新
Symbols Life
renewal
ㄒㄧㄣ xīn
Two versions of the same picture, and both are free with no account and no watermark. The first has no background at all, which is the one to send your artist — but a phone or computer photo viewer set to dark will show black strokes on dark grey and it can look like nothing downloaded. If that happens, use the second one: identical characters on a plain white background. Either way you get the characters on their own — the square and the faint guide lines you see above are not in the file. Each character is 1000px, so a two-character download is 2000×1000, and the script and layout are the ones you picked.
Script
Characters
Same in both
Layout
Rubbing mode: white on black, as a stone rubbing. The download is unaffected.
Making something new again - a life, a season, a commitment. Chinese does this with the new character and with words for replacing what has worn out.
Before you commit
Choose with care新 is an adjective. Alone it reads as new rather than renewal, which is a clean, plain statement but not quite the abstract noun.
Pairs well with革新 for genuine renewal and reform, or 日新 from the classical line about renewing yourself daily. Both read as considered rather than decorative.
At small sizesThirteen strokes, split left and right. Holds together reasonably small; the axe element on the right is forgiving.
Meaning
New, fresh, newly; to renew.
The simplest and clearest carrier of the idea, understood everywhere.
Other characters for “renewal”
What to do next
Pick the script and layout you want above, download the PNG, and send that file to your artist. Ask them to work from the file rather than redrawing the character freehand — that is where strokes go missing.
Related concepts