Mandala Creation With Affinity Designer

1. Introduction: What do I Mengele add rows. We know a million calendar and a snowflake having common. There are beautiful examples of radial symmetry. Hi, my name is Sarah. I am an engineer, designer and self-taught illustrator. I am the founder of playful and whimsical. And my LD50 is to help you vanish Laura walls and let your house see with personality. I've always fascinated by the mathematical beauty of them in Dallas. But the creation of the species by Han is a mesmerizing but HARQ process. It requires time, experience, and kindness. As a designer, I thought I could do better or at least quicker. I wanted to create a process that allow me to focus on the creativity of the signing this Mandela's. But let the computer or tablet low, the higher precision work. The result is an Nordic process. In this class, you will learn what is radial symmetry? How to create it with Affinity Designer have to create shapes like petals are circles to the final design and how to save them to reuse. Filling your designed with different textures, layering more complex designs and gallery ideas to use on Mandela's aspirins current pages, or to sell imprint on the mangroves. At the end of the class, you will end with a rose window design ready to use as a coloring page. And we'll have folly call blur and gestural Mandela. Also, you will have learned how to use these principles and saves to create all their surplus the size like snowflakes, flowers, or even charts, and how to use them in your designs in all kinds of media like a stickers, prints, or event occurs. In this class, we will use Affinity Designer, but you can do the same in other vector programs. This is not an Affinity Designer class, so use of knowledge will be needed. If you're a beginner, there are hundreds of great classes about Affinity Designer and it's Giza. They won and came back here. Humans have created radial symmetry on, for millennia and adapted into their cultural background is military. Creating an especially fat. So give it a go, and I'll see you in the next class. 2. Class Project and Downloads: Your project is of course, to create a Mandela. But we are going to do it in three steps are very easy and quick. Step one, where you will learn about symbols and radial symmetry when doing the simplest of Mandela's, a bit more complex, but it's still ECS step 2, where you will use them for assets I provide. So you will quickly learn the basics when designing a coloring page of our Mandela. And the final also easy three-step where you'll focus on how to create assets. So you will have a collection of the science to do Mandela sweetening. Once you have mastered these concepts, you will be more than ready to create a more complex layer, fully color and texture Mandela, and have your sport the partner on this steps. Yes, the three of them are easy to do. My idea for this project is that you will have a finished product on every step of the way. So it's a bit of an instant gratification plan. And don't worry, I will explain every step of the way before we start any design project. I always he'd been there S and the one you board in this case of Mandela's filaggrin when ideas and inspiration, and I recommend that you do the same. I have created a library of assets, so gestures, color palettes, and a collection of brushes for you to use. This, we allow you to jump in and have your friends mandela ready in no time. The link to download data sources is in the project, our resources tab. And I will show this buzzword in the screen. Now. In the next video, I will show you how to do radial symmetry on Affinity Designer and how to do the base for any Mandela. So see you in the next class. 3. Create Radial Symmetry: In this class, we are going to learn radial symmetry. Radial symmetry in Affinity Designer in the most basic way. And how to create handlers and other variations you can read. First thing I'm going to do that Xander persona is to create a circle. We click the Tool Ellipse tool, and we are going to use the sift key. So you just press saved to create a perfect circle and not an ellipsis, then we are going to focus on this point. This is the origin, and we can move it around. So the circle is going to rotate with that point as a center, like here. We can put that point, the origin wherever we want. It could be in the center. What is it appears by the fact? Or we can put whatever one and it doesn't have to be on the circle. It can be inside or it could be outside by Ray. Now, we wanted there on the circle. What I want do now is right-click on the ellipse, click duplicate, and we're going to have a second ellipse. And because we change the point of origin, if we rotate, as you see here in transform, the second ellipse in fortes with the origin at the center. So if we use the Sift plus rotation, we can do fixed degrees. So here we are duplicating with 45 degrees. We do again, an affinity is very nice. Do it by itself. And because we have 45 degrees, we need eight circles and then you have it. You have a very simple Mandela. So I grew up everything and I name it Mandela base. Obviously this is a very simple one, but it's the first step that will help you gain confidence so you can play even more. And thus we are going to do no. So what happens is instead of 45 degrees, we do exactly the same