Hi there! This is The Jared Wilcurt, and this is going to be a comprehensive tutorial covering the
Pen Tool in Illustrator. It's also going to cover the selection tool and the direct selection tool
(the black and white arrows). These are the three most commonly used
tools in Illustrator and
we're going to go over
every single thing that you can do with them. All of the different versions
of the pen tool and
how it affects anchor points,
handles, and segments; along with each one of the tools uses with the modifier
keys (control/alt/shift)
So, we're going to go in to all of these.
This file we're looking at is available for free in the description to
download. It's going to go over all the stuff i'm going over with you here.
It's all written out and explains it all as a nice little shortcut to
explain every last aspect of it.
I'll go over the layers here real quick. In the layers we have a tracing pad,
which is so you can practice on these images here. You can draw over them
with the pen tool.
Below that we have the examples which are these shapes here. If I disable them
you'll see. Those are the examples. We have the text, obviously.
And then the images in the background. So
in this case I'm going to uncheck the examples for this demonstration.
I'm going to zoom in to the very start, here.
So, we're starting off with the bare essentials.
Don't skip this video just yet! This part is going to be super super
simple.
But we have to start with the basics first, right?
So, select the pen tool, it's the 5th option in the here in the tools box.
Click once to create an anchor point.
Click once again to create a second anchor point and these two will be
connected by a segment.
If I click and drag, then I'll pull-out handles
and the further I pull them out the more curved
my new segment will be.
The closer I have them to the original anchor points that I clicked
the sharper it will be; the more it will be a straight line.
So I'll put this out some.
If i hover over the original point that I left
my cursor changes to have
a circle,
instead of just the pen tool. So, I'll hover over it
and it turns into a circle.
Which means this will close the path if I click on this anchor point. So I will do so;
and now I have a closed path.
That is the basic functionality of the pen tool. How to create a shape just by clicking
in different sections and using the handles that come out to create
these curved shapes, these bezier curves.
And how to connect back your path to make it a closed path
The most primary function for the selection tool
is to deselect objects that are already selected by clicking on the artboard,
or to
click and drag those objects around (to move them).
And that is the most basic functions of them.
Let's go to the next section.
The inside of a shape this called the fill (that's what this green section is).
The outside edge of it is called the stroke,
that's the blue section there.
You can use the selection tool to select a shape,
and when you do
it's colors will be adjustable here in the tool box.
There are several other places you can adjust them as well, but this is a quick
way of doing so.
There's little arrow here as well that will swap them, so it swaps the fill and the
stroke colors. Or you can just double-click on them and change their
color
like so. Double-click on the box here in the tools section.
You can also adjust the stroke width.
Here on the side I've got the stroke
panel pulled up, you can also find that under window and stroke if you don't see
that
and I'm gonna change this from 18pt to 4pt.
And it's going to be adjusted because that object was selected when i changed
that.
We'll go in to the next section.
You can click and hold the pen tool icon,
which is here and the toll box. Click and hold on that
and it will pull out your different options. You've got
the Add Anchor Point tool,
the Delete Anchor Point tool, and the Convert Anchor Point tool. So there's different versions
of the Pen Tool that you can use that have different functionalities. If I click
this little Tear Off button here, then I get it
like so, and I like to keep it up here in this top corner. I basically have it up
there all the time, because
the Pen Tool is so useful in Illustrator.
So far we've been using just the Pen Tool on its own, I'm gonna switch over to the
Add Anchor Point tool.
And I'm going to click
anywhere on a path.
In this case you see that there is an anchor here
and here and there is just a segment between them with no anchor points.
If I click anywhere in there, I can create a new anchor point
There is also a Delete Anchor Point tool. If I use that then I can remove anchor points
like this one here. There's also the Convert Anchor Point tool.
With its elected I can click on an anchor point that has handles;
clicking on it once will remove its handles
and now this which was rounded has a sharp point because the handles have been
removed.
I can also
click on a single (individual) handle
to remove just it while the other handle on an anchor point
is still
is still visible and at its original position.
You can also click and drag out from anchor point to create new handles that
will move in tandem with one another.
And you can click and drag a single handle to convert it to be moved
independently from the other.
I'm going to deselect this shape by clicking on the Artboard with the
Selection Tool.
With the Selection Tool when i click on a shape it selects every anchor point in
that shape so I can move the shape
as one individual object.
The Direct Selection tool (the white arrow) on the other hand,
allows you to select individual anchor points and to adjust them on their own
so I can select a single anchor point
and relocate it
like so, click and drag it to a different position.
You can also hold on the Shift key
to select multiple anchor points.
So I'm just going to hold down Shift and click on multiple anchor points
then I can move those together
while the rest of the anchor points
are stationary.
The Direct Select tool can also click and drag out a window and any anchor point
inside that window become selected to allow you to control
what is selected in your piece.
