X.Y.Z. and more for all

How to create a romantic heart with illustrator

2012-01-26T19:57:00.001+02:00

Valentine is near and it's time for some new Heart tutorial.

This is the image of what we're going to create.

Notice that I'll be using lots and lots of shortkeys in this tutorial; in the future it will make your workflow way shorter.

Let's begin!!!

1. Open a new document for your illustration. (Alt+ N) and make it square. I've made mine 200mm by 200mm.

2. Create a perfectly shaped circle on your artboard. To do so press L on your Keyboard and then Shift+Alt+Drag until you're circle fills half of the artboard.

3. Press Shift+C on your keyboard to select a Convert Anchor point.

4. Press A on your keyboard, choose both vertical points of the circle and hold the Down arrow on your keyboard you have a nicely shaped heart end.

5. Now choose an upper anchor point of a new shape and drag it down until it almost levels with the vertical points of the shape.

6. Press A, then the Alt key and raise the handles to almost vertical position so your heart gets a nice curvy shape. The basic shape is ready.

7. Now let’s add so some color to it. Choose a dark burgundy color from your color picker.

8. Go to Effect - Stylize - Inner glow.

9. Change the settings to Mode - Normal; Color - Bright red. Play with the Blur size until you're satisfied with the result. Check Preview to see the result before submitting.

This is it. Your red glowing Valentine heart is ready.

Have a great Valentine's Day :)

Making of an open book with Illustrator

2010-02-23T11:20:00.002+02:00

Following the Making of a closed book tutorial in this one I will show you how to make an open book.

1. Open a new document and File - Place a reference image. Change Opacity to 25. Enlarge, if needed. Lock layer and create a new one.

2. On a new layer draw a cover of the book using a Pen tool - see red lines. Move anchor points to make the figure match the reference. Hold Alt to move each handle separately.

3. Create a New Layer. Outline the pages parts as shown – left and right parts separately - see blue lines. Add short lines for corners. Choose all (CTRL + A). Go to a Pathfinder menu, choose Divide. Right – click to Ungroup.

4. On a new layer outline the open pages part as shown. Draw a line in the middle, Go to a Pathfinder menu, choose Divide. Right – click to Ungroup.

5. Unlock layers, hide the reference and choose all. Apply white Fill color and black stroke to all elements.

6. Add some lines on the pages part to give an effect of actual pages.

Now let’s add some color.
7. Duplicate open pages and paste on a new layer. Arrange so that the bottom outline will be visible.

To color these pages we will use a Mesh tool.

8. Choose Mesh tool and click in the middle of the page. It will create a new anchor across the page. Add more lines – as shown.

9. When applying color remember, that the brightest color should be on the highest part of the page and the darkest – on the lowest.

10. First give it all a bright grey color. I used grey from Swatches pallet – k5, k10, k20. To apply colors choose three Mesh points on one page. Those inside the page will be the darkest those outside the page will be the brightest. Lock layer.

11. Choose the inside pages and apply a grey gradient.

12. Go to Cover layer and duplicate and paste the image. Bring to Back.

13. Apply any gradient to your book cover.

This is it. The book is ready.

If you have any question regading this tutorial, dont hesitate to post it here.

Making of a Closed book with Illustrator

2010-02-17T14:28:00.006+02:00

In this tutorial I will show you how you can create an illustration of a closed book.

1. Open a New document and File + Place a reference image. You can create your own or use this one.

2. First we will draw the upper cover of the book using a Pen tool. Move anchor points so they fit the reference image – hold Alt to move each handle separately. Of course, you can do the same using a rectangle tool, but since it won’t be as flexible as a hand drawn figure we won’t use it this time. Delete the Fill color and change the Stroke color to something other than black. Also I made the stroke 2 pt (we will change it later).

3. Duplicate the rectangle and right click your mouse to Arrange and Send to back. Place as shown. Choose both objects and Align to Left. Make it fit the reference image

4. Use Pen tool to create the binding and the pages of the book.

5. To make the book cover look thicker, duplicate the pages outline and copy paste it on a new layer. Lock other layers.

6. Change the Stroke color of this new outline so you can see other lines – I changed it to Green.

7. Drag it to the right to make it longer.

8. Duplicate this figure and make it fit the book cover perfectly. Bring it to back (Shift + Ctrl + [). Choose both, go to the Pathfinder menu and choose Divide. Right - click to Ungroup them. Delete all the unnecessary parts.

9. Paste this element back to the main layer.

10. Hide the layer with the reference image. Choose all (Ctrl + A). Give it all a White color and a Black stroke.

11. If some of the elements are not in the right place - like the back cover is on front, or the pages are invisible, right click your mouse and arrange it the way it should be.

12. Make adjustments, if needed.

13. For the last touch, create some lines on the Pages figure to make it look like there are actually some pages inside.

The outline is ready – let’s put some color on it.

For the color I used green gradient with some mesh colors.

14. Choose a front cover and apply a Mesh tool (U) on it. Apply twice more so you have three parallel lines running through your front cover. Move the anchors, if needed. Don’t worry, if the outline disappears. As long as the lines are visible – we can work with it, we will apply the color later.

15. Choose central anchors and move them down a bit. Play with the anchors’ handles to deform the cover.

16. Now choose the color you want to work with. It will be a dark color, a light and the one in the middle. It is very important that when you are satisfied with you colors you will write down its data so you can work with it later. It might be helpfull to remove the upper cover to another layer and lock the rest.

