners for a realistic look.
The negative terminal is a cylinder, so all it needs is vertical lines to complete the shape.
The outlines of the positive terminal are next. It's important to pay attention to which lines
will be seen in a particular view. The edge of the lower hexagon will only be visible on the
front, for example.

With the line work mapped out in pencil, it's time to assign line weight with pens.

The line weight rules are the same with 3D views as they are with 2D. In the video I'm only
using two line weights, but for a bigger, more precise drawing, this is how you would
handle the line weights:
Extra Light: surface details
Light: corner edges
Medium: edges with background surfaces
Heavy: perimeter outline
Give It a Try
Keep going with the drawing subject you've chosen and try a 3D isometric drawing. Share
what you've got with the rest of the class and we'll give you feedback.
In the next lesson, you'll learn about light, shadow and shading to bring some realism and
detail to your drawings.

LESSON 5: LIGHT AND SHADOW

Shading is the last level of detail we'll cover in this class. Much like contour lines, shading
and shadows articulate features and bring out detail, but they're unique in that they make
drawings much more realistic.

There are 5 basic parts of a shadow.
1. Cast Shadow: Just like your own shadow on the sidewalk on a sunny day, a cast shadow is a
-distorted- projection of the shape of the object. The length of the shadow and its direction
depend on the direction of the light. On the Copic Marker scale, this would be N8.
2. Core Shadow: This is the shaded part on the opposite side of an object from the direction of
the light. This part is especially useful in defining geometry. On the Copic Marker scale, this
would be N6.
3. Reflected Highlight: This is ambient light bounced off of the ground to brighten part of an
object that would otherwise be in core shadow. It's often okay to leave this part out if you want
to make a quick drawing. On the Copic Marker scale, this would be N4.
4. Mid Tone: This is the part of the shadow that transitions from the core shadow to the highlight
on a curved surface. Think of it as a blurred edge of the core shadow / highlight. The mid tone
also shows up on flat faces that aren't directly in the line of the light direction. On the Copic
Marker scale, this would be N2.
5. Highlight: This is the part of the object that reflects the most light. The highlight is directly in
line with the direction of the light. This will remain white.

In the example above, the mid tone is on the top face and the highlight is on the front face.
This is because (as you can see from the long shadow) the front face is more directly in the
line of the light direction. If the light direction were more vertical (meaning a much shorter
cast shadow), the top of the cube would have the highlight, and the front would have the
mid tone.

A rounded cube is a bit more complex, but the rules remain the same. The rounded edges
are basically just partial spheres, so they're shaded the same way a sphere would be. The
rounded corners and edges blend into the shading on the flat faces.
The light-mid tone on the front of the rounded cube helps the viewer understand how much
of the face is flat and where the rounded edges start, even though you technically might
not see this in a more literal rendering of the object.
Remember, the point of shading in a design sketch is to communicate geometry, so it's
okay to sacrifice accuracy for clarity sometimes.

A cylinder has a sharp edge between the side and the top, but there's a blended mid tone
between the highlight and the core shadow.
A cone follows the same rules regarding the blended mid tone.

Shading a Simple Object
To get acquainted with the idea of shading, start with the 3D drawing you made of a
household object- the 9V battery we used in Lessons 3 and 4. A simple form is good
because it will prevent you from getting distracted by too many details.
I spray-painted the 9V battery so the shadows and shading would be easier to see. The top
of the battery has the lightest value ("w" for white), the front of the battery has a slightly
darker shade because the sunlight on this face is less direct, the side of the battery in
shadow is the next darkest value, and the cast shadows are the darkest. Notice the
smooth gradient transition between the front and the side- this happens because it's a
rounded edge, like a cylinder.

Starting with the cast shadows is a good idea because this will give you a sense of what
surfaces should get what level of shading. Choose a light direction: imagine the rays of
light are parallel, like sunlight, and project the top of the object onto the floor. The lines this
projection follows should be parallel to each other. The cast shadows will get either the
darkest (N8) or second darkest (N6) color if you're using gray markers.

In the case of the battery, the terminals also cast shadows, but the shadows are cast
much shorter than the shadow of the battery perimeter. This is because the terminals are
shorter. Position your object in relation to sunlight or lamp light, and you'll see exactly how
the light should be cast. The bezel around the edge also gets a thin gray line- a shallow
cast shadow.
The shading of the surfaces is also dependent on the light direction. Since the light
direction is at a steep angle in relation to the sides of the object, the top surface will get the
most reflected light- that means it remains white. The front of the object in this example
gets the second most reflected light, so it's filled in with the N0 marker. The back side gets
the next level up in the value scale, which is N4 using the Copic marker scale.