If you select a single
anchor point with handles (like this one)
you can click
either handle and if they are in line with one another
you can move them both at the same time in tandem.
On anchor points where the handles are not in a straight line you can move the
handles independently, like so.
And finally:
You can also click on a segment on it's own
and move a single segment.
Let's go to the next section. So that was the basics.
This next section will cover use of the modifier keys.
You can choose the Selection Tool (the black arrow)
and while clicking and dragging a shape, if you hold down ALT, you'll see the cursor
changes to have
a black on top of white shape. You can release it
and you'll create copy.
So, clicking & dragging while holding down ALT creates a copy. If you click and drag while
holding down Shift it moves your object
in a straight line at 45º increments.
This is useful if you want to move something directly
to the side.
You can also combine these. If you hold down
Shift
to constrain
and hold down ALT at the same time and let go
then you will create copy directly in line with the original
this can be very useful for a number of of things.
Finally, with the Selection Tool selected you can hold down CTRL and it
will temporarily give you access to
the Direct Select tool.
If I release the CTRL key, I'm still using the Selection Tool.
But if I hold down CTRL I get my white arrow instead
and so you have access to some of the uses of the white arrow
very quickly by just holding down the CTRL key.
Now I'm going to be using the Direct Select tool
(the white arrow)
With the direct select tool on an anchor point you can click and drag an anchor point
and then hold down ALT
and it will a create copy of what you're dragging out. But only
that anchor point and the segments that are connected to it.
Now if I were to
move this
elsewhere you'll see that it created
a shape
based off of what I pulled out
from that anchor point. The original one stays intact
and it creates a duplicate, but only of that anchor point and the two segments on either
side of it.
If I hold down Shift, just like before, while clicking & dragging
it moves at 45º increments.
And holding down the CTRL key switches back to the black arrow
temporarily, so I can select
the entire object and all of its anchor points, or I can click off of it
to remove
the selection that I had. You can also use the modifier keys with the Direct Selection
tool on handles.
So if I select a single anchor point and adjust its handles, like this one
here, I can hold down the ALT key.
My cursor changes to have a plus sign and now I can move
this
single handle
independently
of the other handle.
Holding down Shift while dragging it
will constrain it
to be at 45º angles.
And finally, we'll use the Pen Tool!
Switch back to the Pen Tool here.
And if you hold down CTRL you'll temporarily have the Selection Tool (the
white arrow). If you hold down ALT
you'll temporarily have the
Convert Anchor Point Tool
at your disposal. Now you won't have these tools with their ability to
use modifier keys because you're already in a different tool using modifier
keys.
If you try that it will give you an error sound.
With the Pen Tool
like before you can draw out anchor points and pull the handles out.
Hold down Shift while pulling the handles out and you'll be constrained at 45º
angles.
While drawing with the Pen Tool
if you put the anchor point in the wrong position
if you're still clicking and dragging out the handles
you can hold the space bar to reposition that point.
This is extremely useful, especially if you're tracing something and you accidentally
click your anchor point
down in the wrong place you can hold down the spacebar and reposition it
to be on top of the correct area of the image.
This functionality is missing from the Pen Tool in Photoshop (pre-2014)
and I think it actually hampers at quite a bit.
As I said it it can be extremely useful particularly when
tracing overr something. But just in general it's very helpful to be
able to quickly reposition it
on the fly, while you're drawing something and making a shape
I'm going to delete that shape.
The next thing is, if you click and drag
as you are pulling out the handles
if you hold down ALT
you can
change the forward facing handle independently
of the previous one.
This is really good if you're trying to make corner,
for example.
And then click and drag out in a new area
as your clicking and dragging
wherever in the backwards facing
handle is at whenever you hold down the ALT key
that is where it will stay. So, I could hold down ALT here and it would be really close
or I could pull it out really far and it would be
really far...
but the moment I hold down the ALT key that backwards facing handle
is going to be
stuck where ever it was at.
And then I can change the forward-facing handle and put it in whatever position I like.
Now this path is selected.
This segment here
from this anchor point to this anchor point has nothing between them. It's just
a segment.
If I put my Pen Tool over it, it adds a little plus sign next the cursor. It lets you
use
the Add Anchor Point Tool
on the segment.
And it temporarily gives you access to that because you're hovering over a
segment that doesn't have an anchor point in that area.
I'll click once and it adds a new anchor point there.
I can also hover over an area
that has an anchor point and i get a minus sign on my cursor.
If I click then
I'll remove that anchor point.
So it gives you access to the Delete Anchor Point tool, and the Add Anchor Point tool
very quickly on a path. So you don't need to necessarily switch between them
as often.
And we'll move down some here.
