Preview of Final Results

3D Textured Text Photoshop Tutorial

Step 1

Open up Illustrator, and with the Type Tool type a letter or text, I typed the letter “C” I used the font Adobe Caslon Pro, you can use any font that you like, just make sure that it is a bit thick font to yield better results. I set the font size to 400 pt & scaled it horizontally & vertically to 150% through the Character Palette, though don’t worry about the font size too much because we’ll be pasting it as Smart Objects in Photoshop so we can adjust the size at any given time. The color I used for the letter is #8CC63F.

Step 2

Now go to Effect>3D>Extrude & Bevel, make sure that Preview is on. Use the settings shown below, apart from specifying rotations for x, y & z axis, I chose Tall-Round from the Bevel drop down list. The settings will more or less depend on the font, so if you have used a different font play a bit, though I will advise to stay away from the fancier Bevel settings, mostly None setting works best. You can also make it more thick by increasing the Extrude Depth.

Step 3

After you’re happy with your 3D effect, it will be time to move on over to Photoshop. Open a new document in Photoshop. Now, copy your 3D text/letter from Illustrator & paste it as Smart Object in Photoshop, press Enter key or checkmark to commit. You can now resize your text to whatever size you want, in fact, bigger the better, but for the purposes of this tutorial, I will stick to a small canvas.

Power Tip: If for any reason, you want to edit the pasted 3D Smart Object, just double click on the Vector Smart Object thumbnail in the Layer Palette, press OK on the resulting window, the Smart Object will automatically open up in Illustrator, do the changes or editing you want, then go to File>Save & close the file & tadaa the changes will reflect in your Photoshop file.

Step 4

Now, lets begin with the Photoshop magic, we will be adding various texture on the different layers & will spice them up with the variety of blending modes, the key is to experiment & choose the settings that will best suit your purpose.

Open the texture image that you would like to use, for the first layer I used a texture, lets call it Texture 1 from a texture pack on deviantArt. Go to Select>All & then Edit>Copy to copy the entire texture image, Now we are going to paste this image into our letter, but you have to tell Photoshop where to paste it. So return to your 3D text document & pressing down Ctrl/Cmd Click on Vector Smart Object thumbnail, this will select the entire text/letter, in our case, the letter “C”, now go to Edit>Paste Into (Shift+Ctrl/Cmd+V) to paste the texture image on “C”. Change the blending mode of the texture layer to Overlay.

Now, your image & layer palette should look like so:

Look at your layers palette now. You see your texture image there and a mask has been made that allows only the letter part of the image to show.

If you’re using different images, play around a bit with blending modes, mostly Overlay, Soft Light, Hard light, Multiply will give the desired results.

Step 5

Repeat the procedure prescribed in Step 4, but with a different texture. I used one of the texture from this pack.

In brief, open the texture image, Select All (Ctrl/Cmd+A), Copy it (Ctrl/Cmd+C) & return to your original document, pressing down Ctrl/Cmd Click on Vector Smart Object thumbnail to select the letter/text & go to Edit>Paste Into (Shift+Ctrl/Cmd+V) to paste the texture in the letter “C”. And, change the blending mode to Multiply.

Step 6

Now, its again time to do the same thing as mentioned in Step 4 & 5, but with the different texture image. This time I used a more colorful texture from a another texture pack over at deviantArt. And, this time I choose the blending mode to Soft Light.

This is how my image & Layer Palette looks like after step 6.

Power Tip: If you need to edit the filler texture image or if you don’t like how it looks within the letter, you can still change it! Just choose the Move Tool (V) & drag over with your texture layer selected. Also, if you need to resize the texture image select Edit>Transform to resize it.

Step 7

Now, select the Background layer & fill with a Gradient Tool (G). I used Linear Gradient & the colors for the two stops are as prescribed in the screenshot. Drag the gradient tool diagonally from bottom to top.

Step 8

Pressing down Shift key select all the layers in the Layer Palette except the background layer & Link all of them. Also make sure to link the Layer Mask thumbnails with their corresponding layer thumbnails by clicking once between them.

Step 9

Now, we will do the reflection of our letter “C”. For that, select all the linked layers & duplicate them.

Step10

Merge all the duplicated layers & name it Reflection.

Step 11

On the Reflection layer, go to Edit>Transform>Flip Vertical & place it beneath the letter “C”. Adjust its perspective if the need be.

Step 12

The next step is to add a layer mask to the duplicate layer. To do this simply click on the add layer mask button in the layers palette.

Now pick the Gradient Tool (G) and draw a gradient (black to white) in the direction from bottom to mid top.

Finally just reduce the opacity of the duplicate layer and you are all done. I reduced the opacity to 20% , there is no golden rule about the opacity % , just play with the opacity setting & choose the one that suits your image.

Step 13

Finally, with the Type Tool, I wrote the words “for creativity” with the settings as shown in the Character Palette.

The font used is Larissa & can be downloaded from here. I also rotated the words a bit via Edit>Transform.

Then I applied the layer style, as shown in the screenshots below.

Step 14

To add a bit of finishing touch, I added Outer Glow to the Vector Smart Object layer, as shown.

And, that’s how my Layers palette in end & final image looks like.

Here, is a another example of image, I made with the same technique.

To take it further, play & experiment with various textures, the blending modes, also changing the various Adjustments options like Invert, Posterize, Hue/Saturations settings etc. gives the different results. You can also make the text look grungy or rusty using grunge textures, its just the matter of exploring the powers of Photoshop & tapping your creativity!

::GFXZoOM::source:photoshoptutorials.ws::

::GFXZoOM::source:transfuchsian.blogspot.com::

Final image:

Here’s how you do it:

1. First we will create a border for the image that will keep everything we draw within a nice clean shape. Start by drawing two rectangles with the Rounded Rectangle Tool. You can use the Pathfinder Palette like in step 2 to make a traditional matte or the more simple technique is to make just one rectangle with a really thick stroke.

