This article demonstrates an analytical and arts-based approach using drawings as tools to retain the visual information in a film visual, throughout the research process as well as for thinking. The approach brings in methods and theory from disciplines using visual materials as data: Visual Anthropology, Ethnomethodology/Conversation Analysis (EMCA), Art History and Film Studies. Furthermore, tools and reflections on how to sketch, draw and construct analytical images using paper and pen, technical tools such as features in movie players and image processing software, and basic drawing apps on a tablet, are presented and demonstrated in empirical examples from a study on preschool naptime. The drawn analysis are abstractions of the visual data where certain visual aspects, visible in the film, are re-used thus creating a direct link between the film and the drawing that preserve visual aspects of the original throughout the research process. This gains new knowledge, further and different knowledge than just using words. Also, the drawings address ethical issues as children's right to anonymity in a study. The visual remake is proposed as a term for this arts-based approach to highlight, enhance and visualise the features of films that are of special interest to an enquiry and facilitate comparative analysis.

In previous historical studies on preschools, the main sources are texts; photos are used merely as illustrations. Inspired by the idea to use visual materials to study the look of the past by scrutinising historical photos and films of naptime in preschool, this article will shed light on preschool as an institution and on the materiality of naptime practices. The data comprise of historical photographs and films from the period 1900–1970 (in total 14 films and approximately 200 photographs that, in one way or the other, depict naptime: adult and child interaction, the beds' constructions, the material organization of rooms and naptime routines). By using visual analyses, visualizations and the notion of path dependence, the article shows how the everyday practice of napping was carried out in the historical preschool in relation to questions of continuity and change. The results suggest that the design of beds, as child-sized and easy to move and store, can be understood as defining the institution as a preschool with play and educational practices as its main purpose. At the same time, however, the beds themselves indicate that care, as sleep or napping, was an essential practice in historic preschools.