February was a great month full of awesome tutorials, interesting articles and interviews, and stunning showcases for inspiration.

Photoshop Tutorials

Illustrator Tutorials

A portfolio design is a reflection of the skills and talents of the designer that owns it. Often, the hardest web design is creating your own portfolio, and thus, can take a lot of the designer’s time to create and finish. This collection is a follow up of the showcase called, "25 Impressive Portfolio Web Designs" which you should view as well.

Feast your eyes on some of the web’s most beautiful online portfolios.

1. camellie

2. Fool’s House

3. Ed Peixoto – I create Flavors

4. COO/COO CORE Graphic

5. n.design studio

6. Fully Illustrated

7. Attack of the Web

8. Ekin Yalgin

9. Twenty3design

10. Jirí Šebek

11. Nathan Sanders

continue reading…

There are many ways to create a marker in Adobe Illustrator, but this might be one of the quickest. It only takes three paths, some text for the imprint and a 3D effect to create a semi-realistic and freely rotatable marker. So let’s get started!

Final Image Preview

Want access to the full Vector Source files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join Vector Plus for just 9$ a month.

Tutorial Details

• Program: Adobe Illustrator CS3
• Difficulty: Beginner
• Estimated Completion Time: 30 minutes

Below is the final image we will be working towards.

Step 1

Use the Pen Tool (P) to draw the following path. You will need it for the marker itself as well as for its cap. Set the Width to approximately 5 mm and the Height to approximately 12 mm.

Step 2

Use the Convert Anchor Point Tool (Shift + C) to round the two corners as seen below.

Step 3

Duplicate your path (drag it to the side while pressing the Alt key). Then use the Direct Selection Tool (A), select the two lower Anchor Points of the duplicated path and stretch the shape to a Length of approximately 70 mm.

Step 4

Use the Pen Tool (P) to draw the tip of the marker. The Height is approximately 20 mm. Select both elements of the marker and group them (Command + G).

Step 5

Select the cap (the first path), place it next to the tip of the marker and flip it horizontally (Object > Transform > Mirror).

Step 6

Select the Add Anchor Points Tool (+) and add two new Anchor Points to the path: one at the left side and one at the top. Then use the Direct Selection Tool (A) to move the upper-left Anchor Point as seen below.

Step 7

Remove all outlines and fill the shaft of your marker with a light gray (K=10) and the tip and cap with red.

Step 8

Use a black and bold Sans-serif font for the text of the imprint. You could even add additional elements like a barcode if you want. Placing it vertically and adjusting its size at this stage is useful.

Step 9

Group (Command + G) all elements of the imprint and drag and drop it into the Symbols Palette to create a new symbol.

Continue Learning…

In this tutorial, we’ll explore the Adobe Illustrator Appearance panel and learn to create objects that look like groups of many shapes, but consist of only one shape with multiple fills applied, with no brushes used. We’ll dive really deep into the the Appearance panel and unlock its secrets. Illustrator enthusiasts will love this detailed tutorial!

Final Image Preview

Below are the images we’ll be creating in this tutorial using the Appearance panel. Want access to the full Vector Source files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join Vector Plus for just 9$ a month.

Tutorial Details

• Program: Adobe Illustrator CS3/CS4
• Difficulty: Beginner to Intermediate
• Estimated Completion Time: 60 minutes

Introduction

The more you explore Adobe Illustrator, the more you’ll learn about it’s magic and get fascinated by it’s secrets. I oftentimes like to make up vector challenges for myself, and this time I wanted to create a flower in Illustrator with only one shape, using no brushes. That is a moment when the Appearance panel is everything – the perfect tool for managing your complex object. Today we will learn the magic of the Appearance panel, the ways to use it and its advantages, and then we’ll create several objects with it’s help to practice the skills.

Theoretical Part

Let’s start with theory, so that even beginners understand the secrets of multiple items and the Appearance panel.

1 – Where is the Appearance Panel?

The Appearance panel was introduced in the 9th version of Illustrator, and it was a very creative and smart developers’ decision to add this tool. It brought object modifications to the next level, opening new horizons for vector designers.

I suggest that you open up the Appearance panel to be able to access it at any moment. To bring it up, go to Window > Appearance, or press Shift + F6. You’ll see an ordinary Illustrator panel that looks rather simple, but you can’t even imagine what is hidden in it!

2 – What Appearance Means?

The Appearance panel is a place where all modifications of a particular object are listed and made. Actually, it applies not only to shapes, but to text, groups of objects, entire layers and so on. Therefore, any object on your artboard has some appearance, and it can be viewed in this panel. To access it, select the object and then go to the Appearance panel – and you’ll see it as a list of elements. Perhaps, you’ll see only stroke, fill, and default opacity shown there, if no other changes were made.

Important Note: Make sure an object is selected when you access the Appearance palette. When nothing is selected, this panel shows elements of the last selected objects, but nothing happens when you edit it.

3 – What is Shown There?

Of course, when I said “all modifications” are shown in the Appearance panel, I did not mean actually all of them. It is not similar with the History panel in Photoshop, so most of the actions you apply to the object are not listed there. Only modifications that alter the object appearance are written – that is why it is called Appearance (more like layer styles in Photoshop). Therefore, when you move the object, transform it with any transform tool, cut it, edit points, and so on – these actions have nothing to do with this palette. On the other hand, anything related to the object’s fill, stroke, opacity, blending mode, brushes or effects applied will always show in the Appearance panel.