The terminals also get shaded. The negative one is a terminal, so it gets a smooth gradient
fade from white to medium gray (N4). The facets of the positive terminal get solid shaded
in gray with the darkest gray on the back side.

The example on the left above was done with Copic markers, and the one on the right was
done with cross-hatching in pencil as demonstrated in the video. As you can see, markers
tend to have a cleaner result, and they're easier to control.
Show Us What You Got
Your homework for this lesson is to shade the 3D object you did in the last lesson. Take it
outside or put it under a lamp to get a general idea of what you'll see, then use the
methods you learned in this lesson to make your drawing more realistic.
The next lesson is a case study of one of my own projects. You'll see how I came up with
the idea, how I came up with the overall form, and how I fleshed out the details through
drawing. You'll also learn some additional techniques like drawing cross-sections and
detail blowups.

LESSON 6: CASE STUDY- WHITE NOISE MACHINE
Now that you've got the basic skills down, here's a case study to help you learn how you
might apply them to your own design.
Drawing a New Design
Any time you design something, you're going to start with some things you already know.
What the design is intended for, generally how big it will be, what manufactured parts it
might use, etc. For more information on the design process, check out Paige Russel's
Design a Product Class.
The example you'll be following in this class is an analog white noise machine of my
design. It's based on this Wireless Charging Lantern project I made. It's a lamp that's
battery powered and uses a universal wireless charging platform. When I designed the
lamp, I intended for the platform to be used with a variety of products: a bluetooth speaker
or an aroma diffuser, for example.

I saw this awesome product on Kickstarter called Snooz that I thought would be a fun one
to make my own way. I think the idea of an analog white noise machine, where the
whooshing sound is made by a fan, not a looping digital track, was a brilliant idea. The
canned sounds of white noise machines for sleeping always bothered me.
Anyway, no matter what I design for this platform, I know some of the variables already.
1. I have the design of the platform completed. This means I've got dimensions and geometry to
work with.
2. The wireless transmitter in the base is 3.6V, so if I don't want to get fancy with the electronics,
I'll need to use a motor that will run on that voltage.
3. I know the fan will need to be inside an enclosure because I don't want it to blow any air
around, and I want to make sure nothing can touch the spinning blades.
4. I know I'm probably going to use a 3D printer for most of the parts. This gives me parameters
like minimum material thickness and fastening methods.
That's a lot to work with, so now I can start drawing to come up with an idea for a design.
Whatever you are planning on designing think about your own known variables before
sketching.

We'll get into 3D drawing later, but what you see above is some quick sketches of me
thinking through the problem. You can see early on that I was thinking of a rounded cube
with a cap on top with a gap to let sound through.

What's above is another quick iteration showing the top view, a section view, and an
exploded section on the left. These drawings took about 10-20 minutes each, and helped
me along in the design process. What follows is a step-by-step guide for making accurate
but quick design sketches.

Construction Lines

Construction lines are a great tool to control your drawings. They tell you where lines
should go, help you make sure things have the right proportions, enable you to make
circles and other complex shapes, and keep different views consistent. You can never
have too many construction lines, especially if they're done in pencil.
Think of construction lines as a kind of cage that your drawings a built from.
In the example provided, the top of the object is square, and I'm planning on drawing a side
view based on it, so the best place to start is with a square that has longer construction
lines going up the page that will be used later for the side view.
Remember that there's no need to have your drawing completely planned out when you
start, but if you know some basic things about your design (in my case, I know it's square
from the top and probably also from the side) it's a good idea to plan out the space on the
page to make sure everything fits.
Start With a Single View

There's going to be a circular cap centered on the top, so I'll need to find the center of the
rectangle. To do that, tick marks are placed at the center of each of the line segments to
serve as targets.
Using the tick marks, vertical, horizontal, and diagonal construction lines are drawn.

The same arc segment trick discussed before will make for a clean circle.
The corners are rounded at the same radius as the existing charging platform.

Draw the Next View Based on the First
With the top view finished, there is now some information to base the side view on. There
is a radius for the rounded edges of the box that can be used for the side view, and a width
for the circular cap that might be a good with for the slots on the sides.

Now is as good a time as any to go over the pencil construction with pen to add line
weight. The perimeter gets a heavy line because it's the perimeter edge, and the circular
cap gets a medium or light line because there's not much depth between it and the top.

In the side view, the most logical place to start is with the platform, since I already know
what that looks like.

