Transcripts
1. Intro: I'm Erica and I have a surface pattern designer, illustrator and front designer in this class will teach. How did Illustrated, Nutcracker and Adobe Illustrator without using the pencil, even though we will not be using the pen tool? The skills and illustrator tricks I demonstrate will help gain understanding on anchor points. And where to plot them will use simple shapes such as rectangles and circles to create an army of nutcrackers. We'll start with a simple sketch, and I'll teach you how to have illustrator do most of the work for you.
2. Head, Hair, and Hands: Okay, welcome to class. And I mean is go over, This gets really quick, and then we're gonna die right into making our Nutcracker. So this is the sketch I drew out. It's on a little tiny Rhodia pad, and I should have done a better job lining things that. But I was actually sitting the back of my kids class, so and I didn't have a dust to work on. Says balancing it kind of on my knee, my little note pad. And so this is what I ended up. But if I, um I had a little more time, I think he did this in about 15 minutes. I probably would have lined things that better on the center line, but that's OK, cause we're gonna I'm with the help of the guides and a lot of the tools of illustrator leasing these nutcrackers gonna come together really easily now, I used the pencil a lot, Teoh make my nutcrackers. But in this class, I'm gonna show you how to do what I did. Using the various shapes and other tools of illustrator. These were going to come together very easily. So if your pen tool skills aren't uh, kind of rusty or you're still learning the pento or you haven't tackle the pencil. That's OK, because you're not really gonna need it for this class. I do, however, recommend my other class adobe illustrator create a detailed illustration from sketch to finish. That's where I really break down how to use the pen tool in bite sized pieces and explain really easily how Teoh use the Penta whereto plot the anchor points. I also go over picking colors and the color guide and setting up the layers. But for this class, we're going to need a couple layers and you're gonna want your sketch layer on its own layer and you wanna lock it because that way we don't actually moving around or bump it. Um, I was have a background layer so I can kind of pop in a color and see how the colors are working together. And then I could just close out the I and, um, get rid of it so I can keep working away when a layer for guys because we want these guys to guides to stay locked, and, um and I like to just spilled it kind of close out the I so I can get rid of them real quick and then a layer for that We're are working layer where we're going to draw. And again I named my layers. I can see them really easily know which one I need to unlock or close the ire. Open I out over here. Um so to start, we're going to start with the faces. And I made thes faces different on each one of these. But we're going, going thio, going to start with this guy over here and there, just slightly different and again based, depending on your comfort skill if you want, you can just make a round circle for the face, but and that's what we're really going to start up on your show. You had a work with that circle and kind of make the shapes. It's just has a little more, um, not so Customize those little toys with little wooden toys that kids had a little round ball for the head. Little kind of stick body, But just so it has a little character to it, some he grabbed, um, a skin color here, and we're gonna get our lips tool hands get richer, draw layer, and we're gonna draw out and hold down the shift key. See, you get a perfect circle. Otherwise you end up with an oval. We're going places over. We want to line this up tour guide, and now we're only gonna work on one side of the face, and then we're gonna reflect it over to the other side. So one of the windows you need to have open or the panel panels is your transparency. We're gonna use this a lot. And we're also going to use Pathfinder lot specifically unite, divide and trim. And, uh, stroke. Probably cause we're gonna create some If you have some decorative brushes, some strokes here changed the wait on those your swatch panel and brushes if you're gonna use some of these decorative strokes. So but for now, make sure you have your transparency. Us. We will reduce that transparency down so we can see our ah, face here museum in a little closer. OK, so we're gonna work again. Just on one side of the face and Renee's are direct selection era, which is this white one up here. Or you can use a on your keyboard and that this way you can independently maneuver each anchor points. I gonna grab this anchor point and pull this down. And I grab this handle up here and I'm gonna pull this one out. And this went on a little bit too, because I'm a nice little more of, ah, rounded square face a little bit broader jaw here and again, we're only gonna work on one side of the face and let me show you how we get to the other side. So, um, this is looks pretty good. I'm kind of happy with that. I'm You're also gonna want your rulers out, because this is where we're gonna grab her guide. So if you don't have your rulers out, it's command R on your keyboard, and that will bring out your rulers. And now you have your guides. So now we're gonna bring a