4 – Appearance Possibilities

When the targeted object is selected, you see its fill, stroke, and its general opacity in the Appearance panel. However, you are able to add more fills or strokes to it (I’m not sure how many, but I’ve added up to 30 easily). Here is the biggest secret – multiple fills and strokes are very powerful! There are several ways of adding them in the Appearance panel:

1. Select either fill or stroke in a stack (depending on what you want to add) and press the small Duplicate Item icon. This way the copy will appear on top of the original, inheriting all of its parameters (type, color, opacity, mode, brushes, and effects).
2. Select either fill or stroke in a list and drag this element onto the Duplicate Item icon. Also you can choose Duplicate Item in the fly-out menu. These are equivalent to the previous method.
3. Go to the panel fly-out menu and choose Add New Fill or Add New Stroke, then a new fill or stroke will appear on top of all the other elements, and it will have no effects or brushes applied to it (however, it will inherit the color and type of the last chosen fill or stroke). If an item is selected in the stack, the new one will be added on top of the selected one.

This way, you can add many fills and strokes to any selected object. This also applies to other items in this panel, like live effects. It may not sound inspiring at the beginning, but consider this: there are two types of strokes (color and pattern) and three types of fills (color, gradient, and pattern), now multiply it by sixteen blending modes, one-hundred opacity levels, countless variety of stroke width and types (also plenty of effects) – and you’re starting to understand how many things that can be done with this panel!

5 – Changing Items

When you add a few more fills or strokes to an object, you can then alter their color and type by choosing the particular element from the list in the Appearance panel, then pick the color, gradient, or pattern in the Swatches panel.

For strokes you can change the width and type in the Strokes panel (Command + F10). Users who use the Illustrator CS4 version may pick the color or change the stroke width right in the Appearance panel, which is handy.

Of course, try altering opacity and blending modes of any item in the Transparency panel (Shift + Command + F10). To delete an item, simply drag it to the Trash icon. All the items in the Appearance panel are handled individually – only you can’t move or transform them separately with the usual tools.

6 – More Advantages

You can’t just take any particular fill or stroke and edit its points or transform it, because it is not a separate object but a part of the object appearance. However, there are ways of altering the shape of any item in the Appearance panel.

The Effects menu gives you enough amazing options for dressing object fills and strokes the way you like – either together, or separately. You can move and rotate the item using the Transform effect, turn it into another figure with Convert to Shape effect, offset the path applying the Offset Path effect, and many more great effects, such as: shadow, glow, and Photoshop filters like blur or texturizer. You have to try them to realize their power. Once applied to the item, effects are shown in the Appearance panel with the FX symbol.

7 – Order of Items

Another great thing about the Appearance panel is the possibility to change the order of items for any object. You can easily drag one element up or down in the stack to achieve the needed result. Moreover, you can do it with effects too. When the effect is applied to the entire object, it is positioned on a separate level in the Appearance panel. Still, you can drag it on any item to use it on particular fill or stroke.

Sometimes changing the order of items in the Appearance panel will result in a completely different outcome. In Illustrator CS4 version you also may hide items by clicking an eye icon on the left of it. I recommend you to visit this brilliant Vectortuts+ tutorial that explains a lot about the Appearance panel and the order of elements in it: Using Effects to Create a Cool Design.

8 – Where We Can Use It

Multiple strokes and fills, as well as other items in the Appearance panel, may appear very helpful and save plenty of time. You can use advantages of the Appearance panel in cases where several elements of similar shapes must be positioned on top of each other by simply adding a few additional fills with different parameters, rather then creating several separate object.

You can also use it to create multiple strokes on a single editable path rather then using a few copies of the same path. Also,the Appearance panel is great for creating evenly distributed copies of objects or it’s parts (fill or stroke) with the powerful Transform effect.

It is possible to create elements that are masked with the top items so that the background shows through, just like an opacity mask, with multiple fills or strokes only. You can even try using the Appearance for more complex objects, where every item has a different shape – in this case you’ll need to apply certain effects to achieve the result.

9 – Where We Can’t Use It

Unfortunately, although Appearance panel is very powerful, it has certain limitations, and not everything is possible to create with it on one object. By default, every fill and stroke added in the panel has exactly the same shape that the original object has. So, it may sometimes be hard to change the shape of items if you need to.

You can’t use Appearance panel to create elements with really different shape, as it’s not easy to present it with multiple fills on one object (but you can use it if you need a rectangle or ellipse, with the help of the Convert To Shape effect.

It’s impossible to make one object that consists of several elements of drastically different point amounts and type – as we can’t edit points of fills in the Appearance panel.

Also it may not be easy to create many elements positioned too far from each other or too randomly scattered. For all those situations it is better to create different objects, rather than trying to fit various elements in one object via the Appearance panel.

The image below shows fills with different shapes, point types, and scattered to randomly, which demonstrates these problems.

10 – Saving Effects

There is one more advantage of the Appearance panel that I love to use very often. Imagine you create a complex object, add many fills and strokes, apply effects and brushes, adjust opacity and blending – and the work is finally done. You then want to try this combination of items on other objects, while not spending so much time for modifications again.