but with 30 degrees. So as you can see, or you are going to see their result is similar but very different. It looks like I loved the flower. And in this case we need 12 circles. And what I'm going to do now is just grown-up books that don't worry if that happens, just Control C, then get it done. And what I'm going to do is use this base and duplicate, as you can see. And thus escalate up and down on delay. Have a new saved that I like. What I usually have. I'm very careful in that the points that I'm going to show you now are perfect. So I don't create we're little stapes there. So I'm carefully here escalating. So this point, that point there, matches on one is done. I have a saved that I can color. Now, what I'm doing here is grouping these two shapes and duplicates and rasterize. I do it this way. So the first one keeps the vector information so you can get back to it and change it later if you want. But this is, the rasterized part is a very quick way to just apply color to a drawing like that. So you will have a Mandela in novel time. So I just pick up the paint tool and click with the color I wanted. So I'm going to speed this up a bit so you can see the final result. So this is your first color motif. It is easier than Amanda lab we are going to do in a few lessons, but it is a way for you to understand the basics. And I think it's beautiful. So we are going to do another one. But this time the origin is going to be outside the cycle and creating seen circles here. And I missed, again, duplicate them the group, but this time I'm also rotated them and color. In fact, you can have something like a print for your room or wherever in less than ten minutes. So then you go, you have your freshman data. Don't forget to post it below. So I know that as students, you feedback and get inspired by the art. In the next class, we are going to learn all these symbols, sleeker and I was more fat. So see you in the next class. 4. Symmetry With Symbols: In this class, we are going to learn about symbols and my favorite tree. And that will make our life a lot easier and more fun. And also they gave us the opportunity to change your mind. Even when the Mandela, it's already done. It's very powerful. And we are going to do this one. So let's go. So this time we are going to start by creating a petal. And so we get, and we do an ellipse this time, no circle, but we're going to convert it to curve. And that allows us to modify the nose that there are those little circles. And if we just press one of these options, for example, from where to sharp points on that are we have our bed. So from now, I'm just going to demonstrate gouache. White symbols are really good. For that. I'm going to start just doing the same technique that the previous class very quickly and you have the opportunity to see another way to work with it. Stand with a petal and tin scholars. But what happened in, after all this work, to the side, you know, I don't like this. Bet on that much. I prefer it to be a bit more there or just bigger. So for that, you go back to the petal and go to BYU. Make sure you're in the center persona, of course. Go to BU on, on studio. Select. Symbols are just special, that symbols is checked. And you will have this new menu. Just select the shape you like and click on Create. Let's say you have a symbol. You can use it as many times as you want. And what it does is create a copy of itself. So you modify one of the symbols. Like there. You see it's like a leaky bucket has the battling side. If you modify the data that is inside the symbol inside the bucket, all the other instances will be modified as well. See, I'm changing the color and it changed, but that's not very impressive. But if I come back and make sure that I am the curb and I modify it. Let's play through this. I like it more. You see, I'm just modifying one, but all the other symbols change as well. So this is very powerful, isn't it? I can make any change I want, and it will propagate. So how do I use symbols to create nonetheless? So what I do is I just duplicate the symbol. And exactly I use the same Technique. And the class before. And they have again a Mandela created by symbols with simple. So I can make modifications after the creation of the bandanna. So I have this very basic flower like Mandela. I'm going to group them and I'm going to duplicate it. Of course plays with it. And if I get to one of the petals, note the pedal symbol. But the bed down inside the shape that is inside the symbol. All of them changes so I can make the modifications I want. As you can see, it's very powerful and it's going to get powerful by the end of the lesson. And the great thing about this as you can and create another symbol. So you can create a symbol of a combination of symbols. And you won't lose any information. So if you open this, you can move it wherever. If you open it, it's still a combination of shapes. And you can come here and change the stroke. I use the Scale with Object a lot. Thank You, can do whatever you please with it. So now we are going to use my favorite trick for symbols. And for that we're going to create a symbol that has just a rectangle. But it is a square. This case, I'm just going to copy or place that symbol in every corner of our campus. And for simplicity, we're going to call it corners. To open