Despite its falling popularity, the traditional lecture has remained a key feature in the first year of many undergraduate programs. Advances in slideware technology and lecture capture have had a positive impact on student engagement. However, with current approaches, material written on the whiteboard can be difficult and expensive to capture. This practice report describes an innovative approach for enhancing the effectiveness of the traditional first year lecture through the use of ‘digital ink’ technology. By incorporating a USB touch tablet into the lecture presentation, hand-written material is captured live and made available for capture by the standard university lecture capture system. Feedback from students has been overwhelmingly positive, suggesting that this is an effective approach to improving engagement and enhancing the presentation of material in first year lectures.