There is a simple way to save the combination of all items in Appearance panel to apply to any other object. Simply select the object, open the Graphic Styles panel (Shift + F5) and press New icon. The Appearance will be saved as a graphic style (similar to Photoshop layer styles), you can name it and apply it to selected shapes.

Practical Part

If you read the explanation above carefully, you understand how invaluable the Appearance panel is for making work in Illustrator easier and more fun. Let’s apply the knowledge we gained by putting it into practice.

We’ll create five objects with the help of multiple fills in the Appearance panel, from the easiest to the more complex. We will be using the Appearance panel all the time, so make sure it is open in your document (Shift + F6).

We’ll implement primarily fills and effects today. In this tutorial we’ll use very few strokes and won’t be using brushes – multiple strokes were explained in the tutorial How to Create Roads and Rail Tracks on a Path, while brushes are so amazing that they will need a separate tutorial to cover in depth.

11 – The Sun: Beginning

Let’s create a new document in Adobe Illustrator – I made it 1200 px by 800 px in RGB mode, though you can choose other parameters. We’ll start from the easiest object – the sun. Create a circle (L) 100 px by 100 px, give it no stroke and a subtle yellow-to-orange radial gradient fill.

12 – The Sun: Adding Rays

Now, while the circle is selected, open the Appearance panel (Shift + F6) and add one more fill. We want to add rays to the sun, so we’ll apply the Pucker effect. But the only problem is that this effect will create rays depending on amount of points in the shape.

We have only four points – not enough for sun rays. So go to Object > Path > Add Anchor Points, this command adds four more points. Now we can choose the bottom fill and go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Pucker & Bloat, and move the slider to the left about 130% – the rays are ready.

13 – The Sun: Adding a Hole

Although the sun looks nice already, I decided to add one more element to it – it is not necessary, but it gives a creative detail to the object. Honestly, the real reason I add this step is because I want you to learn one trick with the Transparency panel.

We will make a hole in the sun, so that the background is visible. Select the sun and add one more fill on top. It’s color does not matter, so I changed it to black. Now go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform, and reduce both the horizontal and vertical scale to 50%. You’ll have something similar to the image below – not very pretty, but be patient.

14 – The Sun: Finalizing

Now, with top black fill chosen, open the Transparency panel (Shift + Command + F10) and reduce its Opacity to 0%. It will become invisible. Go back to the Appearance panel, and choose the topmost line that says Path, and back in the Transparency panel check the Knockout group option. The top black fill will knock out all the bottom fills, and the background will show through!

This Transparency panel option works for groups where objects with 0% Opacity serve as masks, although this trick affects separate objects as well. I also altered the main fill (second) moving the yellow gradient slider to the right to make the transition faster.

The sun is ready! All its elements are actually Appearance items, while the shape remains a simple circle. We applied three fills to this shape, one effect, and Transparency options. You can check it in outline mode (Command + Y). Now you may want to save this combination of effects as a graphic style – name it “sun.”

15 – Clouds: Main Shape

Let’s move to another object – the clouds. First, we’ll create the basic cloud shape with the Ellipse Tool (L). Create several ellipses so that they form the image we need. Don’t make them big – my resulted cloud was 180 px by 90 px.

Now unite ellipses into a single path by pressing the Add button in the Pathfinder panel, press Expand (or simply Alt-press the Add button to unite and the Expand with one click). Change the fill color to a light blue (#AFEBF9) and the stroke to a vivid blue (#57E0FF) at 1 pt wide.

16 – Clouds: Volume

Now we’ll use a simple trick to add dimension to the cloud. Add one more fill in the Appearance panel and change it to a default white-to-black gradient. Change the gradient angle either in the Gradient panel (Command + F9) or with the Gradient Tool (G) to -90 (from top to bottom). Now go to the Transparency panel and change the fill blending mode to Overlay.

17 – Clouds: Softening

To make the cloud more cloudy, let’s soften it’s edges. With the shape selected, choose the topmost line in the Appearance panel saying Path (make sure the effect applies to the entire shape, rather than to any one particular fill) and go to Effects > Stylize > Feather, and enter 10 pt. Now the effect appears in the bottom of the Appearance panel, and you can change the settings any moment. The cloud looks much better now.

18 – Clouds: Duplicating

I’ve mentioned before in the Theoretical section that we can make copies with the Appearance panel. Let’s duplicate the cloud. Again, with the entire shape selected (topmost Path line in the Appearance panel), go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform, and change the Horizontal Move to -60 pt, and Vertical Move to 30 pt. Check Preview and enter 1 for the number of copies. If you like the outcome, apply the effect.

19 – Clouds: More Copies

We could make more copies in the last step transform effect, but they would look too evenly distributed. We better apply one more effect to create more clouds.

Again, with the entire shape selected go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform (in the prompt window click Apply New Effect). This time, change the Horizontal Move to 70 pt and Vertical Move to 30 pt. Also enter 1 for copies, and reduce both the Vertical and Horizontal Scale to 90%. If you are happy with result, apply the effect.

The clouds are ready! They are nice and soft, and there are several copies, while the shape remains simple. All the effects we see are just magic tricks of the Appearance panel. Here we used two fills, one stroke, and several effects. You can save it as graphic style to apply to other shapes later – name it “clouds.”

20 – Daisy: Beginning

We’ll proceed with creating another object – let’s make a daisy. Create a circle (L) 40 px by 40 px. Fill it with a blue radial gradient going from a lighter (#00A6E0) to darker shade (#345197) of blue.