symbol. And inside the symbol, I'm going to put a baton. So we do an ellipse. And again, we convert it to curves. Select opposite nodes, and solve them. So they're under just clip, combat the sharp. And there we have. So if we move our petal, we are not having radial symmetry. But what happens if we pick up one of the symbols, noting side of the symbol by symbol, flip it. So as you can see, and let me move this to see it better then. As we're picking up the symbols and we're going to flip it horizontally and vertically. The inside of the symbol morphs and we have symmetry in to access. You can see what I'm doing. I'm just flipping here recently and vertically depending on which corner and working with. And you are going to seeing this glass on the nested class. How powerful this little trickier. So I'm going to pick the curve that is inside the symbol and put it on the center. And of course you can always see one curve. So now we're going to pick the curve. I won't go into repeat. The technique will be new symbol. Yeah, I like it more like that. And with the curve, we move the origin to the center. And because we are working with task one corner, we don't have to repeat these 12 or 13 times or we just have to fill one corner. And as you can see, the symbol, the square symbol, fill the other four corners. Isn't that easy? So here you have it. So why our rectangle? First of all, it's easier for you to work with a symbol if you have original shape, our first shape and that rectangle is ideal for any Columbus. But also, as you can see, you can get the shapes inside the rectangle. So you are only going to see what is inside each rectangle. So anything that is outside gets cropped. So you don't see the unions of all the shapes in this case. That's not good, that's not what we want. But we're going to see in the future that can be very, very useful. And what else I can do with this was, of course we're going to color it. So I just choose the group, I color it. But if you use layers, layers blend like I'm doing here, is we're good to go and select all the individual layers and then change the blend mode. I like that one. It was beautiful and really of course this is something that you should play and to the combination that you like. Because in fact, I like the yellow, I think, yes, I really like the yellow and I'm going to give it that little center. And that's it. You have a beautiful Mandela, the quickest possible way. So then you have it. Isn't this a break week and found way to the radial symmetry. I am really looking forward to see your mandalas using symbols, so please post them below, and I will give you feedback. In the next class, we're going to learn another very powerful technique, assets. They will allow us to do a coloring page like this one, a less than ten minutes. So the method, and I'll see you in the next class. 5. Designing With Assets: In this class you're going to learn how to create, use, and manipulate assets. This is probably the second more important for creating mandalas. Weekly. You will learn how to use the library I created with 30 assets for you to use. The credit for this class is to create a color in baseline, this one. So let's get started. So right now we're going to do is learn about assets. So you go to BYU Studio, click assets, and it opens this new menu and you can click there and import assets. So hopefully you have downloaded the ones I created for you, just selected them. Click Open. Remember all these goodies will appear. All these are pictorial objects. That means that it doesn't matter how big you made them. Though we'll have the best of qualities and you can print them even in a poster. And how do you assess? You drag and drop, does it. And then in the layers, you can see. And you have all these backdoors and you can change colors. You can tell the size if you want. You can use them as any other vector, any other shape. The more beautiful, more complicated. You can use these assets. Whatever you want for personal or commercial uses are yours to use. And we're going to do is create a symbol with this little petal. And then for this first time, using assets, we're going to repeat the technique we are we've been using. So we move the origin and we rotate the Bethel. And that's it. You can see they're very UCI you see, sorry. They're really easy to use. And in no time you have a beautiful little Mandela. And how do you create assets? That is, if you get all this, select and create a group, this is very important. Create a group. Selected rope. Have everything inside the selected. Go to this little symbol here. And click From Selection. And what it is. It is a bit more slow that I saw here, but it is okay. You can use it. No problem. And there you have it. And you beautiful symbol asset. So we are going to use the assets to create a beat. A more complex Mandela is, this is a bit of a drag and drop. Technique is very basic, very fun. Be creative. So that is nothing Commedia. So I'm just going to put some music. As you can see, the only thing I'm doing here is drag-and-drop, duplicate it and rotate it, and then moving the groups on layers. So a creative thing, what do you want to show? What do you want to hide? As any creative thing? You can make decisions and then to step forward. Change your mind. Just delayed. No problem. As you can see, I'm