2. Select both rectangles and then in the Pathfinder Palette click on “Substract from Shape area” and then click on expand. Now make the new shape white and place it on it’s own layer and keep all other layers below it. As we continue throughout the tutorial you can make new layers as you see fit to place your different objects on. I will leave that up to your discretion; as such, I won’t be pointing out when we make new layers.

3. Draw a new rectangle and apply to it a blue gradient. This is the basis of what will become the sky. Note that this looks like a rounded corner rectangle because it is behind the matte layer.

4.Using the Pen Tool (P) draw some wavy shapes on the scene that will become the grass.

5. Now to make the bushes. Using the Pen Tool draw an abstract shape like below.

6. Select the new shape and go to Effects -> Distort & Transform -> Zig Zag and put in the settings below or you can experiment to get something different.

7. Next we will make a few variations of the bush shape. First copy it two times and then fill the copies with slightly different gradients. Finally double-click on Zig Zag in the Appearance palette and play with the settings a bit to vary each shape.

8. Select the 3 shapes and go to Object -> Expand Appearance. This will lock the Zig Zag effect we applied.

9. Now place the 3 shapes on a new layer behind the grass field and scatter them arround however you would like them to look. A simple way to copy them arround is to hold down the Alt key while dragging the shape. This will make a copy of it in the release spot.

10. Next we will create the sun rays. Start by drawing a hourglass shape like below.

11. Press Ctrl+Shift+Alt+D to open the Transform window, put in the settings as below and press Copy.

12. Repeat the previous step until you get a full circle.

13. Go to Object -> Envelope Distort -> Make with Warp (Ctrl+Shift+Alt+W), select Twist and set Bend to 100%.

14. Move this shape over the scene, go to Object -> Expand Appearance and click OK.

15. Set the fill color to white and Opacity to 10%.

16. Now to make the Sun: draw a circle and apply a Radial gradient to it.

17. Duplicate the Sun (press Ctrl+C to copy and Ctrl+F to paste in front)

18. Set the fill color to yellow and then go to Effect – > Blur -> Gaussian Blur.

Conclusion

You should now have a better insight into what it takes to use simple shapes, color, and gradients to create a summer landscape environment. A pleasing illustration is not always about intricacy, one of the most rudimentary factors is composition. Keep practicing, learning, and continue to have fun.

::GFXZoOM::source:talextech.net::

Functions

• Type Tool: Click on the artboard to begin a Point Text object, alternatively click and drag, or click on a Closed Path to create an Area Type object.

  

• Area Type Tool: Click on a Closed Path to create an Area Type object, which constrains text within that path.

  

• Type on a Path Tool: Click on a path to constrain text along that path.

  

• Vertical Type Tool: Click on the artboard to begin a Point Text object with vertically flowing text.

  

• Vertical Area Type Tool: Click on a Closed Path to create an Area Type object containing vertically flowing text.

  

• Vertical Type on a Path Tool: Click on a path to constrain vertically flowing text along that path.

  

Keyboard Shortcuts

• Select the Type Tool (T)
• Show/Hide Character Panel (Command + T)
• Show/Hide Open Type Panel (Alt + Shift + Command + T)
• Show/Hide Paragraph Panel (Alt + Command + T)
• Show/Hide Tabs Panel (Shift + Command + T)
• Create Outlines (Shift + Command + O)
• Show/Hide Hidden Characters (Alt + Command + I)

Cursors

• Prepared to place type on artboard
• Prepared to place an Area Type object
• Prepared to place Type on a Path
• Prepared to place vertically flowing type on the artboard
• Prepared to place a vertically flowing Area Type object
• Prepared to place vertically flowing Type on a Path
• Direct Selection cursor prepared to place a linked container for flowing text
• Direct Selection cursor prepared to place a linked Area Type object for flowing text
• Direct Selection cursor prepared to edit end handles on a Type Path.
• Direct Selection cursor prepared to edit central handle on a Type Path.
• In the process of typing (blinking cursor)

Keyboard Controls

1. Hold Shift whilst Type tool is selected to switch between vertical and horizontal orientation.
2. Press Esc whilst Typing to release from Type object. Selection tool is chosen and Type object remains selected.

The Panels

Type is a huge part of what Illustrator does and as a result the list of options for defining text is immense. The most appropriate panels when working on text-based documents can be revealed by going to Window > Workspace > [Type]. This default workspace will give you all the essential type-editing panels. Further panels can be found under Window > Type, and the most crucial are listed below with brief descriptions.

The Character Panel (Window > Type > Character)

Your text-editing work-horse. Here you can alter the appearance of your type, character by character. Here are some useful terms found in the Character panel :

• Font family (self-explanatory, in this case Myriad Pro)
• Font style (version of the font such as Regular, Bold, Light, Condensed etc.)
• Leading (line-height)
• Kerning (spacing between two characters)
• Tracking (character spacing across a selection)
• Horizontal scale (character width)
• Vertical scale (character height)
• Baseline shift (height of baseline upon which text sits)
• Character rotation (rotation in degrees of specified characters)

The Paragraph Panel (Window > Type > Paragraph)

All your basic options for defining paragraphs (sections of text separated by line breaks). Options here include indentation, alignment, and spacing above and below paragraphs.

Also worth noting is the Hyphenation option. When selected this allows words to be hyphenated (-) should they be too long for the text area and need wrapping to the following line. Where exactly the words become hyphenated is defined by the current selected language (see Character Panel). Make sure therefore that if you choose Hyphenation that the selected language corresponds with the language of the text.

The Open Type Panel (Window > Type > Open Type)

This Panel is used to define how you wish to display alternate Open Type characters within your document. Alternative characters available for the selected font family can be seen in the Glyphs Panel (see below).