guide over. And this one we don't want our guides locked because we're going to use this to divide this square. So places over our face here select Botham. So now that guy, now the one underneath that's lock is on its own layer the guide and the face and click on this divide over here in past minor. Now, whenever use divide at automatically groups everything, it got rid of that extra guy that we use because it used it to divide this face. So now we're gonna end group it, which is shift command G on your keyboard. Now I can delete this half So we bring up this a pass ity here's you can see the face and now I'm going to reflect it to the other side. And the reflect tool is O on the letter on her keyboard. Or you can always access it up here in transform. But I really usually work with them. The keyboard shortcuts. It just makes my workflow go much faster. So we're going to reflect that to the other side. Let me just show you How do you like and really quick So you're gonna plot your reflect will down anywhere on the guide that way, because that's your center. And then you just take your cursor your arrow and swing it around and hold on your shift key, and that will lined it up perfectly to the other side. And then hold down your option key lift up on your cursor your arrow, and then you can lift up on your keys on your keyboard. And now I have head both sides of my face. Now they're two different pieces, so we're going to make him into one. And as you re user, unite tool. I might reduce this transparency down. I can see what's going on behind, and I'm gonna do the same thing with the hair. So I'm gonna get a different color here and grab, um, the lips tool time and make a mobile. And I don't need to go too far over cause I'm gonna again reflect this. We reduced the transparency down again. Grab my direct selection tool, which is, and the keyboard, and start working with these anchor points crab. This one kind of bring it down here. This one bring in a little bit. This one doesn't need too much, um, manipulation. That's looked pretty good. I'm also going to send this to back cause right now it's on top of the face and I want it behind the face so must select it, and you shift command left bracket will send that directly to the back, or you can go upto object and do the same thing and let me just bring up the past e on that and a capacity on this one as well. That looks really good. So I'm to reflect this and select just the sight of the hair again Oh, on your keyboard and reflect this to the other side. Hold down the shift key. So and now it's perfectly even to the other side altar or option key lift up on my cursor and that we have both sides. So that looks really good. And I did the same thing that I did to the face I did with the hands. I just started off with a circle and I just and I didn't have to re divided or anything like I did with the face. I just reflected it. Um And I'm sorry, didn't I reflected after I manipulated the circle with some of the anchor points and then I once I had the whole arm together. I just reflected the whole arm. We're gonna get into more details in the arm. I just want to show you that do a similar way that you do use manipulate the anchor points of the face with the hand in the next segment, we're gonna go over the face. Facial features
3. Face Features: Okay, now we're gonna go over the features on the face, and these are a lot of fun. I'm in the pretty easy to dio so I'm gonna reduce the transparency down here. I'm phase. I can see the features behind it. Maybe a little bit lower. And I'm also going Teoh lock, um, lock it so that I don't actually accidentally bump it. And what I mean by Lockett is just I can still see that the facing the hair but it's locked in the background so I can't bump it accidentally, grab it one of their anchor points or moving or anything. So to do that's command to on the keyboard and to release it, it's option command, Teoh, and that releases it, unlocks it. So I mean it. Just lock it here again and again. We're just gonna work on one side of the face and then we're going to reflect. So let's start with the nose and the nose is pretty easy. And we get a little darker, kind of can keep flesh tone, then the nose here and we're going to use our marquee tool and you can access it right over here in the tool panel or just use em on your keyboard and we're going to draw a triangle line up with, um, the that are center guide here. So it's pretty. Looks just like a really long skinny. I'm sorry, not triangle rectangle, but we're gonna use our direct selection tool again to maneuver some of these anchor points and reduce the opacity down this on this just a little bit. Second, see what's going on behind it. Get my direct selection tool, which is a on the keyboard, and start working with the, uh, the anchor points. I'm gonna grab this bottom one over here and move that one out, and I'm gonna bring this one in a little bit. And that looks really could mean that. Bring up the opacity, See how that looks. OK, remember, just reflect this over and both sides together, and I'm emerged. Um, unite them together. So it's one piece, and that looks really good. I'm gonna go ahead and lock that too. Now for the eyebrows again, We're gonna use the marquis told it, or just skins will make a square or a rectangle and get that same hair color over here and re