deleting a lot of things here and take my mind. But the beautiful thing of working with Vector promised that you can do that. As you can see, all the assets are scalable. So you can really change the same and even want to play with. You can do it as well. Now when putting this bottom layer. And what I'm going to use now is one of the brushes I created for you. So just go to Import and pull them under law brushes. Again, you can use a brasses for personal or commercial use. No problem. There you have it. You have a lot of different shapes. You just can play and use wherever you like. But I'm going to use that one. That's the one. And that's it. You have a beautiful coloring page of less than ten minutes to make mandela joint. And that's it. You now have the knowledge of how to use and create assets for my data. So you have the opportunity of design and infinite variety. And don't forget to foster coloring page of the printed coloring. In business class. We are going to symbols and you don't want to miss it. So see you in the next class. 6. Advanced Symbols: In this class, we are going to learn how to mix the two techniques. The other symbols, I'm ready in less than 10 minutes. This is a special class. I'm going to do it in real time, so no accelerate footage. So you can follow it with me and have a floral inspire my data. By the end of it. What we are going to do now is to mix these two concepts of symbols and assets to create very, very quickly. I wonderful drawing a little Mandela. For that. I use a technique IS playing lossless lesson. Let's create a square, rectangular symbol. And then guess, put it on the Columbus and flip it it accordingly. And then calling corners. And then I'm going to just pick one of the symbols, in this case, the first petal length. And I'm going to work with it. So too late you see how quick this technique can be. I'm not going to accelerate this video is less than 10 minutes. And you can see my process from beginning to end. True? This is a very simple little Mandela. But you can do any very complicated one very quickly with these techniques. So here I'm using the duplicate technique. Again. I'm going to group these four petals. In reality, there are only two, of course. And I'm going to create them better. I'm just going to create a third one. And I'm going to show you something. When I, if I put a white color or any other color, you see that they are not properly place. And for that is a rectangle. If you put them inside the rectangle, the rectangle crops the petals. So can you see the difference? They're not on the right or the one that outside, but there are in the proper order whether inside. I'm going to delete all the colors so you can properly see. And then I'm going to add a little circle. This is an desk creating this design, as I'm talking with you, clearly, looks like a flower. So I'm just doing the center. And then the process is just pick one asset, drag-and-drop. As you can see, this is a very small one. But because they are, yeah, you can make them as big as you want and you won't lose quality. And from now on, I'm going to be doing is just raindrop, insert on the symbol and just playing with colors. And although the layers and thus it here I want these two points, the top points touching change the origin, you know the drill by now. So I'm just going to let you enjoy the process. In fact, used to doing this with me. So you can find not only watching me having fun and music. So right now I'm just placing this better. So now that I'm happy with what it is, that's making it bigger. And of course I wanted inside the symbol. And so DSC, like popping from the flower. And now that the little flower is done, I want to do a circle on the bottom just to frame it when desk put it on the bottom, center it. And let's choose the size to like it. I wanted to have it just barely touching the flower. And then here a duplicate. And I use the bottom one to make it bigger. And I remove the guides so you can see the design complete. And we're going to quickly coloring. Because it clearly looks like safflower. I'm going to use flower colors. So the green for the bot, there's obviously pink for the petals. Green for those leaves to be this center. Pink. And I think the darker pin for those more complicated patterns. And of course, this isn't just keep going until you are happy with the design. And I decided to make the center a bit more complicated with more fancy. But you can stop as soon as or as late as c1. In fact, I don't like it that I prefer just a simple two-color. And then giving you two, so you something interesting. So I'm using the symbol, that's the symbol. Remember that we are just using doing one corner. But what happens is you pick that symbol and instead of using it around the center to just put it on the corners. As you can see, you have coordinate bolder or just another kind of design that you can do. I know this class is about Mandela's and radial symmetry, but I think this is a beautiful way to finish your art. And to Soviet, I'm not cheating. Look, I'm going to move that symbol there and it does exactly the same. And that's it. I hope you like it and I'm dying to see where you are going to do. And then you hide the two techniques together. I quite powerful RNA. You have a gallery print in less than 10 minutes. In the next class, we are going to learn how to make it even more powerful and versatile with a little trick that I'm going to, so you don't forget to post your Mandela before I really want to see them all and see you in the next class. 