17. Choose the element and apply the brightest color. I chose two RGB Greens – 0, 104, 56 and 55, 179, 74 and Black. Now for the interesting part. We will create a nice gradient using the meshes we just applied. Choose the central anchors and apply a darker color. For other two – the middle color. You should have a result close to this.

For my taste the cover curve is too small so I will move it a bit to the left. Also I will deform another part of the cover, this time just adding some anchor points without using Mesh.

18. Choose the Binding of the book and apply a Linear Gradient (G) tool to it. Apply the same Gradient to the Back cover and to its front.

19. Choose all and delete the stroke lines. Make adjustments.

20. Apply a Gradient on the “Pages” – bright yellow and bright grey.

21. Change the pages strokes to 0.5 and its brush style to Pencil Thin.

That is all. The book is ready.
I hope you found this tutorial helpfull.

If you have any question regarding this tutorial, dont hesitate to post it here.

Best regards

Creating a Valentine greeting card with Illustrator - Part 2: The Background

2010-02-08T12:50:00.058+02:00

In Part 2 we will be creating a Valentine card itself using the Heart image we created in Part 1 .

1. Place the heart you created in Part 1 of this tutorial on a new document and group it (Ctrl +A, right click - Group).

2. Create a new layer and copy paste a heart on it. Lock and hide it for now.

3. Duplicate a visible heart a few times and place and transform it as shown - you don't have to be precise.

4. Choose this group, make it smaller and place in the upper left corner of your document. Duplicate it (Alt + drag) so it fills our working space.

5. Choose all hearts (Ctrl +A) and go to Object – Transform – Transform each.

6. First check Random and Preview so you could see all the changes you're making.
Play with the settings a bit. I suggest you make some manual changes after this step to spread it a little bit more.

7. Add a new layer above this one. Create a rectangle to completely cover the spread hearts. Fill it with bright pink corol(0, 9, 100).

8. Go to Transparency window and choose Screen.

9. Unlock the Heart layer and place it above the others. Duplicate and place as shown – or as you wish.

10. To write a personal greeting press T on your keyboard and start writing. To change size and font go to Type – Size/Font.

That’s it.
Happy Valentine!!!

If you have any question regarding this tutorial - don't hesitate to post it.

Making of a Valentine greeting card - Part 1: The Heart

2010-02-07T12:41:00.051+02:00

Valentine’s is just a few days away so today we’ll be creating this Valentine Day Greeting card.

This tutorial will be divided in two parts. In Part 1 we will create the Heart itself. In Part 2 we’ll create the background for our card.

Let’s begin.

1. Create a big circle (L+Shift). Press Shift + C on your keyboard and choose circle’s bottom anchor point. It will turn from round to pointy.
2. Press A and choose the upper and bottom anchor points and pull them down a bit till it looks like a huge water drop.

3. On a new layer create another, smaller circle and duplicate it (Alt+ drag). Go to Window + Align and choose Vertical Align Bottom. Place as shown.

4. If needed, pull the upper point down a bit more to create a shape of a heart.

5. Choose all figures and go to Window - Pathfinder. Press Add and Expand.

6. Duplicate (Alt+drag) the heart twice and place as shown.

7. Choose both hearts, go to Pathfinder and choose Divide and Ungroup.

8. Choose the right part of the divided heart and place as shown. Alight to Top and Right. Erase the leftovers.

9. Create another copy of the original heart and move it aside. Press R and choose Hearts bottom anchor. You will see a small blue circle appearing above it. Press Alt and rotate to right as shown.

10. Choose both hearts, go to Pathfinder window again and press Divide and Ungroup (rightclick).

11. Choose the left part and place as shown.

12. Place it as shown. Make this detail a little smaller by moving corners. This will be the a white highlight
13. Another way to create this highlight is to draw a crescent shape with a Pen tool.

It’s time to color the heart.

14. Choose Cherry color for the right part and White for the Left. Delete Stroke for both.
15. The heart itself will be colored with Radial gradient colors - Red and Yellow. Apply by pressing from upper the left corner of the heart.

The heart is ready.

In Part 2 of this tutorial we'll be making a background for our Valentine greeting card.

If you have any question regarding this tutorial - don't hesitate to post it.

Making a Refrigirator with Max

2009-08-28T13:24:00.084+03:00

Hi all!

In this tutorial you will learn how to create a simple refrigerator using mainly Chamfer boxes.

1. Create a Chamfer box on a top view....

..and in a Modify panel change its parameters to 70, 80, 170; Fillet-2 and Fillet Segments-10 or just measure your own fridge and work from that.

2. Right click the box and convert it to Editable poly.

3. Go to a Modify panel and choose Edge sub-object. Connect Top edges as shown on the image and move them right a bit.

4. Release Modify and Copy (Shift + Drag) the box.

5. In both boxes delete vertexes so you have a main body part and a door part.

6. Choose the door part and duplicate it. By moving vertexes up create a Freezer door and by down – main body door.

7. If you hit Render (F9) u will probably notice that some, or even most of the parts are missing. This is why we deleted some of the vertexes before. To fix that choose all parts (Ctrl+A) and choose Shell modifier in a Modify panel.

8. Arrange all the parts so it looks like fridge and hit Render (F9).

Now we'll add some details.

9. There is a part on the top of the fridge that connects the freezer door to the main body. To make one create another Chamfer box on a top view measured 18, 5, 2; Fillet 1 and Fillet Segments 10and place it on the top of the fridge.

10. Also, as you've probably noticed before, every fridge usually has some kind of legs that that it stands on, so you can either put some Boxes under it or Extrude them from the main body.

Time to create some Materials – so press M on your keyboard.