The Glyph Panel (Window > Type > Glyphs)

The Glyphs Panel displays alternative characters available for any given font. With the type cursor prepared for typing on your artboard, click on a glyph to insert it into your document. This panel allows different sized thumbnails for ease of viewing, selection menu to display only certain glyphs, and drop-down menus for alternatives.

The Character Styles Panel (Window > Type > Character Styles)

Invaluable when building a document with recurring styles. In the same way that InDesign uses defined styles and CSS defines element styles, here you can predefine styles to apply to multiple instances of type. For example, you have a header which you set to 18pt, Bold, and underlined.

Use the New Character Style from the panel submenu and set these attributes as a style. Future instances of text to which you apply this style will adopt this appearance. Should you edit the style with Redefine Character Style, then all text instances with the style will be automatically updated.

The Paragraph Styles Panel (Window > Type > Paragraph Styles)

This acts in the same way as the Character Styles Panel but (obviously) applies styles to paragraphs.

The Tabs Panel (Window > Type > Tabs)

Whilst text is selected, open this panel to have it appear directly above your text. Add and edit tabs applying immediate results on the selected text.

The Type Toolbar

Simple, yet effective. All your fundamental type options are on the toolbar above your artboard. (Paragraph alignment options shown here apply to vertically orientated text as the vertical type tool is currently selected.)

Preferences

Go to Illustrator > Preferences > Type. Listed here are some of the more important options under the Type Preferences dialogue:

• Size / Leading (line-height)
• Tracking (character spacing across a selection)
• Baseline shift (height of baseline upon which text sits)
• Type object selection by path only (allows selection of type only by clicking on the object’s path, not the text)
• Number of Recent Fonts (determines how many recently used fonts are shown under Type > Recent Fonts for quick selection
• Font Preview (determines whether or not font previews are displayed under Type > Font and at what size)

Go to Illustrator > Preferences > Hyphenation. Just as explained under The Paragraph Panel this determines the base language of your text for hyphenation purposes. Exceptions are also allowed, which won’t be hyphenated when text wrapping is needed. In this example, Vectortuts and Tutorial are made exempt from hyphenation.

Other Hints and Tips

Text Flow Between Containers

With the Direct Selection Tool, click on the small red cross icon on an Area Type Object (this appears when text is too large for the container). Clicking again on the artboard will create a container of equal dimensions, clicking and dragging will create a container of whatever dimensions you determine. Your text will automatically flow between the newly linked containers.

Deleting Empty Type Objects

Go to Object > Path > Clean Up and select Empty Text Paths to remove unwanted empty type objects which may have slipped your attention.

Handling Type on a Path

Use the Direct Selection tool to edit handle positions along a Type Path. Handles affect start points, end points, position, and the baseline (whether above or below a path). Use the central handle to flip the baseline or go to Type > Type On A Path > Type On A Path Options, select Flip, and click OK.

::GFXZoOM |source:tutsplus.com::

Final Image Preview

Below is the final type treatment image to show you what we’re working towards.

Step 1

Before we get started in Illustrator, download the Museo Font, and install it on your system.

Step 2

Create a new Letter sized document, then use the Rectangle Tool (M) to create a rectangle that is the size of your document.

Step 3

Fill the rectangle with a Radial Gradient from the Gradient Panel. Change the first swatch on the Gradient slider to a violet color and change the second swatch to a dark violet color.

Step 4

With the Line Tool (\), draw a line at a 45 degree angle that stretches from the bottom left corner to the top right side. Change the stroke to 5 pt and change the color to white (so you can see it against the background, but we will be changing it soon).

Step 5

Select the line with the Selection Tool (V) while holding down Alt, and drag out a copy to the right and down so the copied line is still inside the background.

Step 6

Select both lines and and create a blend by going to Object > Blend > Make. Next, go to Object > Blend > Blend Options, to bring up the Blend Options dialog. Change the Spacing to Specified Steps from the drop-down menu and change the option to 15.

Step 7

With the blend selected, go to Object > Expand to separate the blend. With the lines still selected, expand again, to outline the stokes.

Step 8

Fill the outlined line with the same Radial Gradient that you used for the background, but change the first swatch to a lighter violet than before.

Step 9

Select the lines and the background, then use the Gradient Tool (G) to adjust the gradient. Click in the middle of the rectangle and drag to the top of the rectangle. This will match up the transitions on the gradients.

Step 10

Create a ellipse with the Ellipse Tool (L) that is 10 px by 10 px. Fill it will a violet color.

Step 11

With the ellipse selected, go to Object > Path > Offset, to bring up the Offset Path dialog. In the dialog, change the Offset to -4 px. Change the offset ellipse to a light orange.

Step 12

Select the bigger ellipse and change the opacity to 0 from the Transparency Panel. Select both ellipses and create a blend by going to Object > Blend > Make.

Step 13

Before you start making a brush in this step, save a copy of the blend for later use. Select the new blend and drag it into the Brush Panel. When the New Brush dialog opens, select New Scatter Brush from the dialog. When the Scatter Brush Options dialog opens you are going to need to change a couple of settings.

First change all the drop-down menus to Random except the Rotation. Change the first field for the Size to 20 and the second field to 100. For the Spacing, change the first to 15 and the second to 115. For the Scatter, change the first to -220 and the second to 175.

Step 14

With the Brush Tool (B), draw a wavy brush stroke in the middle of your background, creating a scatter of your blend.

Step 15

With the brush stroke selected, change the Blend Mode to Overlay from the Transparency Panel and give it an Opacity of 25.

Step 16

Draw four to five more brush strokes, then change all of them to Overlay. Change the opacity on the stroke, but vary the percentage as well as the stroke weights.

Step 17

Select the blend copy that you saved from Step 13 and scale it to 52 px by 52 px.