7. Building your Mandala: In this class, we are going to mix all the knowledge. We have a wire and give it a spin. So you can create more complex Mandela's without adding difficulty. This is where you will let your creativity flow to create truly spectacular. Like this one. This time we are going to twist a bit the idea of the rectangular symbol. So usually a Mandela, do them have four repetitions, right? You have eight or 12. So for that, we are going to create a triangle. So as you can see me here, I'm just go from the center to one corner, to the center and to the center. And I create a symbol of that triangle. Let me So you that triangle there. So obviously, right now is just not drag and drop in every corner. We have to rotate the symbol, but we know how to do this. We are, we've been doing it for the last four classes. So you just pick the symbol and rotate the whole symbol. And I think most of you know where this is going. So you just rotate. This time. You have to do it 12 oh, sorry. Times. And it's the same technique. No difference. I'm keeping the lines so you can see it properly. And counting that we have the eight. And now we do what we've been doing. The last two classes. We crack and we drop. Thus it led me sodium. You have inside the symbol you have this curve. And of course, this curve is our triangle. And we're going to remove the line because I prefer to work with this. And when you put it, It's beautiful, isn't it? When you put a shape, an acid, in this case, in one of these symbols, you have this mesmerizing effect. And you duplicate and rotate. Of course you have to rotate, rotate like that, but that's not the effect. What I'm for. You can see it doesn't go to the bottom. Let me protect it. The 20 to 50 degrees and make it bigger. I move it below because I want this part does on the bottom, but I can't have it, Can I? And a decimal if I put it inside the curve or not. So what do they do? Why not create a new symbol? You can have as many symbols as you want while creating a Mandela. And sometimes the distrustful look, I just rotated. I, of course you can just make the rectangle trick. But I think it's easier to visualize like this. So you can have as many symbols as you want and just drag and drop between symbols to create a more complex and layered Mandela finance. As you can see, I'm just using the technique and drag-and-drop, but I'm adding color sooner. I usually prefer to our color sooner because it helps me to visualize what I'm doing. And of course you can change the stroke, all the filling color. So in this case, I'm not creating new elements, I'm just using the assets, but of course, you can use everything we've learned so far. And add. Circles are creating assets or your elements, new symbols. This is your PR activity at work here. And I can go inside the acid or modify something in the assets, like right now, I'm using the stroke with the brushes. I provide it. But I don't like it like that. So what I do is I create a CEP that is going to go below C. Does the CEP that below the whole group. And is 2 that saved that I will add that brush. This is a personal tastes kind of thing. So you, I encourage you to play and show below as many different Mandalas on as many prints as you want. I will feed back all of them. And it's fun. Now, I want to create a background. I usually prefer it's a personnel days thing. I usually prefer walk with rectangle tool, the battleground. But of course you can use a pixel layer and decide, and trying to decide which color I prefer. Again, use the one you like. I in there. You have it. Your own Mandela. Isn't it this mesmerizing? I am really excited to see your complex Mandela's full of colors. So please post them below. In the next class, we are going to learn how to add texture to our Mandela's and finish. So, see you in the next graph. 8. Texturing Your Mandala: In this class, we are going to learn texture to our Mandela's. There are many ways to add texture techniques, but these ones are, the ones are used more often by the end of texture. So let's get started. In this class, we are going to learn several ways to add texture to your designs. So for this, make sure you are on the pixel persona and choose abroad. In this case, I'm using this crunch kind of brush. I Googled let information on the canvas. I wouldn't usually do is I pick the same color of the item I'm going to drawing. And I change like that. You have the new pixel layer. I'll change the blend. You can play with it. It can be multiply or it can be supplied. Screening depends effect do I look for? And you can play with the opacity. This is a bit of trial and error method. And then what I usually do is I draw around the line so it's not overdo it. You see, I see here that I'm just drawing around this kind of battle, the orange brittle. So you have the spirit texture, object but not over done. And you repeat this with different brushes, different blends, different opacities. In all the different items you have, your of course, applied texture pour the whole thing. But I think it works better if you do it one by one. And this is one of the methods