Smith. Draw a rectangle, zoom in a little bit closer here and bring down the capacity. Get my direct selection tool and I'm going Teoh, bring this'll corner way, way up, and then bring this one in. Now it's looking pretty angular, so I want to add some curve to that. So I mean, you shift, see? And that brings up this tool. I remember what's called Anchor Point Tool anyways, Show C on your keyboard brings that up. And if you just grab the edge of, um, well, uh, any shape here, you can get a nice curve and that will also bring out handles automatically. Some just can't do that to both sides here, and then I can go in and work with these handles. If I won't make the arch a little bit bigger or whatever, I can. Even I wanted to kind of bring this out a little bit. It's not so sharp oven angle and send it a little higher in my sketch, but that looks really good. Bring up the opacity on that and let's reflect back to the other side. Yeah, down the shift key, Ault lift up there he had both sides and I don't need to lock that because I'm working pretty far away from it. Um, so won't bump it, but okay, for the eyes for this one, I drew them close, and you can draw them anyway, open And what I did on my other one. Um, I just used the Ellipse tool and made an oval. And that's one way you can do an eye for this one. And we use the blob brush sometimes. Um, don't always like my Nutcracker staring at me, so well, just closer, I So I'm gonna bring up the block brush, which is shift be on your keyboard or you can access it over here is not on top. Misr. Underneath your paintbrush and bring the size down a little bit with my left bracket and I'm going to just could drag over and make a kind of ah curve line there. And that's, um, adjusted. Closed? I am I gonna add any eyelashes, but if you wanted to, you can use the blob brush and just draw some little lines here with your blood brush and then for the cheeks. The cheeks are really fun. I'm again. We're gonna either lips tool, animate grab flash color that I used for same color used for the phase and draw the circle whole downshifts. You get a perfect circle, get about the size that I want and again because this is locked. Um, I could work right on top of this and I think just got a little bit bigger. Okay? And now I'm gonna use some of my brushes that I have, and I'll post a link to this, um, in the class notes where I got these brushes and I think gonna try this one right here. Make it. This was the same color used on the nose. And my brush brush is just be on your keyboard and I'm gonna draw right over this a little denser than I want. So you see if there's one that's not so stints there, I kind of like that one looks good. Okay, So whenever you use a stroke, um, you need Teoh. When you're happy with that, you need to expand it. Because in order to be maker illustration, scalable without altering anything on a stroke, where it's scaled is based on the anchor points, which here, there's one here, and there's one there. All these little pieces. You can't see their anchor points right now. So when you if I was to scale this down really small, it would kind of explode, it would look like it's exploding. So I need to expand its I'm gonna just make sure selected, and I'm expand appearance. And now you see all the anchor points. I'm a zoom in. I need copy of this circle. Okay. Very habit. Now I want it. Ah, use command. See, I'm a keyboard and then shift command V to bring make a copy and bring in a top. And there you go. There's a copy is gonna go little slow because there's so many anchor points and drag around. I have everything selected both circles and the anchor points or the stroke I made. And I mean, use command seven on my keyboard to make it clipping mask, and I need to go over here to Pathfinder. This is where we use our trim. And even though you can't see all that extra scatter brush that I used, it's there and without used trimming it off, um, it would still weigh it down, even though you can't see it. Illustrator sees it, and it just makes your file really heavy and makes illustrator run really, really slow. So that is the cheeks. Now it looks kind of finding because you're not seeing the whole face. But once I bring up the past city, it'll look really cute remembering this over to the other side. And I'm going to reduce the passing down on this one, and I'm gonna lock it. Doesn't work right on top of it. And I don't want to bump it by accident. Okay, so I did. Two different mustache is here. Someone had kind of walk you through, both of them really quick. This one. I drew out with the pentacle. I'm actually. Did you draw everything that on my crackers with the pencil? My minute kind of show? You kind of a cheater? Way to do this. So ah, without using the pen tool grab. Same color. A used for the hair and in a kit A over here. Get my dreck selection tool and start working with me. Bring Nell Opacity West the F anchor points, and I'm going to just try to fill in as much of this is possible. And I'll just use the blob brush to you. Get the rest. You further with this, and that looks pretty good. Think I'm gonna use kind of pull this one down a little bit Single? That looks really good. Bring this when he also don't want it. A handle. Teoh overshoot the path of another one. So if I was to draw imaginary line this way, this'll handle shouldn't pass that line. That