Step 18

Set the copied shape to Overlay and it place over your brush strokes.

Step 19

Copy (Command + C) the blend ellipse and Paste (Command + V) a couple more times. Scale the copies separately to get varying sizes, then place them in different spots over the brush strokes.

Step 20

That should do it for the background. Now let’s take a look at the text. Type out some copy and change the font to the Museo font you downloaded. Change the Tracking to -100 from the Character Panel. Outline the text by going to Type > Create Outlines.

Step 21

With the outlines selected go Object > Ungroup (Command + Shift + G).

Step 22

In this step we’re going to modify the text. If you typed something different, the basic idea of connecting the letters will be the same. With the Direct Selection Tool (A), press Shift and select the top right line on the V. Drag the line until it’s overlapping the E. You might need to modify individual anchor point as well. In the example below, I dragged the top right anchor point to the right to close up the gap.

Step 23

Continue doing this to the other horizontal elements of the outline text until all the text is connected.

Step 24

Fill the text with a Linear Gradient. Add another swatch to the Linear Gradient by clicking right below the Gradient Slider in the Gradient Panel to give you a three swatch gradient. Change the first swatch to white, the second swatch to a light blue-green color, and the last swatch to a dark blue-green color. Use the Gradient Tool to adjust the gradient so the white color is on top.

Step 25

Place the text in the middle of your document over all the other artwork.

Step 26

For this next step, we’re going to create another brush. Draw a 14 px by 14px ellipse. With the Direct Selection Tool, select the right anchor point and drag it to the right – doubling its length. With the point still selected, set the Control Panel defaults to the Anchor Options. To the left of the Control Panel, press the Corner button, converting the anchor point to a corner.

Step 27

Fill the shape with black, drag the shape into the Brush Panel, and Choose New Art Brush from the New Brush dialog. When the Art Brush dialog appears, change the Colorization Method to Tints at the bottom of the dialog.

Step 28

For this step I’m going to use the Brush Tool (B). If you’re not comfortable with the Brush Tool (B) for making paths ,then you can use the Pen Tool (P) and apply the brush to the stroke. Create a brush stroke to the bottom left of the V. It is a good idea to change the stroke color to a lighter color than black so you can see it.

Step 29

Drawn another brush stroke above the previous one.

Step 30

Expand the brush strokes by going to Object > Expand Appearance. Next, it’s a good idea to clean up the leftover paths by going to Object > Path > Clean Up.

Step 31

Fill the outlined brush stroke with a Linear Gradient. Make the first swatch a blue and the second swatch a dark blue. Select the text and bring it to the front by going to Object > Arrange > Bring to Front.

Step 32

Copy (Command + C) and Paste (Command + V) both shapes numerous times around the text. On some of the copies, change the swatches on the Linear Gradient to a pink color and a dark pink color. Adjust the gradient so the darkest part of the gradient is closet to the text. When you place the copies around the text make sure to rotate and flip the shapes. All done!

Final Image

Below is the final type treatment image again.

::GFXZoOM |source:tutsplus.com::

Make an Aurora Borealis D

Final image

The image below is what we’re working towards (larger version available here); though the nature of this tutorial will more than likely generate a different result.

Step 1: Beginning the Background

We’ll begin by making our backdrop of the night sky. Place a rectangle of 1680 pixels by 1050 pixels on your artboard and give it a color of #151121.

Step 2: Background Mesh

Select the Gradient Mesh Tool and click three times on your rectangle to segment it into twelve areas.

Numbers, dimensions and colors throughout this tutorial are arbitrary, use whatever values you please. Have you ever seen the Northern Lights look identical in two different photos?

Step 3: Background Gradients

Recreate the colors you see below by clicking the Direct Selection tool and selecting each mesh point individually. Once selected, the color, the position and the handles of a mesh point can be altered.

For more detail on the Mesh tool take a look at Rype’s tut on Create a Glowing Abstract Light Vector Graphic.

Should you want to replicate these colors precisely, here’s a sample palette.

Step 4: The Stars

We’ve finished our backdrop for the time being, now let’s concentrate on scattering a few stars around.

Make yourself a circle with the Ellipse tool, then copy and paste in place (Command + C, Command + F). With the new circle selected, go to Object > Transform > Scale, and scale it to 25%. Give it a Normal transparency of 40% and color it #F2D0DC. Select the original circle, give it a Color Dodge transparency of 0%, and color it #E52266.

Step 5: Blending

Select both circles and go to Object > Blend > Blend Options. Choose Specified Steps in the dropdown and enter 25 as the amount, then click OK. Now go to Object > Blend > Make.

Step 6: Bright Centre

Use the Direct Selection tool and click on the centre of the smaller circle. Copy and paste in place (Command + C, Command + F). Now give the resultant circle a Normal Opacity of 90% and color it white (#FFFFFF).

Step 7: Checking the Star

Place what has become your first star on the dark background to check that the transparency and blending has given the result you wanted.

Step 8: Alternative Colors

Repeat this several times creating a small collection of blended circles, all with different colors.

Step 9: The Milky Way

Copy and Paste (Command + C, Command + V) your stars, placing them randomly around your background. Alter the Opacity and Scale them as you go. Once they’re in place, group them together (Command + G).

Step 10: Prepare an Opacity Mask

Make a rectangle over your grouped stars, then with the Gradient tool give it a gradient similar to what’s shown below. It should go from white to black vertically and begin fairly far down the rectangle.

Step 11: Select the Objects

With your gradient rectangle selected go to Select > Next Object Below. This will select the object directly underneath your gradient rectangle. Now hold down Shift and select the rectangle too. You should now have the grouped stars and the gradient rectangle selected.

Step 12: Make an Opacity Mask

Click on the menu in the Transparency panel and select Make Opacity Mask.