11. For the Fridge I used an Off-white color with a Standard material, Specular Level of 96 and Glossiness – 54. Scroll down to Maps and set Refraction to 15 and a Raytrace material (leave as is).

12. The handle is some kind of a glossy metallic surface, so I used Standard material and a Multy-layer shader.

13. For first specular level set Color to 229, 229, 229 (light grey), Level to 537, Glossiness 19, Anisotropy 78.

14. For second specular level set Color to 229, 229, 229 (light grey), Level to 338, Glossiness 28, Anisotropy 74.

16. Scroll down to Maps and set a Diffuse color to Noise. Change Tiling Y to 50; Fractal.

17. Set Color 1 to Raytrace and leave the rest as is.
Apply materials to your refrigerator.

18. Hit 8 to change your background color to White and then hit render (F9).

The fridge is ready.

If you have any questions regarding this tutorial - don’t hesitate to ask me.

Making of Glasses with 3ds Max

2009-06-29T23:49:00.074+03:00

Summer is here, so it's time to model some glasses!!! These are actually regular ones but with some material adaptation you can use the same tutorial to create some sunglasses too.

So...

1. On a top view create a box measured 8-140-50 with 2 Width segments.

2. Right click the object to convert it to Editable Poly. Go to a modifier panel and choose Vertex sub-object and delete a left part of the box.

3. Now if you look at the Perspective view you’ll notice that deleted Vertexes created a hole in our box. To fix it we should choose an open Border and Cap it.

4. Mirror – Instance this box and Move it aside. This way, while working on one part only, we’ll be seeing a progress on both parts. We will connect them later.

5. Connect opposite splines 3 times and other opposites twice.

6. Choose the shown polygon and extrude it outside. It will be the bridge holder (the nose part).

7. Start moving the vertexes on a Front view to give it a basic glasses frame shape. Use reference image or your own sunglasses for that matter. When finished, go to a Modifier panel - Subdivision Surface and check Use NURBs with Iterations 2 and uncheck afterwards.

8. Choose central Polygons and Bevel them inside twice – first for the (0;-4) and second for the lens (-3;3). Do the same with the back side of the glasses. Check and uncheck NURMS sbdv for a quick check. If you wish to make some changes – to make a lens thicker or thinner, or to change the shape of your glasses – just keep moving the Vertexes. Just do it now, while we’re at the beginning.

9. To create nose part choose one half and convert it to Editable poly again.

10. Before creating an Earpiece take another look at it. You’ll notice that it is not totally straight, but a bit curved. Choose an upper side polygon and Extrude it a bit - twice. If it goes up or down – fix it by moving Vertexes.

Now from the back of the second part – One long extrude and two small ones. Move and Rotate it Vertexes to give it a curved shape Connect central Edges, if needed. Check and uncheck NURMS subdvs again.

11. Time to connect the two parts together.
12. Choose both parts and convert them to Editable Poly again (right-click). Choose one part and Attach it another part. Now the two glasses halves are chosen.

13. Remember the nose bridge? Choose both polygons as shown (Choose – Ctrl - choose) and press Bridge.

Now we have one solid pair of glasses. Make adjustments if needed – by connecting Edges and moving Vertexes.

14. Since glasses are usually concaved, move and rotate your vertexes so it fits the shape of the head.
15. Now we'll start adding materials. Since its one single object we'll obviously use a multi/sub-object color.

16. Press M for material editor. Change Standard to Multi/Sub-object and Set the material number to 2. Name them Frame and Lens. For a frame I used Black for Ambient color with a Specular level of 107 and Glossiness of 26 – ID 1.

17. For a lens I used White for Ambient, 96 for Specular level and 32 for Glossiness – ID 2.

18. Choose your object and Assign materials it and make them Visible in Viewports.

19. While glasses are still chosen, press Element in a modifier panel and choose glasses again. You will see that all polygons have been chosen.

20. Scroll down to Polygon Properties and set ID color to 1. That will color our glasses to black.

21. Choose lens polygons – front and back – and set their ID to 2.

22. If you haven’t done it yet, check NURMS Subdvs to make the glasses smooth.

23. Hit 8 to change the background to white and F9 to render.

24. That’s it. The glasses are ready.

25. If you have any questions regarding this tutorial - don’t hesitate to ask me.

Chess rook

2009-06-15T14:20:00.003+03:00

In this tutorial you will learn how to create a Chess Rook. This will be one of a Chess Set tutorials explaining how to create a Pawn , a rook, a knight and a chessboard itself.

As usual, you will need a reference image before you start creating anything. You can upload it here or find/create another one.

1. On a front view create a 150 x 100 plane. Then right-click the Front View and check Smooth and Highlight. This will allow you to create your pawn easily.

2. Press M and choose an empty slot. Go to Diffuse color, hit the grey square near it and choose a Bitmap to import the reference image. Apply the image to the Plane.

3. Of a front view outline only a half of the reference pawn using a Line tool. Close spline when you finish outlining. If the outline is not as accurate as it supposed to choose Vertexes in a Modifier menu and right click your mouse. Click Bezier Corners. Now you can adjust each corner handle separately. When finished outlining go to interpolation and change to 20 steps to make the line smoother. If you need to add some vertexes, press Refine and hit the line when little white cross appears above it.

4. When you are pleased with the outline, go to the Modifier menu and choose a Lathe modifier. You will see that your outline became 3dimensional. In Parameters press Min button to set the pawn right. Change Segments to 40. Keep smoothing the corners, if needed.

5. Now choose the object, right click it and convert to editable poly. Press F4 to see the wireframe, choose all polygons except the upper one's. Go to Edit + Select + Invert, to choose only upper polygons.

