Combining Analog and Digital Note-taking

Introduction

• Speaker's journey with note-taking: started with pocket notebooks and transitioned to digital note-taking using Obsidian.
• The tactile satisfaction of writing in physical notebooks and the joy of accumulating ideas and sketches.
• Introduction to Obsidian: simple yet powerful note-taking software.
• Obsidian as a second brain: helps keep track of notes, documents, and projects.
• Communities around Field Notes and Obsidian.

Integrating Field Notes with Obsidian

Initial Steps

• Decided to combine the analog joy of physical notes with the power of digital notes in Obsidian.
• Importance of retaining the best parts of handwritten notes while making them searchable and organized in Obsidian.

Scanning Process

• Used a flatbed scanner set at 600 DPI for clear and manageable file sizes.
• Recommendation: scan in color to capture different pen colors used.
• Save scans as PNGs or high-quality JPEGs to avoid artifacts.

Cleanup Process

• Used Affinity Photo for cleaning up scans (Photoshop or similar software can be used).
• Separated ink from the page using the magic wand tool (tolerance level around 20% works best).
• Refine options are used for anti-aliasing and smoothing the selection.
• Create a new layer for ink and apply a color overlay effect.
• Clean up junk around corners using the eraser tool.

Handling Text and Diagrams

• Transcribe pages of text directly into Obsidian for better searchability.
• For diagrams and sketches with text, keep the original handwritten look to retain character.
• Save line work as PNG files with clear backgrounds for easier integration into Obsidian.
• Use embedded file name with pipe operator to resize images within Obsidian.

Customization in Obsidian

• Use CSS for per-note customization to retain the look and feel of handwritten notes.
• Developed themes for changing page color, text color, and pen color in Obsidian.
• CSS snippets for these themes are available on GitHub.
• Installation: Download the file, place it in the Obsidian CSS Snippets folder, and enable the snippet in settings.

Advanced Customization

• Adding multicolor text and diagrams using Span or div HTML tags with pen color classes.
• Drawbacks: HTML tags lose markdown formatting.
• Solutions for embedded diagrams with different background colors.

Searchability and OCR

• Options for making text in diagrams searchable:
  1. Use Omni search and text extractor plugins for OCR.
  2. Manually transcribe and store text in the note's front matter.
  3. Use the Excal plugin to transcribe text, though results may vary.

Conclusion

• Personal project aimed at combining physical and digital note-taking methods.
• Encouragement to subscribe for more creative deep dives.