The stars will have taken on a faded mask whereby they shine completely through what was white in your rectangle and become invisible behind what was black. Everything in between appears with the appropriate amount of clarity. Your stars will be less visible towards the bottom of the sky.

Step 13: Your Aurora (Try Saying that Late on a Friday Evening)

Okay, we’ve dealt with our night sky and the stars dotted around it. Now it’s time to tackle the light effects. Begin by making a rectangle of more or less the proportions shown below and with a dark purple color of #130119.

Step 14: Gradient Mesh

Whilst no objects are selected, set a color of #7CA491 in your toolbar, then select the Gradient Mesh tool. Click on your recently created rectangle roughly where shown to make a mesh point with the color you’ve just chosen.

Step 15: Plenty of Mesh Points

Go along the existing horizontal mesh path with the Gradient Mesh tool and add around twenty new points. They will all automatically inherit the color of the first.

Step 16: More Mesh Points

It’s getting a bit meshy (as Sean Connery once said), but one last mesh path before we can start coloring our light. Place it roughly midway between the top and bottom of your rectangle to give you the following result.

Step 17: Peaks and Troughs

Having completed the mesh, take your Direct Selection tool, and one by one raise some of the mesh points to create peaks. This is again completely random and it’s up to you how many you raise or lower and how far.

Step 18: coloring the Mesh Points

Select individual or groups of mesh points on the first of the horizontal mesh paths you created and subtly alter their color. We’re trying to create movement with this effect, so try and give the impression of areas falling away or coming closer.

Again, here is a sample palette of the colors in this example, just in case you need them.

Step 19: Envelope Distort

We need to create waves in our object for the final suggestion of movement. It’s probably possible by altering the handles of your mesh points, but you won’t be making your life easy. Instead we turn our attention to Illustrator’s Envelope Distort feature.

Keep your mesh object selected and go to Object > Envelope Distort > Make with Mesh. There are several ways to manipulate an object Envelope Distort, this way will add a new mesh over your rectangle with as many points you determine.

Step 20: Define the Envelope

In the Envelope Mesh dialogue, choose how many rows and columns you want to work with, then click Preview to get an idea of how it will look. In this case, I’ve kept it relatively simple with just two rows, but the fewer mesh points you’re altering, the smoother the resulting form will become.

Step 21: Shear

Before we add waves, we’ll shear the rectangle to splash it across the sky in one easy step. Select the Shear tool, then click on either the left or the right side of your envelope mesh object, and drag to shear it, as shown below. Hold Shift down while doing so to ensure that the peaks and troughs remain vertical – not essential but helps the final effect.

Step 22: Distort

Having played around with Gradient Mesh objects, this will be second nature to you. With the Direct Selection tool, alter the Envelope Mesh points individually or in groups to create smooth wavy forms. Bend the handles on each point and try to create consistent movement in the object. Imagine you’re wiping the object upwards and towards the left.

Step 23: Blur

Now we’re getting somewhere.

With your distorted, sheared, colored, meshed rectangle selected, then go to Effects > Blur > Gaussian Blur. In the dialogue which appears, choose the amount of blurring you want. In my case 3 pixels is fine, but you can check what your object will look like in the preview pane and adjust appropriately.

Note: If you intend to print the resultant image you’ll need to make sure the blur is rasterized at a high resolution. By default the blur will be rastered at 72 dpi to optimize processing time, but for printing purposes it is likely you’ll need 300 dpi. Go to Effects > Document Raster Effects Settings to alter this.

Step 24: Transparency and Position

Give your object a Lighten transparency, then scale and position it above your background and stars. The Lighten transparency of your object will cause any areas which are darker than what’s underneath to disappear. You’ll be left with fluorescent waves and stars shining through them.

Step 25: Finishing Touches

Make a secondary Aurora (perhaps smaller, less opaque and blurred more) and place somewhere among your objects. Group everything together, then place a rectangle of 1680 px by 1050 px on top. Select everything and press Command + 7 to use this rectangle as a clipping mask.

Conclusion

Finished! After following these twenty-five concise steps you should have something attractive and unique to decorate your desktop with! It’s little wonder those clever people at Apple recognized the aesthetics of auroras with their last OSX release. The larger version is available here.

::GFXZoOM |source:tutsplus.com::

Note: Since Illustrator changes very little over the versions, it shouldn’t matter too much if you’re using an older version.

Step 1

First thing’s first, set up your canvas. Just go to File > New, and use whatever settings you like. I’ve never been a big fan of using custom sizes and all that in Illustrator, unless designing a business card or something like that, so just change the color mode to RGB and leave the rest.

Enable the grid (View > Show Grid) and Snap to Grid (View > Snap to Grid).

Step 2

Let’s create the base of our shape. Using the Rectangle Tool (M), draw out a rectangle on your canvas, keeping it aligned with the grid. Looking at the subdivisions of your grid, make sure that the base of our pencil is an even number of boxes tall, umm, see the screenshot:

Width isn’t important at this time. You can easily change it later if it looks out of whack with the rest of the pencil.

Step 3

Now we should make the rest of the separate shapes. You’ll need to use various different tools for this one, such as: the Pen Tool and the Rounded Rectangle Tool. See the below screenshot to get the idea of it.

So, using the Pen Tool, you should create the pointed end(s). Start by creating the wood part of it, then afterward create the sharper point (the lead).

Step 4

Now let’s give the pencil some life! Start with coloring each shape the color you would like it to have.

Now, using these colors as a guide, add gradients to each of your shapes (some might not require it, though).

Now, as you can see we’ve added gradients to each of the shapes. All of these are simple two-color gradients except for one, the metal piece next to the eraser. All of the colors used in this gradient were: #f2f2f2, #b3b3b3, #ffffff and #e6e6e6.