Now select the fill in the Appearance panel and go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform, here enter 60% for the Vertical Scale and 145% for the Horizontal Scale. Leave the other sliders intact, but make sure to choose the middle-bottom point in the little proxy on the right to assign the point of transformation. Apply the effect and the petal is ready!

21 – Daisy: Petals

Again, with the only fill selected, go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform, choose Apply New Effect. Here enter 100% for both the Vertical and Horizontal Scale, leave the middle-bottom point in the proxy, and type 45 for the angle. For the number of copies enter 7 and apply the effect. Now we have eight petals for our daisy.

22 – Daisy: More Petals

Now we’ll make another row of petals. Duplicate the only fill we have in the Appearance panel – you’ll get two of the same fills. Choose the bottom copy and double-click the top Transform effect line. We’ll edit it so that these petals are visible under top ones.

Change the Vertical Scale to 80% and Horizontal Scale to 180%, now you’ll see the bottom petals. Still, they are not positioned properly, so let’s rotate them. With the bottom fill selected, again go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform, choose Apply new effect. The only parameter we need here is Angle – change it to 22,5, while the number of copies we need is 0, and transformation point we need now is central. Apply the effect and see the result.

23 – Daisy: Center

Now, add new fill using the fly-out of the Appearance panel. This way the new fill will be added with no effects, as when you copy the existing one. Apply a yellow-to-orange gradient to it.

Now again go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform, you only need to move it a bit down, so change Vertical Move to -20pt and apply (enter 0 for copies and central point for proxy). Now add a subtle shadow to this fill (Effect > Stylize > Drop shadow), use orange for the color and change X and Y shift to 1 pt.

24 – Daisy: Texture

To complete the central part of the daisy, duplicate the top yellow fill and change the fill from gradient to pattern texture – I chose the Mezzotint pattern (Window > Swatches Libraries > Patterns > Basic graphics > Textures). You can try other pattern from this library – the only demand we have is we need a random texture here.

Now simply change blending mode of the texture fill to Overlay in the Transparency panel – and you’ll have nice textured surface. Just keep in mind that the pattern fills are as powerful as other items in the Appearance panel.

25 – Daisy: Finalizing

You probably noticed that the new texture fill has drop a shadow effect left from duplicating. We don’t need it here, but don’t delete it. Take the drop shadow line on the top pattern fill and drag it down to the first blue fill. This way we just moved the effect from one item to another.

Now double-click it and just change the shadow color from orange to blue. Now duplicate it by dragging it to the New button in the Appearance panel. Drag it down to the bottom blue fill. Now all the items cast a subtle shadow.

The daisy is completed! It looks like a complex group of many objects, while it consists of a single shape – all the elements are made with Appearance panel. We applied four fills, including a pattern fill, and various effects to it. Again, save the object as a graphic style to use it later (but mind the size of the objects when applying it).

26 – Ladybug: Basic Shape

It’s time for a more challenging object – we’ll make a lady-bug now. Create an ellipse (L) 120 pt by 100 pt. Please, make it this exact size, as all future modifications will be based on it.

Leave the stroke 1 pt black, and change the fill color to red (#E21B25). Select the red fill in the Appearance panel, and add some inner shadow by going to Effects > Stylize > Inner Glow. Here change the color to red, Opacity to 50%, and Blur to 12 pt.

Add a new fill in the Appearance panel and change it to a white-to-black radial gradient. Now in the Transparency panel change its blending mode to Overlay to make the lighting.

27 – Ladybug: Adding Wings

Now we need wings – or, the border between them. We need a thin black path in the middle of the ellipse. Although it seems impossible, we’ll create this with effects.

Add new fill with no effects and black for the color color on top of the stack in the Appearance panel. Now go to Effects > Convert to shape > Rectangle. Here we can turn any shape into rectangle – what we need is a very thin (2pt) and 120 pt long rectangle. We can enter absolute dimensions (120 x 2 pt), but this way later, when the ladybug is saved as a graphic style and applied to another shape, this fill may not fit the shape if it has different size.

So I suggest that you enter a relative rectangle size: 0 pt extra for width and -49 pt extra for height. Finally, apply Effects > Warp > Arc to this fill, and reduce the bend to 15%.

28 – Ladybug: Making the Head

To add the head, create a new black fill in the Appearance panel without any effects. Now go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform, and reduce the new fill and move it so that it looks like a head: reduce the Horizontal Scale to 40%, Vertical Scale to 45%, and enter 50 pt for the Horizontal Move. The head is ready, the only thing we need to do is drag this fill from the top of stack to its bottom in the Appearance panel.

29 – Ladybug: Creating the Legs

The more difficult part of this object is its legs – it’s rather hard to create with fills. You can add six black fills, convert them to thin rectangles, and then transform separately. But I think this approach is very long, and I offer you a more creative method. We’ll use only one additional stroke for it – although I promised to use multiple fills only, I think you’ll forgive me this exception when you see this fun technique.

Add one black stroke to the object in Appearance panel. Now in the Stroke panel (Command + F10) adjust some parameters: change the width to 20 pt, make sure the Butt Cap icon is chosen, select Align Stroke to Outside icon, and check Dashed Line. Here, assign the following order: 2 pt stroke – 56 pt gap. Voila! The dashed stroke turned to six legs. However, if you have a different size of initial ellipse, you’ll have to choose the exact gap size yourself.

