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Create a Coffee Cup Mock Up in Adobe Illustrator Using the 3D Revolve Effect
May 22nd
Adobe Illustrator’s 3D effects can be a used to create quick, yet realistic product mock-ups. While not a full ray-tracing 3D application, Illustrator’s 3D feature is quite sophisticated, and it has some advantages over its more expensive counterparts. For starters, vector objects and effects can be scaled to any size without loss of quality. It’s easy to re-purpose vector art you’ve already created, plus you don’t have to leave the friendly confines of Illustrator. And as you’ll see in the following steps, the learning curve is not nearly as steep. Let’s get started! 1. Draw the Outline of Half a Cup The first step is to draw a path that will form the 3D shape. You might want to use a photograph for reference, or a sketch. Or you can just experiment, modifying the path after you apply the 3D effect. The 3D effect, like all Illustrator effects are “live”. That means it can be edited as many times as you like, without degrading the quality of the image. I used a photo reference to draw a simple path, as shown below. You don’t have to draw the entire cup outline, just the right half of it. 2. Add a Lip to the Top …
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Create a Coffee Cup Mock Up in Adobe Illustrator Using the 3D Revolve Effect
Quick Tip: Create a Set of Neon Art and Scatter Brushes in Illustrator
May 13th
Follow this quick tip and create your own collection of Neon Brushes in Adobe Illustrator. You will create Art Brushes and also Scatter Brushes, different colors and sizes that you can use in your projects. You’ll continue to see how you can save a set of brushes for use in the future and examples of some great quick effects you can create with your brushes. 1. Start Your New Project First, create a New document by going to File > New . Type a name and select the dimensions then hit OK . Next, use the Rectangle Tool (M) to draw a black rectangle into your artboard because these neon brushes work best on a dark background. 2. Create Your First Neon Art Brush Step 1 Grab the Ellipse Tool (L) and draw an 83 x 30px ellipse and give it a black fill. With the ellipse selected, go to Object > Transform > Scale and type 50% in the Uniform section then hit Copy . Change the fill color of the resulting smaller ellipse from black to blue then move it a little to the left. Now, scale the blue path to obtain the tiny white ellipse but this time select a value of 20% . Move this ellipse to the left also and make sure the three shapes are aligned horizontally. Step 2 Use the Ellipse Tool (L) to draw other three ellipses with the dimensions below. Align…
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Quick Tip: Create a Set of Neon Art and Scatter Brushes in Illustrator
Quick Tip: The Character Panel in Adobe Illustrator
May 3rd
In this Quick Tip screencast, we take a look at the Character panel in Adobe Illustrator. This comprehensive guide will show you what each field does, and you’ll learn some time-saving keyboard shortcuts for setting the character attributes of your text.
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Quick Tip: The Character Panel in Adobe Illustrator
Create Detailed Tulips With Gradient Mesh, Without the Mesh Tool in Illustrator
Apr 30th
We’re celebrating spring in this tutorial! Here you will learn how to draw beautiful tulips in a vase. We’ll start with a 3D base and then go on to create tulips with Gradient Meshes without the Mesh Tool, all in Adobe Illustrator. So let’s take a closer look. 1. Open a New Document First, open a new document ( File > New ) then type a name and select these dimensions. 2. Create the 3D Vase Step 1 Grab the Pen Tool (P) and draw a path like below representing half of a flower vase. Make sure that the Rulers are …
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Create Detailed Tulips With Gradient Mesh, Without the Mesh Tool in Illustrator
Quick Tip: How to Create a Simple Hanging Sign in Adobe Illustrator
Apr 25th
In the following steps you will learn how to turn simple hanging sign illustration in Adobe Illustrator. For starters you will only need a simple rectangle. Taking full advantage of the Appearance panel we will add colors, highlights and some simple shading for this rectangle. Once you have your main piece we’ll create the rest of the shapes using basic tools and effects along with some simple vector shape building techniques. 1. Create a New Document Hit Command + N to create a new document. Enter 600 in the width box and height boxes then click on the Advanced button. Select RGB, Screen (72ppi) and make sure that the “Align New Objects to Pixel Grid” box is unchecked before your click OK. Enable the Grid (View > Show Grid) and the Snap to Grid (View > Snap to Grid). …
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Quick Tip: How to Create a Simple Hanging Sign in Adobe Illustrator
Using the Blend Tool to Create a Halftone Effect Portrait in Adobe Illustrator
Apr 16th
The Blend Tool has been part of Adobe Illustrator for a long time and it’s very simple to work with. The tool creates objects that fill the space between two key objects. Let’s say we have a square as object A and a circle as object B; the Blend Tool will create intermediate figure shapes between these two objects. You can add how many steps you want and it remains editable until you expand it. We can use this tool to create many effects. In this tutorial I’ll show you how to use the Blend Tool to create semi-realistic halftones with lines. 1. Prepare Your Stock Image in Adobe Photoshop Step 1 To create a semi realistic illustration, a good stock is essential. Let’s work with this image of this beautiful model. Another good point of this picture is the light source that creates dark shadows and visible halftones. This makes it easier to identity where our shading will be created. Step 2 Our work will be done in black and white, using black lines as halftones. Therefore a basic image treatment will help us to…