You should understand that it isn’t important that you comply exactly with what you see above, the shiny metal effect is very random, so you should just add a few extra points, change the colors of them, etc.

Get creative, be messy with the settings.

Step 5

Let’s finish off by adding a nice little highlight effect to the top of our pencil. Start by getting out the Pen Tool, then draw a simple two-point path along the top like this:

When you’re done with the path, add a fairly-thick rounded-corner stroke to it, using whatever color you like. In the “Transparency” tab (Window > Transparency), change the mode to Screen and lower the opacity to around 50%.

Hopefully by now you have something like this:

Hopefully!

Completion

OK, looks like we’re pretty much done! My apologies if the tutorial was a little lean on instructions, but this was my first Illustrator tutorial! If you have any questions at all, please leave a comment or contact me!

You can download the .ai (Illustrator) source file from here: Download Icon Tutorial Source File.

::GFXZoOM |source:designblurb.com::

I start by placing my sketch in Illustrator. Go to File > Place and choose the sketch. Since I’m going to want to have easy access to the sketch as I refer back to it, I put it on its own layer.

Then I trace around the outline of the sketch and fill it with a solid dark color. I chose a dark brown because I wanted the illustration to have a old classic monster feel.

Next, I start creating the bandages from my sketch. To create the bandages, I draw a long thin curved shape that comes to a point on each end. Then, I take this shape and copy it several times with each shape slightly overlapping. I copy it by holding down option (ALT) and dragging it. I do this until it is the proper height of the individual bandage. Once it is the correct height and any minor tweaking is made, I select all the shapes that belong to the one bandage and Unite them with the pathfinder palette. To open the pathfinder palette go to Window and choose Pathfinder. The Unite is the first button on the top left. With the shapes selected, hit the Unite button and expand.

I draw the other bandage shapes the same way, then add a radial gradient to them. I use the same dark brown I used earlier for the darkest color in my gradient. I also pick a yellowish beige for the lightest color. Finally, I choose a brownish color that is in between my light and dark color. I use the gradient tool to adjust the direction of the light on each piece. The gradient tool is located on the tool bar. Once you have the gradient tool selected, select the piece you want to adjust and then click and drag in the direction you want the light to go.

Next, I draw the shapes for the cheeks and mouth. After those are drawn, I add the same gradient as I used for the bandages. I use the gradient tool to adjust the direction of the light and adjust the gradient if I think it needs to be darker or lighter.

I wanted the cheek bones to pop out a little more and the nose area to recede, so I created additional shapes for those. Again, I used the same gradient for the new shapes, but I lightened the cheek bones 2 lighter colors and darkened the noses 2 lighter colors. Also for the cheek bones, I added another color after my darkest color on my gradient slider. The color was slightly lighter than the darkest color. This gives me a nice half light.

I continue with the same process for the eyes. Again, I lightened my gradient slightly and added a half light.

I draw a circle for the irises of the eyes and create a shape that will be a drop shadow on the eyes. I went with a slightly greener gradient for the irises. For the drop shadow over the eyes I used a flat color that was darker than the eyes.

Next, I draw more circles for the pupils. The pupil gradient has two steps. The dark brown I’ve been using and a lighter color. Using the gradient tool on the pupil, I pull a very short line to get an abrupt contrast between the light and dark color. This gives me a nice highlight dot on the pupil.

Finally I add the nose hole and a few detail like facial creases and liver spots. The facial creases are drawn the same way as the bandages were and the liver spots are just different sized circles.

Well, that is basically it. Hopefully, that helps you create some better gradients.

::GFXZoOM |source:illustrationinfo.com::

Final Image Preview

The image below is what we’ll be working towards.

Step 1

These comic book images recreated a printing process using what became known as Ben-day dots. Equally spaced and sized dots in the four printing colors were layered to produce other shades. In any case, the effect was best put to use with limited colors so we’re going to put together a palette of only seven swatches plus black and white.

Drag the following colors (here shown in hex-values) from the color panel into the Swatches panel.

• #FCE354 – Hair
• #E27D89 – Lips
• #E04359 – Tongue
• #2489ED – Eyes
• #FF8048 – Blouse
• #000000 – Black
• #FFFFFF – White

Double-click on the swatches once in the Swatches panel and name them accordingly.

Step 2

We need to complete our palette by adding the two Ben-day dots patterns. These will fill the background and the skin. Illustrator offers hundreds of patterns, but building your own gives you huge freedom. These simple dots are a perfect way to learn.

Begin by selecting both View > Show Grid and View > Snap to Grid from the top menu. These options will make it easier to be precise when creating our patterns.

Step 3

Using the Ellipse Tool, draw five perfect circles of equal sizes. Then position them on your grid, as shown below (with the Snap to Grid turned on you should manage this with your eyes closed!)

Step 4

These dots form the basis for our pattern, but to ensure that they tessellate (tile) properly, we need to define the edges of what will become the swatch.

Draw a square following the darker line of the grid, intersecting the center of your four outer circles. Ensure the square has no fill color and no stroke color, then right-click it, and send it to the back of your tile objects.

Illustrator will recognize this object as the area to be repeated, anything which falls outside (such as three quarters of each of the outer circles) will not be included in the pattern.

Step 5

Select your transparent square, copy, and then paste it in place (Edit > Copy, Edit > Paste in Front). Give this copy a color of #4EACF9 and then color the dots #ABE0F4. Duplicate the whole thing, color it #F2C8BF, and color the dots #D3A09B. Select the objects of each one and group them (Object > Group), making two separate groups.

Note: These colors don’t represent true CMYK printing values, but create a nice effect so we’ll just put that down to artistic license.

Step 6

Before we add these two groups of objects to the Swatches panel, we’ll scale them a little. Select them both and choose Objects > Transform > Scale from the top menu. Give them a uniform value of 15% and click OK.