Working our way up the side, the next part to draw is the base of the white noise machine.
The arcs are the same radius as the ones in the top view at the bottom of the part, and the
arcs at the top are very small because this is going to be a snap-fit feature. Any time you're
working with something symmetrical, it's never a bad idea to get a quick measurement with
the tip of the pencil and draw some construction lines to try and make sure things are
where they should be.

An internal fan will create the white noise, so the piece will need openings in the sides to
allow the sound to travel. A slot on each face of the enclosure seems like a good place to
start. It will take some testing to make sure enough sound is getting out.
New construction lines on each side of the top cap project vertically, creating a boundary
for the side openings.

With the geometry done, it's time to apply line weight.
Heavy: Edges with the most depth in relation to the background- outer perimeter of the
drawing.
Medium: Edges with the second-most depth in relation to the background- the side opening in
this case.
Light: Edges with the least depth- the seams between the parts in this case
Cross-Section Drawing

A cross-section is a view that cuts through an object along a flat plane, usually vertically.
It's a useful tool in design sketching because it can communicate material thickness,
assembly, fastening methods, and how parts interrelate. Drawing a cross-section through
an object can lead to all kinds of revelations- "Oh, that's not going to fit..." or "Oh, I could
make this thing much smaller!" It helps you avoid silly mistakes like designing something
that's impossible to assemble.
The section shares its horizontal construction lines with elevation to the left because it's cut
through the vertical plane.

The section view will have a lot of intricate details and it's symmetrical, so a vertical
centerline is a good place to start.
In section, the features where the base and enclosure meet are shown. There's a small
gap between the parts to communicate that they're separate objects.
You'll notice in the illustration above that the upper clip feature doesn't exactly align with
the construction line

And now, we get into the concept of thickness. Everything you design (with the possible
exception of an origami animal) will have some kind of material thickness. We have a
tendency to draw things as though they were made of paper, but if you can develop the
habit of drawing things as though they have thickness, you'll start to think of things in more
realistic terms and be able to develop designs much more quickly. As the section
develops, it's important to start drawing the thickness of the walls as early as possible to
avoid any weird geometry or impossible assemblies
There are practically endless ways to fasten parts together. You can glue, screw, clip, bolt,
or press-fit to name a few. This particular design is going to work with a snap-clip feature.
It's kind of like the one you might see on a battery enclosure on a remote control. Many
manufactured objects use a combination of clips and screws to make sure things are
durable, but with this 3D printed part, a clip seems like it might be a good choice. The trick
is to give the clip parts enough room so they can move past each other, while making them
overlap enough so that the parts will stay together on their own.
There's a gap above the clip feature to let the sound travel, and the wall of the upper part
has the same thickness as the rest of the parts.
A couple of new construction lines will help control the next feature- a recess with open
sides and a snap-fit cap.

The angle will allow for a gap to let sound travel while keeping the top of the cap flush with
the top surface of the enclosure. The snap clip works the same way as the one at the side
opening.
Moving forward in adding detail, there's a screw-in panel on the bottom of the wireless
charging base that can be seen from this view. The screw is shown in section so that
attachment method is clear- it's a ledge with a hole in it that the screw threads into.

With the general shape finished on one side, it's easy to mirror the lines using new
construction lines as necessary
Cross-Section: Internal Parts

The whole point of the cross-section in this case is to explore the relationships between the
parts on the inside, and to come up with solutions for the assembly. This section will focus
on this study.

The first two parts whose placement is already known are the wireless transmitter and
receiver. The transmitter is attached to the indentation in the base, which is already
designed, so the receiver has to be aligned with the transmitter and fastened to the floor of
the enclosure as shown above.
Crosshatching is an easy way to differentiate one part from another in any drawing. It's
especially useful in a cross section line this one, which will have lots of different parts. The
next part I know I'll need is a DC motor with the post pointing up. This is a generic
representation, so the real dimensions aren't known. That said, these motors come in a
wide enough variety of sizes that it's reasonable to assume something around this size will
work.
This device needs to make as loud a whooshing noise as possible in order to be effective.
That probably means that the blades need to be as big as possible given the constraints of
the enclosure- more surface area means more air moving, right? That seems reasonable.
Design iteration is all about going with your intuition, testing it, and making the best
decisions about scrapping bad ideas and sticking to good ideas. This seems like as good a
place to start as any.