6. Go to Bevel and set its High to zero and outline to -4. Now choose polygons as shown on the image and extrude them – High 5.

7. Delete the reference plane.

8. Choose Smooth in modifiers and check AutoSmooth.

9. Apply an ochre color to it (177, 148, 26) and hit F9 to render.

That’s it. The rock is ready

If you have any questions regarding this tutorial, do not hesitate to ask me.

Making of a Chess board

2009-06-10T18:07:00.002+03:00

This time i will shou you how to model a Chess Board.

The two things you must remember when creating a chess board is that it is square and that it divided to 8x8 colorful inside squares.

So …

1. The first thing you want to do is to create a 100x100x6 box. Right-click any view and choose Editable poly. Go to Modifier list and choose Edge sub-object.

2. While standing on a Top view choose two opposite sides and Connect them (press the little square.

See image for parameters. Repeat this step with other opposite sides.

3. Press M and choose an empty slot. In a Material/Map browser choose a Multi/Sub-objects. This will allow us to use several colors on the same object. Choose Discard Old materials.

4. Since we will use only 2 colors, set the color number on 2. The first color will be a basic bright brown. I chose 254, 228, 171 for that matter.

5. The other will represent a chess board itself with two colors – bright and dark one. Click the Material # button. Now click the Diffuse color button to choose a Checker material. Use 254, 228, 171 for bright and 40, 23, 0 for dark. Make it visible. Notice that each color has its ID number. Remember that so we could work with it later.

6. Apply the materials to our board.
Whatever happened with your colors it might not look the way it should be. But we'll fix it in aminute.

7. Choose the box, go to the Modifier list and choose Element sub-object. After it chooses the entire box go to polygon properties. Remember the Material ID's? It was 1 for bright and 2 for Checkers. Set the ID's to 1.

8. Now choose the upper polygon only and set ID's to 2. Now you see your materials how they should be. Almost.

9. Go back to the Checker material and set the Tiling number to 12. You will see the changes immediately.

10. Change the background to white (8) and hit F9 to render.

That’s it.

If you have any question regarding this tutorial, don’t hesitate to ask me.

Car modeling

2009-06-05T12:11:00.006+03:00

Now, it's not really a car modeling tutorial. But it is a reference for lots and lots car tutorials.

Some time ago I've decided to model a car. Nothing in particular, just a regular car. And since this seemed to be a somewhat complicated task, I've decided that this time I should find a good step – by - step tutorial that will allow me to create my car easily.

After a short search I found a Car Body Design , a cool site where you can find different car tutorials for almost any software, whether it is a 2d illustration or a 3d render. There are tuts for beginners, tips on modeling or sketching, tips on setting the blueprints and final rendering.
For my first model I chose a really nice green Mazda RX8 tutorial and I promise to post my final result as soon as it's finished.

So for those of you who learn how to create a car – this site is for you.

Have fun and good luck.

Making of a Chess Pawn

2009-05-19T23:27:00.084+03:00

This tutorial is one of a chess set tutorials explaining how to create a pawn, a rook, a knight and a chessboard itself.

In this tutorial you will learn how to create a chess Pawn.

As usual, you will need a reference image before you start creating anything. You can upload this one or find/create another one.

1. On a front view create a 150 x 100 (Generic units) plane. Then right-click the Front View and check Smooth and Highlight. This will allow you to create your pawn easily.

2. Press M and choose an empty slot. Go to Diffuse color, hit the grey square near it and choose a Bitmap to import the reference image. Apply the image to the Plane.

3. On a front view outline only a half of the reference pawn using a Line tool. Close spline when you finish outlining. If the outline is not as accurate as it supposed to choose Vertexes (Modifier menu) and right click your mouse. Click Bezier Corners. Now u can adjust each corner handle separately.

When finished outlining go to interpolation and change to 20 steps to make the line smoother. If you need to add some vertexes, press Refine and hit the line when little white cross appears above it.

4. When you are pleased with the outline, go to the Modifier menu and choose a Lathe modifier. You will see that your outline became 3 dimensional.

In Parameters press Min button to set the pawn right. Change Segments to 40. Keep smoothing the corners, if needed.

5. Basically, the pawn is ready. Apply an ochre color to it (177,148,26) and that's it.

Notice: Another way to create a Chess pawn is to use a Loft Deformation .

If you have any questions regarding this tutorial, do not hesitate to ask me.

Enjoy,
Dalia

Color bleeding in VRay

2009-05-16T13:38:00.016+03:00

When I started working with VRay renderer, I discovered that as of rendering there are many colorfull shadows spread around the object. I realized it was something to do with setting but being new to this engine I also knew that it will take me ages to look for the button responsible for this effect.

Luckily, I found this cool tutorial where the author not only names the symptom, but also gives a solution to the problem.
It is called a Color bleeding and there are several ways to solve it.
Here you'll be able to learn how.

Sure, you will find it helpful.

How to create a coffee mug with Illustrator

2009-05-05T12:04:00.096+03:00

Today I will show you how to create this stylish mug filled with coffee.

Before you start, make sure you have a proper reference image to base your illustration on. To make your work easier remember to create each object on a separate layer and keep only active layer Unlocked.

Now we can get to work.

1. Open a new document (Ctrl + N) and choose Portrait orientation for your artboard. Go to File and Place you reference image on the work space and Scale it to fit the margins (Choose – Shift).Close layer and create a new one.

2. On a new layer create the Rectangle (M) that fits the ref. image. Make the Fill color transparent and Stroke color visible on your reference image.