looks really good. No, I didn't get the blob brush. And you bring up the size on this a little bit. So kind of matches this corner. Oops. And I I have Ah, wake, um, tablets. So I used the stylist on that, Um, and there's more inexpensive tablets out there. Really recommend using a tablet Teoh to do this because using a mouse really can kind of get well crazy. Okay, I'm just kind of filling this in a little bit with the blob brush. Yeah. Now it's a little bumpy, so I'm just gonna go in and remove a few the extra anchor point, which, if you just hit the negative sign, doesn't want that one on your keyboard that will get rid of, um in this click on the anchor point that will get rid of extra anchor points. You could also go over here and use your smooth tool. I don't think there's a keyboard shortcut for that. Another isn't so it's under the shape or tool any over here. Just click on that corner on the fly out mitt panel and you confined your smooth tool over here. And just make sure your pieces selected. And then you can just kind of go through and smooth out some of these anchor points Smooth out these lines, get the mind of a little better. Let's bring up the opacity on that. That looks really good. Okay, It's and Haman just gonna reflect that to the other side. They have a mustache. Okay. Another quick way to do in my stash if you're, uh, feeling this is a little more than what you want. A tackle. You could just start with a rectangle Doesn't bring one over here real quick and reduce the opacity down so you can see what's going underneath. That zoom in real close here and okay here ago. So now again, we're gonna use, uh, combination of tools. I'm gonna get rid of this the anchor point right here, cause I'm not going to need that. Somebody's, uh, just used the negative sign on a minus sign on your keyboard, and that gives you a pen tool that deletes anchor points and just get rid of that one right there. Damning to use shift see, so I can curve these out, and I'm gonna bring this one in. And this one, I only have right now one handled toe work with and I went in, I another handle over here, some use shift see again, And that will hold down my anchor point that we're getting my other handle over here. And so now I can, uh, work with this. Bring this and closer, and I'm gonna do the same thing over here again. I only have one handle someone shift, see? And then it just makes you pull the right direction there. Museum in a little closer for you, and and bring this up a little closer. Bring this handle down. Listen, bring way over. And this is kind of how learning the pentacle and reverse. If you do this for a little while, you'll understand where anchor points need to be plotted when using the pencils. So you're kind of learning the pen tool in reverse. And something is a really good exercise for that. Yeah, This is going a little too far out. Okay, that looks really good. You just bring us a little here. Okay? I like that. So this is another way to make mustache. And again, you can get really creative and kind of and grab that corner and we could hire lower. I'm really kind of play with it. Give each one of your nutcrackers a lot of character.
4. Body: this segment. We're going Teoh do the body and arms and legs again. We're just gonna create one arm, one leg. And the reflected me show you how to do kind of some of the different style of boots and give you some ideas on different ways to, uh, kind of make different Nutcracker nutcrackers with each with a little different character to it. So let's zoom in here on the body and this one's a little more rounded and again we're gonna work on just one side of the body cause we're going to reflect. So it's grab or lips tool. And let's pick a color here and just gonna draw out old just get basic shape going here, reduced down the opacity and start working on kind of maneuvering these anchor points. So you wanna I'm gonna have it banned here like a belt of a different color. So anything I dio on each side of it, I'm gonna overshoot the belt, cause then I could just cover up my edges, not worry about lining everything up perfectly and and I want to make sure I fill in this area the sea like a little triangle that's empty right now. And if I put the band here, this would be missing. Although I am going to go over it with this. But, um, case I changed my mind or one of, um, duplicate this nutcracker and kind of change out what I did in the center here, I would want this filled. So I'm just gonna I'm actually probably gonna add another anchor point. I can pull this down, and he just I'm If you use the plus sign on your keyboard that gives you add anchor point, you click anywhere you want on a line segment of his shape, and that will add in anger point. So that way can kind of bring this down and gets this past year again on the worry about this. This is kind of bumpy. I don't worry about it so much, cause the bill's gonna cover it. My main thing is to get this area fills and bring this one out here and this one out here, uh, again, You want to make sure lips this is filled and up here in case I decide to do duplicate my I'm this nutcracker and just change out some of the details and I've done that with some my other nutcrackers I just duplicated. I'm delete some of the details, change out the colors, and then just do something different. Different details on