Step 7

Just as you dragged colors, you can now drag each of the tile groups into the Swatches panel instantly turning them into pattern swatches. Double click each one and assign them names of ‘Background’ and ‘Skin’. I’ll let you work out which one’s which.

Go to View in the top menu, turn off Snap to Grid, and select Hide Grid to return to the original drawing settings.

Step 8

Anything can be drawn to emulate Lichtenstein’s comic book style, though typically his were scenes of domesticity and consumerism. An image of a surprised woman could represent a troubled business woman or shocked mother. So, I chose this image from dreamstime.com.

Step 9

Open your image in Illustrator, lock the layer it’s on, then make a new layer on which to begin your drawing.

Step 10

Using the Pen Tool, draw basic areas to form the colored parts of the drawing. While doing this, you may find it easier to draw shapes with just a brightly colored stroke to avoid hiding parts of the photo while you’re using them. You probably have your own preferred method of working here.

Use smooth rounded lines and don’t be afraid to exaggerate certain features: like the mouth, wavy hair, wide surprised eyes. We’re creating a comic image here after all.

Step 11

See how the mouth is built from just four simple shapes. The teeth are absurdly rounded as is the tongue, but it gives us the effect we want.

Step 12

Using the swatches, fill each of the main shapes you’ve drawn. The labels given to the swatches should make this a simple task; just select the object you wish to fill, and click on your swatch. She looks kind of funny so far, but we’ll keep working on it.

Step 13

We need a brush to give us the black marker pen strokes which define our images features. Draw an Ellipse on your artboard. Then using the Direct Selection Tool, reduce the handle size on either end. This gives you a pointy ellipse which we’ll use as a brush.

Step 14

Drag your form into the Brushes panel. In the dialogue that appears select New Art Brush and click OK. In the following Art Brush Options dialogue give this brush a name if you wish and click OK. The Illustrator default values are fine for our needs here.

Step 15

We now have a layer for our image and a layer for our filled objects. Make the objects layer invisible and create a third one, which we’ll be drawing our black strokes with.

Step 16

Using the Pen Tool draw a series of curves for each of the elements of our subject’s face. Once drawn, keep the vector selected and choose your custom brush from the Brushes panel. In the Stroke panel change the weight of each line depending on the emphasis needed (for example, the eyelid is a little heavier than the line under the eye, and the eyebrow is heavier still).

It doesn’t take a great amount of detail to create what looks like a convincing eye. It does, however, take a bit of practice. You can get away with making certain aspects larger, more pronounced – such as the eyebrow here, but be careful not to make it too Mickey Mouse.

As you can see, I also lowered the eye slightly to improve the overall look of the face. These decisions are entirely up to your artistic discretion.

Step 17

I’d exaggerated the shape of the mouth so much that tracing the photo was no longer appropriate. Make a copy of the mouth and paste it onto your Strokes layer. In the same way as you did around the eyes, draw a series of curved vectors using the Pen Tool, and alter the line to your custom made brush. Just five strokes around the mouth will be enough to make it stand out.

Step 18

Again with her nose, you’ll need only a couple of strokes to finish it off, as too many lines will add years to her.

Step 19

Continue to outline your objects, some with a normal stroke, some with your custom brush, until you’re satisfied with the result. Make your Objects layer visible and see how it all looks together.

Now you may have to start to alter the order in which objects and strokes are organized; send some strokes back and some objects forward depending on how it looks. Don’t worry too much about keeping things in the correct layers either.

Step 20

Build some extra hair strands out of solid shapes and black strokes to finish layering her hair. Place them on top of the whole drawing so far.

Step 21

Select everything you’ve drawn except for the blue background rectangle, make a copy (Edit > Copy) and paste in place (Edit > Paste in Front). Select the Combine tool in the Pathfinder panel to join it all together and then click Expand.

Step 22

Give this object a nice heavy stroke and align the stroke to the outside of the vector, see image below. This gives our character a solid outline.

Step 23

Build a caption bubble out of a series of ellipses by combining them together with the Pathfinder tool. Give your main bubble a heavier stroke than the smaller ones. Also, use a hand-written style font for the caption. I’ve used Tekton Pro, a font from Adobe, but you can use your discretion as to the font that fits your illustration best.

Group the caption objects (Object > Group) and place them somewhere on your drawing, even overlapping the edges, and the character.

Step 24

To finish the comic book look, you’ll need to tidy the image up. Select everything (assuming your photo layer is still locked) and group together (Edit > Group). Draw a rectangle where you wish the edges of the illustration to be and then copy it to the clipboard (Edit > Copy).

Select the group of objects and your new rectangle and go to Object > Clipping Mask > Make.

Now paste your copied rectangle back onto the artboard (Edit > Paste in Front) and give it a heavy black stroke of uniform thickness. You have now masked your drawing and given it a comic book style frame.

Conclusion

You’ve completed your Lichtenstein style illustration! In doing so, I hope you’ve become familiar with making your own patterns and have brushed up on your vector drawing skills too. The final image is below.

Appendix

Scaling patterns is an issue which needs to be mentioned before we wrap up. By scaling an object filled with a pattern you’ll by default increase the surface area of the object, but the pattern will remain at the same scale (in our case, we’d get more dots).

By going to Illustrator > Preferences > General you can change this should you wish to. You can turn on Transform Pattern Tiles, as shown below. You’ll now proportionally scale your pattern whenever you scale your object.

Alternatively, you could go to Object > Expand and turn your pattern into individual vectors, though in doing so you’d be sacrificing the flexibility Illustrator’s patterns offer you.

::GFXZoOM |source:tutsplus.com::

Final Image Preview

To begin with let’s have a look at the image we’ll be creating.

Step 1

Open a new document. I picked a soccer ball image from Stock.xchng. Feel free to pick your own soccer ball image.