3. On a new layer create a narrow ellipse (L) and place it on the bottom part of the rectangle. Scale it if needed. Copy the Ellipse (Choose + Alt + Drag) and put aside for now.

4. Choose both the Rectangle and the bottom Ellipse and alight them (Window - Alight) one to another at their Horizontal alight part.

In the same window find Pathfinder menu. When both Rectangle and the Ellipse are still chosen press Add to Shape to make one figure out of two. Now press an Expand buttons to get rid of all unnecessary lines.
5. Take the spare ellipse, move it to a new layer and place it in the upper part of the rectangle.

6. Since the mug has its thickness, create another copy of the ellipse, scale it be a bit smaller but fit to the bigger one. Alight all to a vertical and horizontal center.

7. Now make two copies of the smaller ellipse and place them above the mug. Alight them to left and put one above the other.

8. While both of the ellipses are still chosen, go to Pathfinder again and choose Divide option. Right click and ungroup the figure. Now all the intersected parts are separate one from another. Choose the middle part and place them in the upper ellipse of the mug. This for will represent the drink itself.

9. Apply some basic color on your mug so we don’t get lost in all lines. We will change it later, when needed.

10. Now – to the handle. Create a new layer and change the color fill to None. Using a Pen tool (P) start encircling the handle of the ref. image. To make soft lines remember to drag your mouse a bit after making each anchor point and only then to release it. Close your line by pressing the very first dot. If the form doesn't exactly fit the reference, choose each dot and start moving the handles. To move each handle separately, press Alt.

If you have trouble seeing the handles, Double click the active layer and change its color to something more suitable.

11. At this point you can Lock the layer with reference image and make it invisible, since the base of your mug is ready. Now we'll start experimenting with colors, shadows and highlights so it looks more realistic.

12. The first thing you must decide is the position of the light source. Let's say it comes from your left. Our mug will have a darker right, a lighter center and some highlights.

13. Copy the front part of the mug, paste it on a new layer and change its' color to a brighter one. Choose both layers and alight the elements to Left. Now add some anchor points as shown on the image using a pen tool. Delete the sidle points (as shown). To make your work easier, keep all inactive layers locked and open them only when needed.

14. Now for the highlights. Using a Pen tool create a narrow rectangle form. Adjust handles. When finish adjusting, fill it with black and white Gradient. Go to Transparency menu and change it to Screen.

15. Choose the Handle and copy it twice (Choose + Alt + drag). Alight objects to left. Go to Pathfinder, Divide and Ungroup (right click) them. Choose colored sections (see image) and place them as shown.

16. Remember we worked on a drink part? Let's finish that. Copy the smaller ellipse. Copy it again and place as shown. Go to Pathfinder - Divide – Ungroup. Put a light color on the middle section and place it as shown. If you wish, you can repeat this step again, to imitate liquid waves.

17. Copy the big inner ellipse one last time. With a Pen tool add and remove some points to and from it. Adjust handles as shown.

18. Create a highlight for the handle like you created a mug highlight.

19. Now let's work the color. Unlock all layers so we could apply it. I used 39, 18, 97 for the lighter part of the mug, 40, 45, 91 for the darker part, 31, 70, 54 and 29, 58, 83 for coffee, 33, 53, 74 for dark parts of the handle. Apply Black for strokes, all but the highlights.

Lock all layers.
Delete all the unnecessary details around the mug.
And now for the final touch – The steam and coffee beans.

20. On a new layer set Fill color to none. Use a Pen tool to create wavy coffee steam. Adjust handles if needed. Create three lines, apply a darker color, and then duplicate it (Choose- Alt+drag).

21. For coffee beans create a small ellipse and put a wavy line inside using a Pen tool. Make the bean dark brown and the strokes – black. Go to Brushes and choose a Charcoal – Thin 1 brush to make the bean more decorative. Duplicate the bean several times and spread them on the mug. Remember to place this layer behind the mugs white highlight.

This is it.

Hope you enjoyed this tutorial.
If you have any question regarding this tutorial, don't hesitate to ask.

Enjoy your coffee... :)

Making of a LadyBug with Illustrator

2009-03-18T16:03:00.171+02:00

In this tutorial I will explain how to create this beautiful Ladybug using mostly ellipses.
Before you start, make sure you have a reference image to base your illustration on. To make your work easier remember to create each object on a separate layer.

1. Open a New document (Cltr + N), Name it Ladybug And choose Portrait layout.

2. Now let's import the reference image. Go to File-Place and choose your image. Scale and rotate the image, if needed, to fit your working area. Use Selection tool (V) to do so. Press Shift to preserve the image original proportion. When finished – lock the layer and create a new one.

Before you create anything make sure your color switches are set to transparent and bright green.

And now let's get to work.

3. To create the body of our bug, draw an ellipse and scale it to fit the reference. To make a pointy tail press Convert Anchor Point tool and press the bottom point. Again, lock the layer and create a new one.

4. Create another ellipse for the wing. With a Direct selection tool (A) choose two middle points and move them to the left. Keep moving the dots until the ellipse becomes a wing.
Choose and right click the wing to Transform and Duplicate it.
In the pop-up menu leave settings as they are – vertical and 90 – and press copy. Your lady bug now has two identical wings. Move it to the right. Scale and fit them again if needed.

At this point you can put some black color on ladybug's body and some red on the wing. Make all strokes black.

5. Create an ellipse for the neck. Move the middle points up to make a C shape. Copy (Alt + drag) and scale it to make the head.