30 – Ladybug: Adding Dots and Finalizing

We’ve come to the most challenging element of the ladybug – the dots. Of course, we can create them by duplicating the head, fill six times and then transforming every dot manually to position them onto it’s body. But, again, I found a more clever way of adding dots that you might like. We will need just one more stroke for it – as long as we already used one.

Add one more black stroke to the object in the Appearance panel. Now uncheck the Dashed option in the Stroke panel for a minute, leave it 20 pt wide, but choose the Align Stroke to Center icon.

Now go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform, and reduce both the Horizontal and Vertical Scale to 65%. Go back to the Stroke panel, and check Dashed Line again. Here enter 1 pt for stroke and 37 pt for the gap. Finally, change the cap option to Round Cap – and the stroke turns to six nice dots! Again, this numbers work if the initial ellipse size is 120 pt by 100 pt, or you’ll have to choose the gap size manually.

The ladybug is ready – the only thing left here is to add a drop shadow to the entire object (dark red color and 50% for Opacity). It was not easy to make this object, and you can save the effects as a graphic style now. The object still remains a simple ellipse – check it in the outline mode (Command + Y). For this object, we used four fills and three strokes, and numerous effects.

31 – Rose: Beginning

Now we came to the last and most complex object in this series – the rose. Create the base for it – an ellipse 80 pt by 65 pt (please note, that all effects will be based on this size).

Make it no stroke and give it a pink radial gradient fill that goes from lighter pink (#E23770) to a darker shade (#BA0053). Now go to the Appearance panel and apply a Transform effect to make 4 copies of this petal, entering 72 for angle and choosing middle-bottom point in the proxy.

32 – Rose: Adding More Petals

Duplicate the fill by dragging it to the New icon in the Appearance panel, now go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform to apply a new transformation. Enter 85% for both Horizontal and Vertical Scale to reduce the petals, and insert 30 for Angle to rotate them. Make sure the center point is chosen in the proxy and apply.

Now to add even more petals, again duplicate the top fill in the Appearance panel, click the small arrow to show the effects applied to it, and double-click the bottom Transform effect. Change the transformation settings: enter 85% for both Horizontal and Vertical Scale to reduce the petals, and insert 30 for the Angle to rotate them. Make sure the center point is chosen in the proxy and apply.

33 – Rose: Center

To create the central part of the rose, add a new fill to it through the Appearance panel flyout menu. Change the gradient to yellow-to-orange, now go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform and reduce the Horizontal Scale to 50% and Vertical Scale to 60%, now change the Vertical Move to -30 pt, and apply. The fill will be scaled down and positioned in the center. Now go to Effects > Distort & Transform > Roughen, then enter 5% and Relative for Size, 10 for Detail, and Smooth for Points.

Now duplicate the top yellow fill and change the transform settings by double-clicking it in the Appearance panel. Change the Horizontal Scale to 30% and Vertical Scale to 40%, also change the direction of the colors in the gradient by dragging the yellow slider and holding Alt to the orange one, so that they change position. I’m not sure if a rose can have such a center, but in my fantasy it surely can.

34 – Rose: Creating the Stem

Add a new fill to the rose via the Appearance fly-out menu, and make it green. Now go to Effects > Convert to Shape > Rectangle, this time choose Absolute for the size at 4 pt Horizontally and 250 pt Vertically.

Now go to Transform effect and change only the Vertical Move to -200pt and apply. The last effect for the stem is Effects > Distort & Transform > Zigzag, then enter 2 pt for Size, check Absolute, enter 4 Ridges per segment, and choose Smooth Points. Lastly, drag the stem to the bottom of the stack in the Appearance panel.

35 – Rose: Making the Leaf

Let’s finish the flower with a leaf. Add a new fill to the rose, no matter where exactly. It may be on the bottom or on the top of the stack. Change it’s color to green, a little lighter shade than the stem.

Now transform it this way (of course, by going to Effects > Distort & Transform > Transform). Now enter 60% for Vertical Scale, insert 30 pt for Horizontal Move, -150 pt for Vertical Move, and enter 40 for the angle. Now this fill reminds me of leaf, if your initial object size was exactly like mine.

36 – Rose: Modifying the Leaf

With the last green fill chosen, go to Effects > Warp > Flag, choose Horizontal, and enter -20% for Bend to distort the leaf. Now in order to add dimension, apply some inner shadow: go to Effects > Stylize > Inner Glow, and change Opacity to 50%. Set the color to dark green and Blur to 10 pt. You can copy this fill now to add more leaves – only with edit Transform effect applied to it (Angle, Scale, and Move).

