I recently had the need to create a realistic looking license plate for a project and I wanted to do it completely in Adobe Illustrator in order to keep it easily editable and total flexibility in sizing for later use. I knew I had read a tutorial years ago, so a quick search found it.
Real World Illustrator offers this fantastic emboss text effect tutorial that yields near perfect results every time.
This icon set including 91 icons in PSD format - and feature vector masks you can export to Illustrator for further editing
This social media icon set was created in Illustrator CS5 and contains 25 scalable vectors complete with semi-transparent shadows for use on various types of backgrounds. The download contains a .zip file with the original .ai file and an .eps version as well. Icons are available for use in personal and commercial projects. (more…)
I’m not a huge fan of QR Codes, I think they’re a great idea that just hasn’t taken off. Regardless, if you have a client that wants to use them, you’ll need a way to create them. There are more than a few iPhone and OS X apps that can create them for you, but most only allow you to save a JPG or PNG version. Not very flexible.
Simple QR Code creation with vector file output
I set out to find one that allowed me to save a vector version so I could edit the colors freely, and scale the QR Code to any size I needed. Here’s what I found. (more…)
Click image to download free paper cutout alphabet vectors
Creating the torn paper effect is easy with this collection of free artwork
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to use a torn paper texture over the years. Getting just the right paper, and then carefully tearing it is difficult at best. Thankfully, artbees has made it easier with three free torn paper vectors for Adobe Illustrator, and matching Photoshop brushes.
The files are flat black vectors you can use as is, or use as a mask in Photoshop as I did in the image above. I got the paper texture itself from one of the BittBox Free Texture Tuesday collections.
Please join me in welcoming The Graphic Mac’s latest site sponsor, Astute Graphics. The first time I heard of Astute Graphics was back in 2008 when I reviewed Phantasm CS, a new plugin suite for Adobe Illustrator. In that review, I called Phantasm CS “the most useful plugin set I’ve ever come across for any version of Adobe Illustrator.”Today I want to introduce you to VectorScribe, the latest plugin from Astute Graphics. VectorScribe allows you to quickly and easily create and manipulate vector paths in Adobe Illustrator CS3 to CS5 through the use of several new tools and panels.
VectorScribe makes complex path operations easy
Because there are two versions of VectorScribe, Designer and Studio, and the tools are so incredibly powerful and in-depth, I’m just going to briefly overview them here. But before I do, let me just say that if you’re the type of Illustrator user who only opens AI once or twice per month to quickly edit an existing logo, VectorScribe probably isn’t for you. But if you spend a good amount of time in Illustrator, working as a logo designer, architect, illustrator, or cartographer, then you’ll definitely enjoy this plugin! (more…)
There was a time when the battle for vector creation dominance was a heated battle between Adobe Illustrator and Macromedia Freehand. Illustrator was the dominant player, but not by much. Freehand users were extremely loyal, and the application offered many features that are still absent in Illustrator to this day. All of that changed in 2005 when Adobe acquired Macromedia and discontinued Freehand completely.
Freehand users were absolutely furious. To this day, Illustrator faces no real competition in the professional vector art creation world.
Out of nowhere (for me anyway), a group called Free Freehand has filed an antitrust lawsuit against Adobe Systems, Inc., alleging that Adobe has violated federal and state antitrust laws by abusing its dominant position in the professional vector graphic illustration software market.
I suspect that the group is seeking to have the code for Freehand sold to another party for active development, or donated to the open source community. At this stage of the game, I’m not sure if anyone could resurrect Freehands popularity among professional designers. Illustrator is a great program, and as part of the Adobe Creative Suite it is a staple product for every professional designer; a group that doesn’t take well to drastic change. But it will certainly be interesting to follow the lawsuit.
Enhancing vector art in Photoshop takes your image to the next level
The greatest value in any tutorial you come across on the web is not the actual image you create following the tutorial, but being exposed to the techniques used to create them.
VectorTuts has a great tutorial on enhancing your vector art with Photoshop. The image to the right is a piece of vector art created in Adobe Illustrator. It’s flat and boring, and you could use many filters and techniques to enhance it in Illustrator, but exporting the vector file as a layered Photoshop file offers you the opportunity to learn some really useful techniques. The end result can be seen in the image at the top of this post.
As with any tutorial, I encourage you to play with the settings illustrated in the tutorial to suit your taste. The tut makes heavy use of layer effects and gradients. While the tutorial is what I would call intermediate level, it will probably take you about a half an hour to go through.
High-quality vector symbols, free for commercial use
544 vector symbols and counting, representing the visual language of the world, is what you’ll find at the NounProject. Clicking on an individual icon will reveal what the icon means (when known) and allow you to download it. All superbly created vector icons are free for personal and commercial use. The only downside to the site is there is no way to download a single archive of all the icons.