Place the image into your document. Double-click the layer with the image, set the Dim Images To to 35% and select it. Now we have set up our source image. Lock the layer with the image. Then create a new layer above and name it “Background.”

Drag a horizontal and a vertical Guide onto the Artboard, and align them to the soccer ball. Select the Ellipse Tool (L) and click on the point where the two guides meet. Then hold down the Shift Key and drag outwards until it matches the size of the ball. Fill it with black, leave the Stroke set to None. Then Hide and lock the layer, so we can see the photo again.

Step 2

Create a new layer and name it “Shapes.” We’ll now create our mesh objects. First, trace each pentagon on the soccer ball (once filled with meshes this will be very effective). Trace each pentagon and fill it with the appropriate color (either black or white). Leave the stroke set to None. You don’t have to create the pentagons perfectly. Leave some small gaps between the shapes. This slightly imperfect look helps to make it more realistic.

Step 3

Once that is done, we can apply the Mesh Paths. Make the black circle we created earlier visible and lock it again.

Let’s set up our shading colors in the Swatch Palette. I picked the following colors: black (C=0 M=0 Y=0 K=95), light gray (C=1 M=2 Y=5 K=10), dark gray (C=0 M=0 Y=0 K=44), and white (C=0 M=0 Y=0 K=0).

Now we can start adding the meshes. Make sure no color fill or stroke is selected. Then select the Mesh Tool (U), and click on the center (approximately) of a pentagon. Then click on each cross mesh path near the edge of the shape. Repeat this with each side of the pentagon.

Select the White Arrow Tool (A), and click on the most outer mesh points. Then fill them with the black (C=0 M=0 Y=0 K=95) color swatch. Select the points all around the edge, and repeat this step. This will add our shades to the white pentagon shapes.

Step 4

Select the next cross point towards the middle, and fill it with the dark gray color. Sometimes, you might see that it gets too dark, and then you can fill it with the lighter grey. At the edges we might need some darker shades. Repeat this with all the white shapes.

Step 5

Now let’s apply the same method to the black shapes. But no worries, this will be quicker since the black pentagons need only one highlight. Select a black pentagon, and grab the “Mesh Tool” (U). Add a mesh point in the middle of the shape. Make sure no fill color and stroke is selected.

Choose the Direct Selection Tool (A), and select the cross point in the middle of the shape. Fill it with the black color. This might not look like much, but it’s enough to make a difference. Repeat this step with all the black pentagons. Voilà, the soccer ball us complete!

Step 6

Let’s add some life to the image. Create a new layer beneath the “soccer ball” layer, and name it “Background.” Create a Rectangle (M) and fill it with black. Select the Gradient Tool, choose Radial as the type, and start dragging from the left upper corner downwards.

Step 7

Create a new layer above the gradient “background” layer, and name it “Reflection.” Then select all the “soccer ball” shapes by clicking on the right of layer. You can see a green square appearing. This means that all the sub-layers are selected.

Make sure though that none of the sub-layers are locked. Now group them (Ctrl+G). Then click on the rectangle again, hold the mouse key down, select Ctrl+Shift+Alt (you will see a “+” sign appearing), and drag towards the new layer.

This will give us a complete copy of the “soccer ball” layer. Move this underneath the “soccer ball.” Keep the selection active, go to Object > Transform > Reflect, choose the horizontal reflection, and click OK.

Step 8

Create a new rectangle over the bottom soccer ball. Then fill it with a gradient vertically from white to black. Now select all shapes from the “reflection” layer, open the Transparency palette and click on the Right Palette Arrow, as shown below. Then choose Make Opacity Mask. Deselect the shapes. We’ve now created our reflection.

Step 9

Lets create the swooshes. Select the Ellipse Tool (L), and create shapes as shown below. I filled them with a green radial gradient. Duplicate the layer to the right and set the Transparency to Multiply. Repeat this two more times. Select all the ellipses and click on the Path Divide tool. Then start deleting the right side of the ellipses by selecting the shapes with the Direct Selection tool.

Step 10

Now rotate the group of ellipses counterclockwise. Go to Object > Envelop Distort and choose Make with Warp. Select following options: Style of Flag, Horizontal Bend of 19%, Horizontal Distortion of 13%, and Vertical Distortion of 33%. Then click OK.

Next, go to Object > Envelop Distort > Expand. Rotate the group a little bit more counterclockwise and place it under the “soccer ball.” Make sure the shapes are below the “reflection.” Duplicate the “swoosh” group and move it slightly upwards. Then set the Transparency layer to Overlay. You might want to duplicate more then once.

Step 11

Let’s make a custom brush to add more interest. Create a circle, fill it with white. Select the Crystallize Tool and click several times on the outer edges of the circle. Then transform the circle horizontally.

Open the Brush Palette, and drag the transformed circle shape into the palette. Choose Art Brush from the pop-up menu, and click “OK”. Then select Stroke From Bottom, and click OK. Now we have our custom brush.

Step 12

Draw a curved line with the Pen Tool (No fill color, only a stroke color) and select the brush we just created. You will see that it gives us instantly a beautiful stroke. Now we will ad another Opacity Mask, just like we did in Step 8. This again adds some dynamism to our soccer ball.

Step 13

Create another circle and apply the Crystallize Tool again, just like before. Then Transform it slightly (E), and place it under the “soccer ball,” but above the “swooshes.” Make a copy and move it slightly to the right and upwards. Then set the Transparency to Multiply. Now select our white custom brush stroke and duplicate it. Then move it slightly downwards.

Step 14

Last but not least, select one of the swooshes and also duplicate it. You can move it downwards.

Conclusion

As a final touch, I added extra pentagon shapes in the background with an Opacity Mask applied and made them into a symbol. That’s all folks! I hope you enjoyed this challenge and that your creative ideas are flowing.

::GFXZoOM |source:tutsplus.com::