Continue Learning…

This time DzineBlog presents you with amazing illustration design inspiration, we run into some cool portfolio on the web we found out some great illustration design, i mean u ‘ll love these,

The work of the artists reflects various styles, personalities and cultures, and all designs have one thing in common: they are colorful explosions of energy, optimism and inspirational not all are pure illustration some of these are illustration with images and so, Basically illustration makes the design look pretty

Hope you are inspired by this collection

1. ) Ideafixa

2. ) Just For Fun

3. ) isoCologne

4. ) isoCologne

5. ) isoCologne

6. ) Love ampaction

7. ) InsomNIAC

8. ) Breathing Egoo

9. ) Mulo mask

10. ) Formula Of Life II

11. ) Visual Arts

12. ) James White

13. ) La Femme

14. ) Random Shape

15. ) Non Cadenza

16. ) For the Love

17. ) The Long Road

18. ) Nature Girl

19. ) Computer Arts

20. ) Djean

21. ) BCC2 UK

22. ) Honda

23. ) MTV Brasil Package

24. ) Planets

25. ) Soccer

26. ) Blowing Wind

27. ) Beard Full of Butterflies

28. ) Fear

29. ) Mad Monkey

30. ) Still Dreaming

31. ) Suicide

32. ) Mouvements

33. ) Thom Yorke

34. ) Clubmaster

35. ) Clubmaster

36. ) Clubmaster

This is a tutorial illustrating perspective techniques and how you can achieve the feeling of depth and motion. We will be doing this in a few steps, such as placing the main character, creating the volume fading away and adding foreground and background images. Let’s get started!

Final Image Preview

Take a look at the image we’ll be creating. Want access to the full PSD files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join Psd Plus for just $9/month. You can view the final image preview below or view a larger version here.

Tutorial details:

• Programs: Adobe Photoshop CS4 and Modo
• Difficulty: Advanced
• Estimated Completion Time: 5-7 h

Step 1 – Preparing the canvas

Before we begin there are a few things worth mentioning. All the photos in this tutorial belong to the author, Pirosca Marcel. They were not gathered from stock sites around the net. The main character was shot in my photo studio.

First off I opened the original image resulted from the shooting with the main purpose being isolating the character and the shadows on the floor. First thing I noticed was that his face was not expressive enough for what I had in mind.

Before we begin cutting out the character I needed to replace his head with one from another picture where he looked more optimistic. I always shoot a lot of pictures every session, so when situations like this arise I have plenty of other images to choose from. The most important thing is that the light sources must be in the same place so it integrates seamlessly and believably. The light needs to come from the same directions. I have found the image below to be a good match for what I needed.

Using the Polygonal Lasso Tool create a selection around his head. The background contains only a flat color, so the selection should be very easy to make. I selected his head just as in the image below, then copy/pasted it into the original image, on a new layer.

I scaled and rotated it so that it matched the old head.

As you can see some integration is needed to be done for the head to blend perfectly. First off, cut out the background head so we can work on our new one. Use the Polygonal Lasso Tool to select and delete it. We should now have something similar to what we see below.

Notice that the most important region to work on is his neck. In order to obtain a nice transition from one to the other we need a transparency mask on the new head, then with a relatively soft (50%) Eraser Brush start deleting some of the harsh edges on the neck until you reach a good result. This part is open to a lot of trial and error, so using a mask will help us recover some of the parts we may have accidentally deleted. Finally, you should obtain something similar to the next image.

As we can see we need to work on some of the details. We need to fix the shirt and neck lighting in order for him to be believable. For the neck I used a combination of Dodge/Sponge tool as illustrated below.

In order to fix the shirt I copy/pasted a part of his shirt and then I blended it (using curves and transparency mask).

We are now ready to isolate our guy and the shadows on the floor. As he is a hard edged surface against a flat background it should be fairly easy to select him using the Polygonal Lasso Tool. I personally prefer this tool over the paths approach to selection because I don’t have to adjust any control points and tangents, even though it means a lot more clicks. Copy/paste him into a new layer.

Next thing we want is having the shadow on a different layer. As you can see the background of the photo studio was kind of dirty, so in order to remove the stains I applied some Surface Blur. I found that this type of blur is best for this operation as it removes noise while preserving some detail.

Once we got to this stage we can select the shadow using Color Range and the following settings.

Of course there will be some unwanted regions in the selection. Hit OK, and after the selection was made enter Quick Mask mode. Proceed to erase the unnecessary parts, as depicted in the image below.

Now in order to have the exact shadow we need to subtract the contour of our guy from the remaining selection. While in Quick Mask mode Control-click the thumbnail of the main character layer in the layers palette. This will load the selection for that layer. Press Delete to erase the quick mask inside the selection.

Exit Quick Mask mode and we have the selection of the shadow. Just copy/paste it onto a new layer.

We now have the character and his shadow isolated and on separate layers. We are ready to begin the final image.

Step 2 – Composition

This was a HUGE piece of work, size related. In order to achieve the final image we need to create an image 3613 by 5000 pixels. To get an idea of what I actually wanted, first I took the main character and moved it around the canvas; finally deciding to place him on the lower half of the image following the flow of his body. Being on a separate layer meant I could add all sorts of details behind him. The first thing that needed to be done was to further differentiate him from the gray background.

Use a white, soft brush with 20% Opacity to create a glow behind the guy.

Next it’s time to determine how the lines in the image would flow. For this I used my tablet with the size controlled by the pen pressure and Opacity set to about 30%. I proceeded in drawing the lines on which our man was surfing by holding Shift (so that the brush draws a straight line) and pressing harder on the tablet (for the line to be thicker) at his feet and then pressing less as the lines faded away.

This gave the lines the feeling of perspective and also helped me to give a sense of depth. I have to add that this is a process prone to a lot of trial and error, so it might take a while until you are satisfied with the results.