all around the Nutcracker. And it looks like like I just recreated a whole one from scratch. So there's a lot you can do here just with the basic shape. So this is good, is covering everything I need. And we have a collie here that's gonna cover this in This covers my center line. Pretty gonna think I'm to come out just a little bit further. Oops. Makes her just this anchor points selected, and they're okay again. We're going, Teoh, bring a new guide over, Made on top of our center. Make sure both are selected Divide and then on group delete that half. And I didn't bring up this opacity so you can see what looks like. And that looks really good. Now I'm going to reflect this to the other side. Unite these two together, and I'm going to reduce this opacity down so I can work on the top shape. I'm a lock this to sit on, bump it. So I'm gonna get a different color and grab my marquee tool, uh, again, that's em on your keyboard. And let's do this lighter green. And even if you start with the color you don't like it, you could just change it. Later on, I'm gonna overshoot the belt and I'm in. Make sure kind of overshoot here in the collar, reduce it's opacity down and get my direct selection tool, which is a on the keyboard, and just start moving anchor points. We're gonna bring this one in, and then this one out some more. This will give me a nice V here. Just bring that capacity up so you can see it. And make sure after you use the direct selection tool on an anchor point, make sure you click off of it and then use your direct select your selection tool, which is a black arrow to re select it otherwise and Reflektor just gonna reflect that anchor point around that you last use and it will kind of distort your shape. So just make sure you do that. Okay, grab my reflection tool. Gannett's o on the keyboard. Hold on. My shift key All to lift up Now. I have both sides of because this would be his shirt unite that I mean it. Unlock his other part of his shirt here and bring up that, um, capacity and yeah, that looks really good. And even though it's the same as this one, just because it's different colors, that's already looking really different. So I mean, it kind of do the same thing with the bottom part of his shirt. Here, grab the marquee tool and I use the same color green as I did here. And I'm just draw a rectangle and then get my dreck selection tool. It's reduced capacity down and see it's going on Abstinence. So what's going on underneath? And I'm gonna grab this one out here like this and bring this one in just a little bit more and you bring this down. Otherwise I might have a dip here, bring this one up a little bit. Okay, just zoom and saying, see this little bit better and bring up this opacity Remus around, and I mean, unite these two. And now I'm gonna bring the capacity down again and lock it. So here I did, um, kind of ah Harlock in looking helicke wouldn't looking design, but with some triangles. And if even if you don't want to attempt a triangle weaken against. Start with a rectangle may use the same color I used on his shirt here and I mean it again . Overshoot the belt, Draw a rectangle. It's reduces opacity down. And I'm going Teoh, eliminate anchor point here on my rectangle. Someone that used the minus Sinema keyboard may get rid of that one right here. Then a on may keep works on with the direct selection tool. And I'm just gonna grab this one and move it over. And now I have a triangle, and now I can, actually, what we do is leave that here cause I'm gonna put the little ball here and I could just reflect that on both sides. You get the lips tool, and I think we'll get this gold color. Remember, whatever colors you start with, you don't have to commit with as you're building anything that you create an illustrator. I change out colors a lot. As I am working through analyst illustration, I'll have it halfway done, and I'll just cite whatever color and working with just isn't looking or sometimes I wait till the very end, and then I'll just start picking different colors and trying them out. So Okay, now I have my triangle, and I have my little pom pom here, and I'm just gonna select both of them. And to do that hold select one. Then hold down the shift key. And just like the other one, Uh, now use oh, for your reflect tool. But down in your center guideline, spin around, hold down the shift, the old key. And there you have it. Now, I have both sides of my, um well, design here for the belt again, that's just really easy. Single use, that same gold color. But I used, uh, for the pom poms and just make a rectangle here. And I want to kind of make sure I overshoot both the, uh, the top of the bottom to cover up those edges and kind of zoom in here, and I'm not gonna reduce the opacity. Now. I just need to make sure I am covering everything's Let me just bring Have the skirt or the bottom of his jacket locked here. Yeah. See, this is better. Okay. See, how have this part is? sticking out a little bit. So I'm gonna He's my direct selection tool. Grab a corner. And this isn't meeting up either. So I'm gonna grab my drink section tool and gets us to match up. And then again, just select O on the keyboard. Plot that. Damn. Take your cursor. Your arrows. Swing it around. Well, that down the shift key, adult or option, a keyboard lift up and we're gonna select both sides and unite them.