that you can use. Usually, ideally, you should do several different methods. So you have a bit of variety. So I'm going to explain all the texture method I usually do. So this one I really like that is just drawing little motifs, in this case just lines and don't try to make it perfect. I see it. If they're imperfect. Made it to the texture and to the beauty of the final Mandela. In this case, I just change the angle of the lines. I think it works very well. And I just going to add texture for the background. So this is a way to create a Mandela part. We are going to explore other ways to create texture. Richness on the Mandela's. In this case, I'm just going to use a motif. This is one of the acids. You of course can use the assets or you can copy the motifs are using and modify them. So this is what we are looking for, is to create like a bit of a shadowy effect like fan I think I will calling in this case. So I'm just placing this curve and this does changing the blend mode of the layer. And because it's an assets or you can of course, Cengage play with it. It is a vector you can do wherever you like with it. And yes, of course you can't rotate it. Who? I like that one. And you can play with it as with any other acid, any other item, you can create a symbol with it if you like. But I like that effect. I think that's like an E. And of course what I'm doing, just rotating it to the other petals. And of course, all the techniques we are explaining, you can make some much. See in this case, I'm not using an assets, but I actually occur in creating a curve to follow that same. But not exactly because I don't want a duplicate. I want like a bit of a shadow effect as I tell you before. Yes. Duplicate it. So I can have a mirror effect here. Of course I'm grouping them. And then again, playing with where do you like it? The blender mode. And you can do this with all the items, all the same. Mandela. Of course you can do it like in the one before. And of course I can add a background here as well. I really like this one. I'm going to give you all the information below. And what I did is just put it inside the group. So Julius half this texture inside the Mandela and not own the whole print. But again, this is a personal choice. I prefer to do it that way because now when I add it to the background, I can rotate it and give a bit of layering. And I think it looks more beautiful, more complex. And that's it. You can, of course, just duplicate the whole thing. You can play. And I encourage you to play, to try new things. You will be surprised with the results. That's it. This is my final Mandela with texture and color. And that's it. You have a texture map. User completes fully color and texture mandela. Ready to print your final Mandela in the towel? And I will give you feedback. And of course, Sharif of Mecca social media, I created a little bonus class that I think it's interesting, so don't forget to check it out. 9. Bonus: Create a Pattern: In this class, I going to teach you how to create a friend or Mandela. I hope you enjoyed. This one is class. I'm just going to show you a quick thing. So you have like iDS to use your Mandela's. I always, every time I do on Monday, when any motif I like to create a partner from it. And what I'm doing here is to create these secondary motifs. So I'm focusing of having something interesting in every corner, narrowly in descender that you have there Mandela, but every corner on the design. So once you create the pattern from here, these coordinates will create the secondary motif. And you will understand what I mean very quickly. Once you are happy with it, you just select everything and you create a symbol with it. I have there. And then you scan and copying every corner. And there you have it. There you see the secondary symbols. Is that easy? Now you play with colors, and that's it. And another way to play with colors is of course to recolor. So you can end with a bluish tone like that. Or if you want something more complex, you can go to HSL and play with the different hues. So there you have it. You have a new way to play with your Mandela's. I hope you like it. 10. Final Thoughts and Thank You: Congratulations, you've made it. You are now able to do any metadata you can imagine. We have covered in this class, radial symmetry and how to activate in Affinity Designer symbols and have to play with them, assets and how to create them, and especially how to mix all together to create a complex and beautiful man data. If there is something I want you to take off from this class is, is have fun. Try new things. See what happens when you create new assets and incorporate into your designs. See what happens if instead of a 45 degree angle on a triangle, you pull a 30 degree angle and one more triangles in your design and see what happens if instead our triangle, you use a hexagon or a pentagon. Have fun. Try new things and you will be amazed by the results. And don't forget to post your results in the previous tab. I'm really looking forward to see all your ad and I will share it on my social media. If you have enjoyed this class, I will really appreciate if you consider leaving a review, it will help me enormously. And I worked with other to find this class and also follow me for more adventures to come. Thank you for being here. And as he isn't.