Now it gets interesting. In order to be able to replicate all of the planes fading away and also maintain proper perspective I used the Vanishing Point Filter to eyeball the plane our man is surfing on. There is an entire discussion here, because you can’t define that plane exactly how it is in reality since you have no reference. After several attempts I settled for the one below, thinking it works. To do this go to Filter > Vanishing Point.

The deal with Vanishing Point is that these planes can be extended at 90 degrees or arbitrarily. Using this method I further constructed additional planes to help me keep track of perspective, while trying to match my sketch lines as close as I could.

With this setup in position I was now able to add elements that will be flowing along these planes. But first I had a point to settle.

Somewhere along the line I experimented with color variations since the gray seemed a little dull. I love color and decided to use its power to give it a little punch.

Step 3 – Color Scheme

In order to obtain the proper colors for this piece I used three adjustment layers and placed them on top of the image. Two of them affecting only the skin (using masks), and a third one to set the general mood. For the skin, a Levels and a Color Balance to add subtle color enhancement.

And then a Color Balance affecting the whole image to give an overall greenish mood. The settings are shown below.

We are now ready to add in the details.

Step 4 – Digital Volume

Open Illustrator and by copy/pasting and then scaling vertical rectangles you can obtain something similar to the first digital volume in the image below. Make a copy and move it below.

By adding horizontal rectangles and subtracting them, it’s easy to obtain the second one. Just create one rectangle, move it vertically (by holding down the Alt key to create a copy) and press Command + D repeatedly to multiply it.

Copy the second volume graphic and go to Photoshop.

Now paste it into the Vanishing Point filter. For some reason Photoshop doesn’t allow directly pasting paths from Illustrator there. So we must paste it on a new layer as pixels first. Rotate it and scale it vertically just as in the image below in order to have as much resolution as we can.

Then Command-click the layer thumbnail in the layers palette. This will bring up the selection of that layer. Press Command + C to copy it into the cache, then delete the layer. We can now move to the Vanishing Point filter.

Go to Filter > Vanishing Point and paste. You should have something like that shown below.

Now if you drag that selection onto the floor plane, Photoshop will automatically calculate the right perspective for you.

Do it again to extend the volume further back.

Go to blending options and add the styles shown below.

You should now have something looking like this.

In order to to have some of the squares transparent, like in the final image, create a Transparency Mask for this layer, and then use a 50% gray (#7a7a7a) to paint over the squares that you want transparent. This can be a tedious process and it is up to you to decide which ones you leave opaque and which not. I will illustrate.

Now to give it a little punch, duplicate that layer, set its Opacity to 68%, and apply the following Curves (Command + M) to its transparency mask and you get this. The gray in the mask should have turned to black so this layer affects only the opaque squares.

It should look something like this.

We have reached a delicate part which takes a lot of tweaking to get right, but the main idea is to use a copy of the volume, move it into place and then use the Warp Tool to simulate the curvature. The tricky part is that some of the lines may get curved the wrong way and I had to personally correct them. Fairly time consuming I must say, but no other idea to create that corner came to mind.

Using the same technique as before, create a transparency mask and block out some transparent squares using a 50% gray.

Again, use the Vanishing Point Filter, Warp and a Transparency Mask to create the next section. It will take some work, but I already illustrated the necessary techniques.

We proceed to add the rest of the sections until they vanish.

Back to Illustrator. Using the Pen Tool to create a path along the sketch lines. Then round the corners. The easiest way for rounding vertices is to use a script called Round Any Corner found in this archive. Read more here.

Fill the final path with white, remove the stroke, and copy/paste it into Photoshop underneath the “volume” layer.

In order to enhance the look I decided to add another volume, this time white, underneath the one we created. Use the Vanishing Point filter once again, copy the first volume created in Illustrator, and extend it into perspective, as shown below.

As we can see, the trail is overlapping the white volume, so we need a mask to hide part of it. Leave only the top-left section visible.

We just need to add the shadow underneath our guy and we’re done with this section. We isolated it earlier in another document so just copy/paste in a new layer and align it. Set it to Color Burn with 50% Opacity. Now he looks like he’s actually there.

Step 5 – Background and Foreground Images

There are multiple ways to create the flying images, but I found that the quickest and easiest was the 3D approach. Basically, I took the planes generated by Vanishing Point and tried to recreate them in 3D. Considering that they were flying on a vertical plane on the surfer’s sides meant I had to create only one plane. I could extend everything else from there. Hang on, you’ll see what I mean.

The application of choice was Modo, but this can be done just as easily in others too. Again, I did this in 3D because it was much faster, I could move the planes into perspective much easier, which means more experimenting hence better results. Arguably I could have done this with Vanishing Point too, but it would have been time consuming.

Besides on my computer, Photoshop kept crashing if I worked more than 30 seconds with Vanishing Point, which happened about 100 times when doing work on the music volume. After that, I knew 3D was the only choice. Besides you’ll learn a new technique.

First and foremost we need to prepare a backplate for the 3D environment with the plane we need to match. I used the following image. Save it as a separate JPG.

In Modo create a new scene.

Go to Item > Create Backdrop. This creates a plane which we can add the image above as reference.

On the right you will see the following menu. From the Items list choose the backdrop item you just created, then in Properties, go to Image > Load Image.

Choose the “backplate” we saved earlier.

