How can I prepare artwork for printing

[Ferrari3469]

I have several hand drawn pictures that I want to be able to print on various substrates(wall hanging, cups, shirts) ..... I don't necessarily want to vectorize them but I'm open to suggestions. I'm using the current Illustrator mainly.

[Doug A Roberts]

If you don't want to 'vectorise' them, what exactly do you want to do? You could print raster versions and you wouldn't need to involve Illustrator.

[Jacob Bugge]

Ferrari,

It is always a good plan to involve, or simply ask, the printer(s) in question who will be able to, and prefer to, tell you specifications including raster/vector and requirements to possible resolution of raster images/effects (at final size).

[Simmer1]

Hi,

Vector is great for printing on all the mentioned mediums especially as the files sizes remain relatively small compared to other programs, like Photoshop for example. 

Thanks,

Sim

[Bill Silbert]

The only way to "vectorize" hand drawn pictures is to scan them and then either use Illustrator's Image Trace feature or use the scan as a template to actually redraw them using the drawing tools in Illustrator. The results with Image Trace tend to be very erratic and unpredictable and redrawing requires both skill with Illustrator's tools and actual drawing ability. So it seems like the best way to proceed is to make high resolution scans and print them out of Photoshop. If you don't actually have Photoshop you can place the scans in Illustrator and print directly out of there. You can also set up an InDesign document (if you have that program) and make a single multi-page document containing all of the drawings which can be sent to output all at once.

[Ferrari3469]

Thank you for the answers......I'm currently working on purchasing an older Microsoft Surface Pro 4, so that I can actually "draw" them into my Illustrator program.

[d0nut247]

I'd still check what the final output (printer) needs from you,

its great to learn new skills etc, but if you are currently using real life pens pencils, paint etc, it's going to give you a different look from that of pure vector work.

there are plenty of art apps on surface and ipad etc that do great vector work but its definitely a different style. and there are also great raster apps like procreate, that can lift your game (if like me youre not totally fantastic with real world media). allowing adjsutments and fixes, plus endless colours etc. but the result is raster, and as such youre still better off goign via photoshop / indesign for most stuff, rather than illustrator.