6. Use a Pen tool (P) to create antennas. Move points and handles until it looks right. To move each handle separately press Alt. If you find it hard to see the handles double click the forms layer and in Layer Options window change the color. Fill the antennas with Black color.

7. Add some black dots to the wings – again, using ellipses. At this point you can hide or remove the reference image, since you won't need it anymore.

Our Lady bug looks nice and almost finished.To make it look even nicer we'll add some highlights for the final touch.

8. Copy the neck and the head and paste them on another layer. Scale them to be smaller, fill them with white color and place them back on black.

9. Add another 2 white small ellipses for antennas.

10. The final highlight will be for the left wing. Create one last ellipse and start moving points and handles to make a narrow C shape. Fill it with white.

That’s it.
Our glamorous Ladybug is finished.

If you have any question regarding this tutorial, feel free to post.

Start drawing - From simple shape to character

2009-03-15T00:36:00.025+02:00

A few years ago, when I was an art student, my teachers used to tell us over and over again:"Have a sketch book. Do lots of sketches. Draw!!!" But for some reason, I haven't. I didn't even have a proper sketch book. And I rarely draw after I passed my basic drawing course. Didn't really have any time to, being too busy worrying about other subjects.

These days I've realized how important drawing is.

You see, a couple of months ago I started working with Adobe Illustrator. While trying to master the software, I've realized one thing: it has to be a sketch based. I realized that I better have some reference image before I start doing something. And since I wanted my illustrations to be based on my own sketches, there was nothing for me to do than, well, start sketching. So, as usual, I started my search.

I found this lovely book called Fun with a Pencil
by Andrew Loomis, where he presents a simple method of drawing from basic shapes. It took me quite a while to get myself into this method, but results were more than satisfying. I would even say that most of the images I've created during these months are based on this method. It is simple, cute and has some great examples in it. So if you are a beginner, this book is definitely for you.

What do you think? Do you have other methods and books that you found useful when started drawing?

Making an umbrella with Illustrator.

2009-02-26T16:39:00.059+02:00

There are several ways to create realistic umbrella with Illustrator. In this tutorial I will cover one of them.

This is the umbrella we will be creating this time. Make sure your reference image of umbrella is multi-colored divided to sections.

1. Open a new document (Cltr+N) and File-Place your reference image. It is always good to separate things at the beginning so Lock the first layer and open a new one. Set the Fill color to None.

2. Start outlining each section of the umbrella using a Pen Tool. Remember, that in order to create curved lines you should point and drag your mouse and only then release it. Each section should be outlined on a separate layer.

If your shape doesn't look exactly as your reference shape, choose the Direct selection Tool (A) and choose an angle on your shape. Then press Alt on your keyboard so you can work with each handle separately to adjust the lines.

3. After outlining all the umbrella sections add a handle and a top to the umbrella using a Rounder rectangle tool.
4. Hide the layer with the reference image.

5. To color the umbrella use either multiple base colors or create a nice gradient color.

6. That’s it – hope you found it useful.

If you have any questions - don't hesitate to ask. I will be happy to answer it.

Making of a Cowboy Hat with 3ds Max

2009-01-02T16:56:00.101+02:00

In this tutorial you will learn how to create a cool brown cowboy hat.

1. Create a simple sphere: Radius-40, Segments - 40. It will represent a head for our Cowboy Hat. Make it White.

2. Then create a circle to match the upper third of the sphere.

3. In modifier menu change the parameters of the circle to: Rendering sides - 20, Interpolation Steps – 20 to make the hat smooth and its Radius - 30. Make it Brown.

4. While Circle still chosen go to Modifier list – Edit Spline. Choose Spline sub-object. Scroll down to Geometry menu and choose Outline to create another, bigger outer circle. To do so, choose outline, go to the Top View and hover over a circle. When the cross appears drag it inside the smaller circle. You should get this result.

5. Now – the most important part: Go to front view. Choose the bigger circle and via Modify panel pick its left and right vertexes and pull them up a little bit.

6. Go to modifier list – choose Extrude and increase its Amount to 1.5.

Well, the difficult part is over.

7. Create a ChamferCyl: Radius 30, height – 50, fillet 4, Height segs 5, Fillet sides 14, Sides – 36, Cap segs 2 and make it Brown.

8. Convert to Edit Poly and Delete the bottom vertexes (8). Place it above the bottom place of the hat.

Now we'll start deforming the top of this hat.

9. Choose all but last row of vertexes on the front view. Hold the CLTR key and choose Top View.

Keep scaling the vertexes lines until you like what you see. Use cowboy hat pictures to get close to the desired model. Mine looks like this.

10. Now in the Top View choose the upper vertexes and on the front view push it down.

11. Repeat with the Top Central vertex.

12. For the last touch – squeeze everything a little beat and put everything on its place.

13. Don’t forget to color one stripe different color than the hat. To do so choose bottom polygons of the top part of the hat. Extrude :0.5.

14. Now press M on your keyboard, choose an empty slot and change the parameters as shown on the image.
15. Now choose the top of the hat and apply materials to it.

16. If the colors are not applied as you wished, go to polygon properties and change the Material set IDs. (19)

17. Press F8 if you want to change the Background color. For final render press F9.

Well, that’s it. The hat is ready. If you have any additional question regarding this tutorial, don't hesitate to ask.

Making of Halloween pumpkin with 3ds Max – Part 1: The basics

2008-10-26T11:13:00.016+02:00

Halloween is coming so it is time to model some pumpkins!

1. To make one you should first create a simple Sphere. In a Modifier panel change its radius to 50 and Segments to 32. Make it a nice orange color (252, 160, 0). You can Scale it a bit, so it doesn’t look like a ball.