Cross Section: Final Features
The motor will need a mount to attach it to the bottom part of the enclosure. The idea in the
drawing is that it's press fit into a carriage with legs that attach to the base as shown
above.
The holes are a bit tedious to draw by hand, but it is helpful to get an idea of how they
might be patterned. The most logical way to do it seems to be to nest them- a row of 3, a
row of 2 above that offset, back to a row of 3 above that, etc. The fan has to be radially
symmetrical, so a four-blade fan seems like as good a place as any to start. The dashed
lines denote the fan blade receding away from the view.
Here's a breakdown of the line weights used for this kind of drawing:
Heavy: cut lines of objects to be fabricated, not manufactured objects to be used (such as the
motor)
Medium: lines that are seen in elevation that have medium depth to their background surfaces,
outlines of manufactured parts.
Light: lines with shallow depth to their background surfaces.
Extra Light: surface pattern
Hidden (dashed): objects hidden behind in relation to the view.

Detail Blowups

The more sketches, the easier it is to understand your design. At a small scale there’s no
need to include all the details, which is why including blow ups is important to show the
finer details. Any part of a drawing, whether in section or on a face, can be used as the
basis for a detail blowup. Consider the important information and what you want to
communicate, not every detail needs to be drawn, and repetitive details can be drawn once
and referenced.

NOTE: Cross-sections can also be done in 3D using the same techniques we used to do
the 3D drawings previously. The rules are the same, they just tend to be more time
consuming.
3D Drawing

Rounded corners can be difficult to draw correctly. A good trick is to draw the straight
segments and rounded corners separately. This will result in straighter lines and smoother
curves.
With the arc in the center of the base, the angles and lengths on each side should be the
same since the object is symmetrical. A quick arc between these construction lines will
create this rounded corner.
With the profile of the base finished, we'll move on to the bottom of the white noise
machine. The bottom of the machine will be rounded at a bigger radius because that's the
way the base was designed previously. It's a good idea to get rough outlines of the objects
first, then move on to details and more intricate features.

To make the object symmetrical, new construction lines are added. The horizontal one
provides a target where it intersects the vertical line on the left, and the vertical ones
ensure that the ends of the arcs are in the same place.
Circular Cap

To construct a circle in 3D, the box on top of the cube needs to be divided evenly with
construction lines. To ensure the lines are parallel to each face of the box and centered,
tick marks are added at the midpoint of each of the segments on the top square.
Starting with the left side, we get a shorter, deeper curve because the bounding box angle
is acute on that side. On the top, the curve is long and flat because the bounding box angle
is obtuse on that side.
The curve on the right side is a mirror image of the one on the left. Extra construction lines
may be needed to control this geometry.

Seam and Hole Features
As seen in the multi-view drawing, the machine top enclosure snap-fits into the machine
bottom enclosure. To draw this feature, another parallel box is added above the second
one, providing a new plane to draw in. Once again, the arc bounding this corner is the
same as the other arcs.
The seam is articulated by small curves on each end. The sweep of the curves here
follows the same rules as circles- the obtuse angle makes the upper curve long and
shallow, and the acute angle of the lower curve makes it short and deep.
As in the 2D drawings, the seam has an opening above it on each face. Construction lines
are added again to provide a boundary for the openings. The vertical lines are coincident
with the ends of the arcs on the machine bottom, and the lines for the tops of the holes are
equally spaced to make the holes the same on both sides.

Contour Lines
Contour lines in fine art are basically the outline of the shape. In design sketching,
however, contour lines are the lines that trace the surface of an object to communicate the
shape. In the examples above, the heavier outlines are the object's perimeter, and the
thinner lines are the contour lines.
1. In a simple rounded cube, 3 continuous contour lines tell us there are no surface features.
2. With a semi spherical indentation on the top, we see a single elliptical edge contour.
3. This example shows an indentation with raised walls and sharp edges at each crease.
4. This indentation has rounded edges. The crossing contour lines show us the radii of each
curve, and the elliptical ones on top communicate the overall size and thickness of the feature.
5. A more complex indentation shows us rounded edges and communicate the depth and shape.
6. This organic form also only needs 3 continuous contour lines to communicate the shape.

To add detail and realism to this sketch, another ellipse is added within the circular shape
on top. This will serve as a reference for the indentation on top of the enclosure.
Straight construction lines are useful for any kind of construction, including curved contour
lines. These are added vertically intersecting the crossed construction lines on top of the
cube. The skewed line from the outer contour to the inner circle will make the ring look as
though it's recessed. The contour tracing this surface is the same radius as the contour on
the end. The construction lines provide targets and tangent references for the arc.
A slight curve on the top and bottom of the slot are all that is needed to communicate that
these edges have depth and are also rounded. Another curve, following the construction
lines, shows that the top edge of the base is also rounded.
Line Weight + Other Details

The holes on the sides are given depth by adding parallel lines recessed on the inside, and
a short segment of the lower contour line turns along this edge.
The cap also has depth, and the edges will be rounded. Two straight segments are added
to the cap.
Curves are added to the ends following the rules of thumb about curves and construction
lines mentioned earlier.