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Using the Blend Tool to Create a Halftone Effect Portrait in Adobe Illustrator
How to Create a Cute Burger Character & Then Turning It Into a Pattern for Cross Stitching
Apr 5th
Jump into Adobe Illustrator and create a cute cheeseburger character from scratch. Then you’ll be creating a grid and converting your image into a pixelled character perfect for resizing or cross-stitching application. You can check out the second part of this tutorial, the cross stitching process, over on Crafttuts+ . 1. Create Your Burger Base Start with a tan filled circle using the Ellipse Tool (L). Draw a Rectangle (M) and place it over the circle in a fashion similar to image #2 below. Select both shapes, hit Minus Front in Pathfinder and Ungroup the shapes. Now you can edit the hamburger bun shapes by pulling the anchor handles and moving the halves to your desired location. 2. Create Your Filling and Sesame Seeds To fill up your burger, use the Rounded Rectangle Tool for the meat and tomato slice. Place them behind the buns. Draw the lettuce with the Pencil Tool (N) and create bits of cheese slices with the Pen Tool (P). Add little details like sesame seeds with the Pen Tool (P) and copy and paste around the bun. Group all shapes together (CTRL + G). 3. Add Hands & a Face To personify our little friend, we’ll need to add some cute little hands. Draw them with the Pencil Tool (N), Copy and Paste the gloved hand, and rotate the image over…
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How to Create a Cute Burger Character & Then Turning It Into a Pattern for Cross Stitching
Quick Tip: How to Create a Gradient on Stroke Effect in Adobe Illustrator CS5
Apr 4th
In Adobe Illustrator CS6, Gradient on Stroke was introduced. Although you can’t do this in an earlier version, we’re going to show you a work around for it in Illustrator CS5. We’re going to do this by creating a Blend from a Gradient and even show you how to modify it using the Width Tool (SHIFT + W). We’ll then go on to create a quick trumpet illustration to show you what you can do with the Gradient. 1. Create a Gradient Filled Rectangle Using the Rectangle Tool (M), click on the Artboard to open a dialog box. Set the width to 1pt and the height to 10pt and hit OK. If necessary, delete the stroke around the new shape. Open the Gradient panel (Windows > Gradient). With the shape selected, set the angle to 90 degrees and make a gradient similar to the one shown. 2. Expand the Gradient & Delete the Clipping Path With the shape still selected go to Object > Expand. Now open the Layers panel and expand the Group by clicking the arrow to reveal a Clipping Path. Click to the right of the Clipping Path in …
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Quick Tip: How to Create a Gradient on Stroke Effect in Adobe Illustrator CS5
Quick Tip: Creating a Bazinga! Text Treatment in Adobe Illustrator
Apr 1st
With this tutorial I’ll show you how to create a Bazinga text effect made famous by Sheldon from the sitcom The Big Bang Theory in Adobe Illustrator. We’ll be using some techniques to add multiple effects to a single shape, also duplicating and copying objects quickly, as well as creating a pattern and even rotating that pattern without disrupting the shape it’s applied too. Tip: Please be aware that you may have to install fonts before you open Illustrator in order for it to show up in your list of fonts. 1. Create a New Document Let’s start off by preparing our document. Open Illustrator and hit Command + N to create a New document. You can make your document any size but for this tutorial I’ll be using a default desktop wallpaper size so enter 1024 in the width box and 768 in the height box then click on the Advanced button . Select RGB , Screen (72ppi) and make sure…
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Quick Tip: Creating a Bazinga! Text Treatment in Adobe Illustrator
Quick Tip: How to Make Longcat Truly Infinitely Long in Adobe Illustrator
Apr 1st
The Internet has been taken over by cats and one of the Internet’s famous characters and memes is Longcat . He’s known for his incredibly long length and is subject to many Photoshop graphics. However don’t you think, out of all the cat memes, this one should be in vector? In today’s tutorial, I’m going to show you how to create a Longcat Pattern Brush in Adobe Illustrator. 1. Planning Your Pattern Brush from a Photo Step 1 Whenever you consider creating a Pattern Brush, the basic theory is to consider the subject in multiple parts. Firstly, the center of the Pattern Brush will be the repeating element. Then if you’re going more in depth, consider the ends of the brush and perhaps the inner and outer corners. For Longcat, I’m going to be breaking him down into two ends (head and feet/tail) and his abdomen center. Use the Line Segment Tool () to create clear boundaries which break up you subject and then Select All (Ctrl + A) and create a Compound Path (Ctrl + 
. Step 2 Draw a Rectangle (M) around the overall subject and then use your lines with the Pathfinder panel to Divide the rectangle. As all the elements which make the brush won’t be central (for instance the tummy isn’t central), then you’ll need these three rectangles set to Opacity 0% to create invisible boundaries for your brush later on in the process. For now, they’ll be acting as a guide. Take this opportunity to enable Smart Guides (Ctrl + U) to help snap your objects and lines to your brush boundaries. Step 3 So let’s…
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Quick Tip: How to Make Longcat Truly Infinitely Long in Adobe Illustrator