As you can see, the backdrop rotates as we rotate the view. We don’t want that, we want it to remain still and only move the geometry. In order to do that go to Projection Type > Camera. This will make the “backdrop” invisible for the current perspective view, but it will act as a background for the camera.

Press Command + Space. This will bring up a pop-up menu where you can choose what your viewport will display. Select Camera of course.

Now if we rotate the viewport the background image will remain still. To make sure the rendering will have the same dimensions as our piece, on the right side go to Shader Tree > Render and set the width/height of the scene to 3613/5000.

We are ready now to match some geometry.

Make sure that Trackball Rotation is active in your camera Advanced OpenGL menu. This will ensure that the camera will be able to rotate on all axis not only on XZ.

Now the tricky part. By rotating the camera slowly try to match our 3D plane with the one in the reference. Also scale the plane and make it longer.

One thing is obvious, the camera perspective is not dramatic enough to match the two planes. When I say dramatic I mean that the parallel lines do not converge fast enough. So we need to increase it.

The perspective of a camera depends on how wide the entering cone of light is. The wider the cone, the greater the perspective. The narrower the cone, the lower. That’s why wide camera lenses tend to distort images and emphasize perspective. That cone angle is directly controlled by the focal length. Fortunately Modo’s camera model is very similar to the real world one, so we can edit that parameter.

I have found by trial and error that 10mm focal length is close to what we need.

Continue Learning…

My newest theme, Glow, has been completed today. With its bright colors, bold text and flashy design, Glow is a great theme for anyone looking to make an impact! For more details be sure to check out the Live Demo as well as the Features Page in the gallery. I realize that this design has been a long time coming, but hopefully you enjoy the way I have expanded on the initial concept.

Features

You will find that Glow comes with all of the great features that you have come to expect from ElegantThemes, including the new ePanel Options Page and all of the functionality that it provides. You will notice a rich featured articles section on the homepage, a sleek and widgetized tabbed menu in the sidebar, and plenty of adjustable settings to keep you busy. You will also find that Glow comes with 4 different color schemes, just in case Purple isn’t your style

Theme Sneak Peek – Deviant

For those of you who do not follow me on Twitter (http://twitter.com/elegantthemes) or Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/elegantthemes), you probably missed my latest theme sneak peek. This design has been a lot of fun to make so far, and I hope its unique and playful style will intrigue you. Here is a quick preview

Now a days you can see a increasing trend of using nature elements in web-design. incorporating nature elements like trees , landscape, sea, sky etc in to the design gives a more realistic and pleasant look to the website

Here i’ve collected 30+ website designs base on nature theme, its quite interesting and inspiring to see how designers take colors and elements for nature and bring them in to web design, hope you all will like this collection

1.) 84Colors

2.) Hrasi

3.) Reklambyrå stockholm

4.) Dara’s Garden

5.) Springtime in Tennessee

6.) Adventure Travel

7.) Morphix Design Studio

8.) Native Springs Water

9.) Qird Studio

10.) Aquatory Group

11.) MacAllan Ridge

12.) kulturbanause blog

13.) Lendl Allen V. Trazo

14.) Viget Inspire

15.) Weingut Trumme

16.) 4design

17.) Adit SHukla

18.) Agami Creative

19.) Hellenic Holidays

Continue Learning…

Often after approving the final label’s design, clients will want to see the design mocked-up as a package. Starting with a final label design, we’ll use Illustrators mesh tools to simulate a 3D package design. Let’s go ahead and do that!

Final Image Preview

Below is the final image we will be working towards. Want access to the full Vector Source files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join Vector Plus for just 9$ a month.

Tutorial Details

• Program: Adobe Illustrator CS3
• Difficulty: Easy
• Estimated Completion Time: 30 minutes

Step 1

Open your approved label design in Illustrator, in this tut I use snack label as an example, which is shown below.

Step 2

Group the objects (Command + G), select it, then apply Envelope Distort > Make with Mesh. When the dialog box appears set 4 in the rows and columns fields. No need to use too many rows and columns because we’re going to add them later.

Step 3

Before we add more rows and columns we have to decide the final shape for the pack first. Use a little bit of your imagination to do it, photo references would be much better. Select the anchor point with the Gradient Mesh Tool (U) or Direct Selection Tool (A) to re-shape the mesh, as you picture it in your mind or as the reference dictates. Add rows or columns as needed.

Step 4

After you’re happy with the result, copy the object and release the Gradient Mesh within the copied one. We are going to use this Mesh to shade the distorted label.

Delete the copied label and fill the mesh with 10% black. Later we will apply black and white colors to it.

Step 5

Now put the Mesh right above the label, then adjust its size and shape. Make sure you fit it into the label. Set the Mesh to Multiply.

Click for full Tutorial…

Retro Futurism is the term used to describe artwork depicting a view of the future, from the eyes of the past. The artwork itself also has the appearance of something old and vintage, basically blending both past and future into one style of artwork that blows your mind! Digital artists are creating their own modern interpretations of the retro futurism style, often taking inspiration from the game covers of retro consoles such as the Atari or Commodore. Check out this collection of some amazing examples of contemporary takes on the retro futuristic style, and continue on to a bunch of handy tutorials giving tips on how to create a stunning design of your own.

Hannibal Chew

Sakke Sioni

Pablo Alfieri

Joao Oliveira

James White

Nicolas Alexander

Alex Beltechi

Peter Nudo

Pinar Demirdag

Click for more designs…