With the contour lines in place, line weight can now be assigned with pens, making the
drawing permanent.
Heavy: The outer edge of the drawing (most depth to background).
Medium: The edges with lesser depth (edge of cap, spatial edges of slots).
Light: Seams and creases (interface between base and enclosure, seam between machine top
and bottom).
Extra Light: Contour lines
In the next lesson, you'll learn about light, shadow and shading to bring some realism and
detail to your drawings.
Shading: Visualizing Form


Now that you know the basic concepts, you can apply them to a sketch. The gray scale
markers are the best tool for this step, but you can fake it with cross-hatching if you'd rather
keep it simple. In the video, I'm working with four different shades of marker (N0-N8),
which is really all that's needed for this level of drawing.
It's always smart to start with the lightest shade- you can always make a drawing darker,
but you can't make it lighter with the tools we're working with. The construction lines
provide regions to shade, such as the area between the square on top and the circle. Use

the N0 for mid-tone areas. The N0 is used for the mid-tone areas on the side of the
drawing as well. Notice the rounded edges are left white.
The base of the machine enclosure will be a different material to articulate the geometry.
The next darkest marker is a good choice here.

The back side of the cube will have a core shadow. Notice that the shading on the rounded
corner to the left curves up, since it's a partial sphere. The edges of the shading should
follow the surface curvature, more or less.

In this step, darker tones are added to the flat sides and lower curve on the back of the
object. Brighter highlights are left on all of the upper edges of the parts. A darker core
shadow is added around the bottom edge of the base.

The dashed lines demonstrate the chosen light direction. The lines are parallel, providing
points for the corners of the box to be projected onto the ground. The outline should be
parallel to the top of the cube on the top and side, then a straight line connects the edge to
the bottom corner.
If you're not sure exactly how a shadow should be cast, all you have to do is put any object
in direct sunlight and move it around- you'll get the idea intuitively and eventually you won't
even have to think about it.

The darkest areas of the drawing are the slots in the sides, so those are shaded with the
N8 marker. The N6 marker is used for the cast shadow.
Finally, the cap casts a small shadow on the recess on the top, and the underside of the
recess gets core shading.

Where to Go From Here
There it is, your crash course in design sketching. My hope is that you picked up the skills
that will give you the confidence you need to start cranking out ideas on paper.
I can't stress enough the importance of practice. This skill takes a lot of patience and a lot
of time to develop. As you can probably tell from the sketches I produced in the videos, I'm
no expert at this, but that really doesn't matter. I'm good enough at it for my own purposes,
and with some practice you will be too.
Here's a list of my favorite resources for ID sketching if you want to dive deeper.
Learning Resources
The Design Sketchbook is the best formatted and most comprehensive resource I know of.
The website has a free PDF book, and the Youtube channel is awesome.
Coroflot has a lot of great portfolios of ID sketching.
Spencer Nugent also has a great Youtube channel with dozens of videos on everything from
drawing to rendering to shading to digital painting.
Other Tools
If you want to get into digital painting and drawing, there is no shortage of tools for you to
choose from. Digital a few advantages over analog tools, not the least of which is the Undo
command.
Autodesk Sketchbookis a powerful digital drawing an painting app for desktop and
mobile. It works really well with an iPad Pro with the Apple Pencil in my experience, but
there are lots of other options when it comes to interfaces, styli, tablets, etc.
They also have a great Youtube channel with plenty of tutorials.
Graphic is another great cross-platform app by Autodesk. It's a vector drawing app, which
means you have a lot more control of lines and shapes once you draw them. If you're more
of an engineer type who likes to use a ruler, this might be a good choice.
Anyway, have fun, and be sure to share whatever you make with the rest of us!

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instructables classes

DESIGN SKETCHING CLASS

Design Sketching Class: Page 1

Lesson 1: Tools & Materials

Lesson 2: Lesson 2: Drawing Technique

Lesson 3: Lesson 3: Drawing in 2D

Lesson 4: Lesson 4: Drawing in 3D

Lesson 5: Light and Shadow

Lesson 6: Case Study- White Noise Machine

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Tools & Materials

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Medium Weight (0.5) Ballpoint Pen

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Heavy Weight (0.7) Ballpoint Pen

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My horizontal lines from left to right aren't great either.

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Drawing (Almost) Perfect Circles

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A circle in a 3D view is an ellipse. If you think of the circle as something bounded by a

Remember the rules of thumb, and you'll get good results.

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