5. Arms, Legs, Collar: okay for the arms and legs. Um, they're pretty easy and fun. So I'm gonna get the, um, marquis tools will make a big, long rectangle. And I think I'm gonna stick with this gold color. And I'm in a kind of overshoot my, um, The shirt here. And I'm gonna send this to back the way you do that, it's shift command left bracket. Now it's behind there, you know, im you reduce this a pass, ity down and zoom in. He's my direct selection tool and move in these corners, and now it's looking pretty good. Now, I have a nice leg here, and I'm gonna bring up the opacity, and I'm just gonna finish, actually matter reduces opacity back down. I'm gonna finish this whole leg, and that will reflect it. So I'm gonna lock this and make his boot, and I'll show you a couple different booth boot styles. Me grab black here and really use the marquee tool again. Draw another rectangle, reduce this opacity down Suman a little closer here, grab my direct selection tool and bring these in hand kind of bring this one down a little bit. Now for one of the boots. I did. I just kind of left it like that. And then, which is fine. And now I can leave it like this. I can bring it into match up my sketch, but to get this curved you shift. See, this gives me the anchor point selection tool. And then I can now have this curvature and handles I can just bring. Except how? Right? One. Another way to make a boot. Um, just make sure you this one real quick. Um, just draw a rectangle, bring these in, draw another rectangle on top, and now you have another It's style. Okay, so now for his shoe, we're just gonna get the lips tool. And we're gonna make, uh, and mobile when I need this a lot bigger. Okay, that's about right now and bring down a guide, and I don't want it directly in hacks. I wanted to give it a little It more, um, side over here in this old. So I have a guide meant slick. Both these. Make sure I don't just like this underneath and divide my path. Finer finder shift. Command, jeda and group just delete this bottom part. Okay? Going to bring up the opacity on these back all the way up. No, me unlock pant leg here. And just gonna reflect these around now, my booth there touching a little bit, and that's fine. But if you wanted Teoh me send this to back, um, you could just delete this leg right here. I'm gonna do that real quick. Select this one. Use your your up downside arrows, Music side arrow. Just kind of move this over a little bit. And then, um, just reflected again and send that back. Oops. There we go. OK, the same way I did the legs, I did the arms starting with me. Get the same colors. A shirt here. Okay, if you touch on a color with your selection tool, that coloring will usually pop up over here in your swash panel. So sometimes I forget exactly which color, especially though past these turned down. If I touch it, it will pop up, and I can find it again. Um, can you draw a rectangle, reduce this a pass ity down, get my direct selection arrow and and it's sculpt his, uh, arm out here And then for now, I didn't mind it just did this with the pen tool. But after those who are comfortable with the pen tool yet are still learning it, you can just draw a circle. And I'm gonna make this a different color. You do the same green. So I did over here, and you bring this opacity up so I can see it. Just bring this over here a little bit more down. Okay? Now what I'm gonna dio is, um take get rectangle and draw this on top. And actually, what I'm gonna do is I need to move this rectangle. I need Teoh, move this ink anchor point up because this is going to get in the way. Actually think I can just get rid of it, and then crab this line with a direct selection tool to hire him and changed the shape there. Okay, because I'm gonna make this kind of exact like that and you can do different things. Bring this out a little bit more coming here. Make sure I'm lined up. Okay, so now I'm going to add few anchor points here. No. What? I could just grab my direct selection tool and just bring these up. Cand just add another anchor tool here and there you have it, and now they're two different pieces. So to make it easier if I was gonna change out colors, it's easier if there if it's one piece and that's all it is. And then for this leaves, it's the same are the cuffs just another rectangle and me zoom in here just maneuvering the anchor points. And then the other segment showed he had to use a hand, make the hand. So I'm just gonna bring this hand over here. Meat reflected around. It was backwards. Oops. And so there you have an arm, and then you can just like the whole arm makes you don't select the shirt or at least lockets. You don't accidentally select it. Grab your reflect tool, plot your tool down on the center line and swinging on around, and that's pretty much it for the arms and legs for the collar. After