2. Go to a Modifier list and choose Edit Poly: Vetex Sub-Object.
3. In a Front View choose the upper and the bottom vertexes and scale them inside – as shown on the image. Repeat it twice.

4. Now on the Top View choose every forth Edge and Loop them (ALT+L). Then go to scaling and pull these Edges inside.

5. Now chose Edges as shown on image and Scale them outside.

6. Make a copy of this model and scale it to be a bit smaller. Move it aside for a while.

7. Choose upper Polygons of the Bigger form and extrude them up to make a pumpkin steam. If it's too straight, connect Edges and move some Vertexes.

8. Press M on your keyboard and choose an empty slot. In a Material/Map browser choose Multi/Sub-object.
9. Change Set Numbers to 3 since you will use 3 colors – orange (255, 132, 0), green (0, 98, 12) and black (0, 0, 0). You will notice that each color has it's ID - we will use it soon.
10. Apply materials to your pumpkin - orange body and green steam. If there is some mixture in colors go back to Modifier panel and scroll down to Polygon Properties. Choose separately body polygons and set the Material ID's accordingly to the Material settings ID.

11. In a Modifier panel choose TurboSmooth to make our pumpkin smoother.
12. Change the background to white (8 on Keyboard) and Hit Render (F9).

The Basic pumpkin is ready.

Hope you found this tutorial useful.
If you have any question regarding it - feel free to ask.

VRay for 3ds Max: What is it and how it works.

2008-10-15T11:28:00.000+02:00

VRay is the engine that makes your scene looks realistic. It is the magic that makes it look really great. It is the final touch of your amazing render.

But in order to make this magic work – it, of course, must be mastered.

While I was looking for ways to make my renders to look better, I mostly ran into the "read and do" tutorials. They guide you through the settings step by step but don't really explain what each of the settings and buttons actually do. Now don't get me wrong, these tutorials are great and usually work for me, but at times I felt really frustrated for not getting a more detailed explanation about how things work on a deeper level.

So I kept digging and searching for something to give me a true knowledge about this engine.
And you know what? I found what I was looking for.

I found two sites that give you a full explanation about how the VRay engine works.
The first one is VRayElite where Joe Pizzini gives an overview on all the settings. If you click the images you will find an official VRay manual with ALL the theoretical info.

Another site is Aversis where everything is explained in a very simple and understandable language. The writer also gives you some useful tips for the effective usage of these.

On both of these sites you will find some wonderful "read and do" tutorials.

Don't skip them.

Making of a Christmas Tree

2008-10-07T12:28:00.015+02:00

Christmas is coming soon so I decided to create a simple, a bit abstract, but a very cool Christmas tree.

1. To create a Christmas tree we must first create its base which will be made of a Helix and a Circle.
To do that go to a Creation panel: Shapes and create a Helix in a Top view.

2. In a modify panel change its parameters as shown on the image to get this result. (50,1,90,5)

3. Go back to Creation panel: Shapes to create a circle in a front view.
In a modify panel change go to Parameters to change its radius to 2 and its Interpolation Steps to 20 to make it smoother.

4. Change its parameters in status bar also.

Now we're going to put these two together.

5. Choose Circle; go to Geometry - Compound objects and choose Loft.

6. Next choose Get path and then – back to choose the helix.

7. You can see that our base is a little bit edgy. To make it smoother choose the tree base again and go to a Modify list. Choose Skin Parameters menu and change Shape steps to 10 and Path steps to 20.

The base for our Christmas tree is ready.You can move Helix and circle aside so they won't make be a distraction.

And now the fun part begins because we're going to add some spikes to it.

8. Change the base color to dark green.
9. Choose your tree, go to a Modify Panel and choose a Hair and Fur from the modifier list – or press H on your keyboard.
10. On a dropdown menu Choose General parameters and start changing them. You can change the hair number with Count - 20000, its length with Scale - 25, its thickness with its Root - 4 and Tip Thick - 2.
11. To make the tree green go to Material Parameters menu and change a tip color to light green and root color to dark green.

12. Press 8 on your keyboard to change a Background Color to white.
13. Hit F9 to render. It might take some time – so be patient.

Any changes you wish to make - from Helix and Circle to Hair and fur parameters – you can. Any change will instantly appear.

That’s it for the tree part.
Hope you found this tutorial useful.

If you have any questions regarding this tutorial - don't hesitate to ask here.

Making of a Five Point star

2008-09-27T12:49:00.003+03:00

1. Create a Cylinder on a top view.

2. Go to a modify panel and change the parameters as shown on the image below.
Don't forget to make the object red - 255, 0, 0.

4. With a cylinder chosen right click on it and choose Convert to: Convert to Editable Mesh.

5. On a Modify panel choose Vertex sub-object in Sub-Material menu.

6. Go to a Top View and press Ctrl on your keyboard. Choose every second vertex of a cylinder perimeter by dragging your mouse.
7. Choose select and Uniform scale. Drag chosen vertexes to the center and make it a look like a star.
Important: Do it exactly as shown on image.

8. Go to the Top view to choose the center vertex.
9. Press Ctlr on your keyboard to move to the Front view.
10. Release the Ctlr and Scale it on the Y axle in the Front View.

11. Hit Render (F9)

The star is ready.

How to make your object glow

2008-08-19T11:33:00.000+03:00

One of my students came to me with a project that included some neon light in her interior.
Since I had no idea how to make a neon effect, I, as always, started the search. Among those simulating the neon effect I ran into this simple tutorial that allows you to Make the object glow.

