Medical illustrations and diagrams

Last revised by Daniel J Bell ◉ on 17 Dec 2021

Citation, DOI, disclosures and article data

Citation:

Skalski M, Bell D, Knipe H, et al. Medical illustrations and diagrams. Reference article, Radiopaedia.org (Accessed on 08 Jun 2023) https://doi.org/10.53347/rID-22518

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.53347/rID-22518

Permalink:

https://radiopaedia.org/articles/22518?iframe=true

rID:

22518

Article created:

4 Apr 2013, Matt Skalski ◉

Disclosures:

At the time the article was created Matt Skalski had no recorded disclosures.

View Matt Skalski's current disclosures

Last revised:

17 Dec 2021, Daniel J Bell ◉

Disclosures:

At the time the article was last revised Daniel J Bell had no recorded disclosures.

View Daniel J Bell's current disclosures

Revisions:

23 times, by 9 contributors - see full revision history and disclosures

Tags:

help, illustration, diagram, annotated, annotation, anatomy, label

Synonyms:

Medical illustrations
Medical diagrams

High-quality medical illustrations and diagrams form an important part of Radiopaedia.org.

original illustrations created by you (you still have to state this in the description unless you have added a signature and license information - see below)
public domain image (source and original file needs to be listed in the case findings)
image reproduced with permission by the author/IP holder (again, this must be explicitly stated).

Quality

Illustrations should have sufficient detail to accurately depict both the basic anatomy of the region and pathology of the condition, in a clear and understandable manner. "Free-style" drawing is discouraged.

Illustrations should also be of high enough resolution as to view all relevant structures easily. Illustrations do not need to contain anatomic structures that are not relevant to the condition being depicted.

minimum resolution: 1600 x 1600 pixels
square image ratios only: all other image dimensions are automatically converted to square resolutions with black extension of the canvas when uploaded

Labeling

header labels at the top of the image should be in bold with a leading capital letter
structure labels should be all lower-case (eponyms excepted) in regular font (no bold or italic)
labeled structures should be indicated using a fine black or white line to the label
- no arrowheads (these are distracting and do not add to clarity)
- lines are preferably horizontal, vertical, 45 degrees or a combination of these
use 'drop shadow' with white text and lines

Fonts

Google Open Sans is the preferred font for all Radiopaedia content. It is a free Google font and can be installed on Windows and Mac computers.

download Open Sans font

Acceptable alternatives:

Windows: Myriad Pro
Mac: Helvetica Neue

Artist signature

the artist's name or initials may be contained within the image in a non-obstructive, non-distracting location, preferably in the bottom right corner; this should not be larger in the vertical dimension than the smallest font size in the image
creative commons license is at artist’s discretion, however, the default on Radiopaedia is BY-NC-SA
do not watermark images

Image background color

The illustration background color should ideally be plain white, plain black, or black with a subtle circular grey gradient.

Templates

The following templates illustrate the above requirements and can be easily modified to suit your illustration. Each file includes plain white, plain black and gradient backgrounds.