this one, you can just draw another rectangle. I think I'm gonna do, uh, gold. Use my direct selection tool Oops museum in a little bit closer here and maneuver this around. If you wanted to make scallops, you could just get your ellipse tool. Draw a circle the same color and grab start to move it across. Hold on your shift key. So it's lined up and then well down all to lift up. And I have a duplicated, and then you can just duplicate this across and then that gives you a scalloped, um, color. I'm going to reflect this. I need Teoh lock all of this. I don't reflect this by accident. And let me just make sure lined up here, okay? This corner needs to go in and sticking out some. Yeah. I mean, grab. I used to come down just a little bit. There you go. That way, those little gaps. Or you could have left that and be part of the design, like an island, but and then getting this will, we're going to reflect over. So we just select all of this and they gave a little bit of it different. Hurry here. But that looks all right. And that's, uh, one of the ways to make a collar. This one just similar. I didn't scallop it this when I did. I just did Larger circles actually drew this with a pinch. Little bit. I'm if you want to do something, which is with two scallops on each side. I'm just doing pent. Will are the Ellipse Make a circle, and that's pretty much it for The Nutcracker.
6. Hat: okay for the hat. Um, it's just very similar to what we I showed you with all these other elements. Um, this one again. Similar to how we did the face. Just with a circle and then kind of maneuvering some of the anchor points for the crown. Very similar to what we did here to get these points. Um, and then with the the band against very similar, you can do different ones just like you did the collar. And that's pretty much it for the hat. Ikan. This one was. You know, you make a square were just a rectangle here, maneuver those anchor points. Um, this one, This is my figgy pudding. A nutcracker. This is just start. You make a circle and then maneuver. These anchor points are actually make a rectangle anding just kind of delete an anchor point and curve that out. So there's just a lot of different ways you can make their hats and just using the same techniques that we use throughout the body. He said the next segment, we're gonna go through some of the embellishment in the final detail
7. Details and embellish: Okay, So at this point, um, work down Teoh embellishment and that details of each Nutcracker and Mrs gives them really gives them. Their character was going for some themes over here. Just bring this down and made a bunch of these last night. And as you can see, we just get rid of my guides here so you can see them better on as you can see. Like this one of this, my just duplicated. This is the 1st 1 I made. I duplicated him. And then I changed out some of his colors, changed out the hat style and some of the details, and he looks a lot different from this one. Uh, this one is the same as this one. And again, I just changed out some of the details, changed the colors. Uh, I changed out what the collar looks like. And, uh, some of the bell ish mint details on him, and he looks like different. Got rid of his points on the cracks. Is the 1st 1 I made and made him kind of around it. Hat. Um, this is the 1st 1 I made over here of this style is my figgy pudding guy and this, and he's not quite done yet. But this is, um, my gingerbread nutcrackers. I might add more detail to him, but what I did is his points. I just deleted the anchor points and gave him, or ever curved look, I and changed out the colors and removed the details that made him unique and just started to add different ones. And again, I'm not quite done with this one. I'm still deciding what I want. A deal when it changes, had out some and add a little more embellishment. Teoh this one to make him look, he just looks a little under underdressed there. So for details, some of the stuff I use museum and, um, was some decorative brushes that I have. I'll post a link of those in the skill share class. Uh, he's over here, but I'm These are just diamonds I made. And I free handed those with, um, my pen tool. But you could just use your marquee tool draw square. I'm rotated on its side Well, down the shift key. So it gets turned proportionally a 45 degree angle. Grab my, uh, a direct selection tool, and I can make these bigger, smaller are, uh, pull him out longer. Kind of change the distortion of of them if I want to make him a little more wonky, Whatever whimsical, we scale this down lips skill this down. And then I can just put these all over, you know, embellished him with those, um, thes little bands I made. I wanted him to be. Didn't want them perfectly. Um, straight. So I drew these out with a pencil. Begin. You can use just your marquee tool. Make some