I did learn the technique and found it really useful while making this Christmas tree.
See how the decorations glow? Nice, huh?

If you'd like to learn how to make such a tree – you are welcome to go to this Making of a Christmas tree tutorial.

Have fun :)

Making of a Red Glowing Heart

2008-05-19T11:47:00.000+03:00

Making of a Heart

1. Create a box in a Top View.
2. Go to Modify panel and change its parameters to:
L 30; W 65; H 80;
L Seg. 2, W Seg.2, H Seg 3.

3. Convert (right click) to Editable Poly.
4. Start moving the Vertexes until you create a Heart-like shape that would look something like this.

5. While the Vertexes are still chosen, go to Subdv. Surface list and check Use NURMS Sbdv: Display - Iterations : 2.
The Heart model will immediately become much smoother than before.

6. For Extra smoothness you can choose a MeshSmooth Modifier and set it to - Iterations : 2.

And now for the Material part.
7. Press M on your keyboard and choose an empty slot.
8. Choose a Translucent Shader. Choose Red (255, 0, 0) for Diffuse and another Red (248, 18, 18) in Translucent clr.
Leave the other parameters as they are.

9. Press 8 to change the Environment background for White.

10. Press F9 to render.

That’s it. Hope you enjoyed it.

3ds Max – a Modifiers war: Loft VS Lathe!!

2008-05-15T14:14:00.000+03:00

A couple of days ago I was browsing through Tutorialized and and found this amazing Umbrella tutorial for 3ds Max. Very simple yet very informative, it offers another – and I'd dare say – more creative way of modeling.

I actually did model an umbrella, but on the way I realized that a second part of this tutorial is a perfect way to model many other things.

So I've made this Wooden Candle Stick.

It took me about 15 minutes to make it (sounds like a part of a 5 min cake recipe) – no prior sketches, just playing with dots.
I could, of course, use Spline + Lathe Modifier, but this way was more fun.

To model a Candle itself I highly recommend to used this Candle Video tutorial – but you must register before you download the video.

Making of Wooden Candle Stick with 3ds Max

2008-05-15T12:28:00.001+03:00

Today we will create a Wooden Candle Stick using a simple method of Loft Scaling.

1. Go to Create panel: Shapes and draw a line in Front view and Circle in Top view.

Choose Line and go to Rendering Drop Down list to change Radial Sides to 20.

2. Choose Circle and go to Create: Compound objects: Loft
3. In Creation Drop Down list choose Get Path and choose Line.

And now the fun part begins!

4. Choose the figure you’ve just created.
5. Go to Modify panel. In Deformation Drop Down list go to Scale.
6. Explore the Scale Deformation(x) window and start adding, moving and deleting points.

After I finished modeling my Candle Stick the Scale Graph looked like this.

7. For Wooden material press M and use these settings.

8. Add 3 Omni lights around your model and adjust its parameters.

Hope you enjoyed this tutorial.

Let there be 3D!!!!!

2008-05-06T17:26:00.000+03:00

This blog is to become a collection of links that are related to theoretical and practical applications of Computer Graphics and Animation, including tutorials, galleries, articles and sites. Since I was (and still am) eager to know as much as possible about 3D CG, I created my own list of essential CG info resources. As my list was growing, I found it equally hard to find the necessary material either on web or my computer. So the main purpose of this blog is to create a collection of all the info that I ever found useful (for me) without the need to search for it whenever I decide to use it again.

The first link will lead you to Tutorialized, a well known website providing all-kind and all-level tutorials including 2&3D graphics, web design, video editing, programming and many more. Since I'm basically self taught (except a short course in college), I practically (still) live there. If you're not familiar with this site, check it out. And if you're new to CG – this one is made for you.

Creating Gold material with 3DS MAX

2007-10-08T00:13:00.001+02:00

Gold material? Easy!!

The first step is to create an object.
Let’s make a simple sphere - radius 30.

Press M for materials to set things up.
First change the Diffuse color to Dark brown - 69, 47, 0
Then – Specular to yellowish - 230,199,91
Set the Specular Level to 191

If you render it now – F9 – you could see that it has a slight resemblance of something that could be gold, but it’s not. Yet.

The next step is to go to Maps menu.
Check Reflection and choose Swirl map.
Change Base color for 165, 144, 0 and Swirl color for 0,0,0 – Pure black.

Hit render.

You will probably have some separation line in the center of your sphere.
In Coordinates change Blur offset from 0 to 1.
Render.

Congrats! You’ve got your Gold material.

Creating a Rubik Cube with Multi/Sub-Object material tutorial with 3DS Max.

2007-10-08T00:10:00.000+02:00

Step 1
Create a Chamfer Box (Create: Extended primitives).
L/W/H Parameters – 100.
Fillet – 9.
Modifier list: Edit Poly.

Step 2
Press M for Materials.
Choose Multi/Sub-object material in Material/Map browser.
Set Number – 7, so we’ll have 7 materials to work with.
First color must ALWAYS be a basic color of the object. Make it Black.
Create 6 additional materials Yellow, Red, Blue, Green, White and Orange.

Choose Chamfer Box and apply materials. It is all Black now.
Go to Edit Poly and choose Polygon sub material.
In Polygon Sub Material drop-down menu change Set ID parameter from 1 to 2.
Hit Enter. The chosen area is Yellow now.
Apply materials and IDs to other sides of the figure.
Hit Render/F9.

Step 3
To create a Rubik Cube you should multiply the existing object 3x3x3
Hit Render.

That’s all :)