long, skinny rectangles and you can use your direct selection tool if you want to make them a little kind of whimsical. I'm again this detail along here. This was from a a brush that I have and let me show you had to make the little spirals over here. These air fun. Let me show you this one real quick. Um, this is just three different triangles that I made of the same color and just overlap them to give up. And they gave him what made a shirt look a little more layer. Let kind of blousey shirt that has the ruffle down the middle. I these little stars I drew these out with my blob brush. And then I just dotted each the end of each one with a blob brush on his boots. Again, this is just the blob brush right here that I just kind of do those that let me show you. How do you make these? Um, Peppermints, I'm You're gonna get your lips tool marquee. Okay, get your lips tool and get a white color. Or even if you want to do a different color, that's fine. Hold on your shift. Key and maker. Um, make her circle Can move this over here. I need a break. Okay, Now we're gonna do big duplicated. Exactly. So hold down this, then. Hold. Start moving it. Hold on your shift, then. You're all turkey inland. Lift up. So I have two of them. Identical. And I need to make this one red, and I'm gonna means him and a little bit closer here. Me. Grab my guides and see where this center is. You want to line us up to the center? I'm gonna get two guides this time. Okay, Miss selected and I have the circle and both guides select. I mean a divide. Where's my Pathfinder here, divide in group and I'm going Teoh, rotate this well down my shift key there. And I'm just gonna repeat what I just did again and divide and group. And then I'm gonna delete every other slice. No, I'm in a group thes, and then move its hold down the shift key. So it lines up and there you have your peppermint And then you can duplicate thes and make peppermints and change out the colors Sometimes if I want road one sickle, local, kind of offset thes. Anyway, so these really find so engine just resize them different sizes and uses to embellishment. Bellis, your nutcrackers at sea whittles thes. I made some stars thes I made with the pen tool. Just kind of free. Formed, But she could do that again. Start with the A square and at anchor points and start moving. The anchor points around. Similar to how you did this with the sleeves on would see what else over here I made stripes, so I just This is just a long rectangle. And then I just duplicated across the pant leg. She has striped pants. Um, the little buttons. They're just the lips circles may with the lips tool. So let me show you how to make the holly. So this one I freeform it So let me show you how I do it. If I was on, I have never made it without with the rectangle tools. I mean it try this year, okay. Should be same way we did the other things. Me Zoom in here and I'm gonna add some anchor points. So me, ad one here and actually no, no, I'm not gonna do that. Get my select, uh, shift. See, let me just bring that in, OK? I'm trying this without the pencil. I usually have to do with the pen tool, but yeah, this works. Okay, so that looks very similar to how I make mine. You can even curve this in a little bit, make me a little more curved. But I usually just, um, start plotting with my pen tool, and so basically just made the same thing with a rectangle in maneuvering. I'm the anchor points and using the direct anchor selection tool to add that curve. So same thing. And I like to make them in two different halfs. That way I can make 1/2 a different color green. And I'm gonna use it darker green over here and group thes and then just wrote to Oops, I forgot I had that anchor. Are that guy in here? And we get rid of this guy? Okay, so you just rotated, resize it and then draw the lips, um, red ellipse to make it very. And then these have texture to it. And I did this exact same way. I did the cheeks with the apply to scatter brush and then created a quippy Max Maskin trimmed it. And so you can make just all different themes. I really like these. Holy. Think I might make another one with Holly, Maybe a Christmas wreath. Nutcrackers. So I've been kind of making those in different kind of themes Christmas themes to make for the Nutcracker. So, um, that's it. And have fun making your nutcrackers
8. Your Project: okay for your final for your project. I'm sorry. Said Final project. I have kids who are in high school and they have final projects. I design at least one nutcracker. Pick a theme, pick a color theme or ah, seasonal theme like a candy cane or something. And make your character Your Nutcracker unique. And add a lot of detail and deliver it and upload it to that project section of the class. And I hope you have a lot of fun making this and have a happy holidays.
Erica Ilene, Designer and Artist