And finally with the modifier keys, and these additional advanced options with the
Pen Tool, if you have an open path like we do here and you hover over the
endpoint (this anchor).
You'll see the cursor creates a diagonal line.
If I click there
and then I go back to the other end point
you'll see I get the close path
symbol.
And this way I can close a path.
You can also hover over an endpoint
and click once
and then continue pulling out
more shapes
as you see I clicked once and it made a
sharp angle here
because it has a handle coming out
this way. But I clicked once and it didn't create a new handle
for going on this direction.
So if I were to
grab the Pen Tool again and
hover over this endpoint and get that line tool
instead of clicking once I can click and drag.
and just like before I can hold down the ALT key
to modifying the direction in which
that forward-facing
handle will go.
And then again,
I can either leave it open
or i can close it by clicking on this endpoint here
and make another closed path.
So a lot of control over the Pen Tool
it's extremely powerful in Illustrator.
In conjunction with in the Selection Tool and the Direct Selection Tool
you can completely control every aspect of the points
and
anchor points and the handles on any object
to make its shape perfect.
So, it gives you complete control over
your designs.
As I said we have some options over here
I'm going to lock these examples back down and just go over to the tracing pad
and we'll just zoom in here. All of these images that i've supplied are in the
Public Domain. They're all raster images as well they're not vector so they're
here just for your practice purposes. If we were to zoom in on the dog
here. This is, I believe, from Wikipedia (this dog image), it's released into the
Public Domain.
If I click
here on this corner part and pull out my
my handle a little bit and then click there on that corner part
pull out the handle a little bit
and then hold down ALT you can move and reposition this down here.
Then click and drag down some.
And like so. You can go through and try and trace these
You may need to turn the fill off
to be able to do this properly.
I'll go ahead and do that now. Turned the fill off.
This is a good example. Pretty simple shape here to be able to
try out your use of the Pen Tool and the Select and Direct Selection Tools to
adjust
the handles and anchor points
to make sure they're in the correct position
there is also a leaf here and this is good for whenever you're going around these
corner parts of the leaf, like right there.
See how I just pulled out
the previous
handle is going out too far, and this next one
I'm going to need to hold down the ALT key to reposition it to go in this direction.
Or you may just want to connect it up before
it hits the corner. Like this one right here, is
not actually on the corner, it's just before it.
Hold down ALT to switch from the Pen Tool to the
Convert Anchor Points tool, and just click and drag this down here, so it's
a little bit closer
and then there on this edge
hold down spacebar to reposition
that anchor point.
And pull it out.
So it creates a nice little smoothed curve
Just
play around with the different modifier keys that you've learned here
and see what you can make.
So this is a really bad example of what I was doing here. I was more focusing on
teaching
the use of the the tool and the different modifier keys like holding down
space to reposition
your shape
and holding down ALT
to move it around or
when you let go, going back and holding down ALT
to adjust a specific
anchor point. So try and make these as exact as you can get them.
And learn how to use
the different modifier keys and the different tools here to correct your
path that you generate. This next guy here, this creature
is also in the Public Domain. Both of these, the leaves and the creature
both came from DeviantArt.
They were released into the Public Domain. So you can do whatever you like with them. This
is a good example of something that you can kind of challenge yourself on.
You can choose how much detail you want to put into this one. If you wanted
to try to tackle it. You could just outline it
or if you wanted to you could also do each of these individual
inside shapes of this color here.
This darker section of it
and make its whole path around, because there's only like six or seven colors in
here.
So it's not too over-done here to go through and do all the layers to
create the different shadings, the different colors. So this
lighter brown
this base color midtone brown. Slightly darker shadow brown and then
these lighter tone
beiges and dark beige.
And then this gray rock and dark gray and then the black outline.
And maybe this like golden brown for the eyes.
And some white! So... there's a little bit to it but
that's a good example of
a creature that could be easily made in Illustrator if you
wanted to take the time to try and do that one. And then finally we've got some French curves.
down here, which you can try tracing.
French curves are just an artist tool. They've been around for centuries.
Artists will throw these down on a piece of paper and then just trace around
this edge. Wherever they need a specific curved shape. The same way you
would trace around a bottle cap, if you needed a nice, perfect circle. Sometimes artist
need less perfect curves and they need these more
uh... organic shapes so
um...
this one is a photo I took myself and released into the Public Domain.
So go ahead and try to trace around these
in Illustrator using
your newfound knowledge of the Pen Tool, the Selection Tool, the Direct
Selection Tool and see
how accurate you can make them.
If you're having trouble with it just keep working on it, because a lot of
people struggle with the Pen Tool. But once you get used to it
you can work with it really fast.
As you see these modifier keys, there's a lot of overlap between them
there's a lot of
logic to it. Like the Shift key in most of them will constrain to
45º angles. So that's pretty universal throughout it.
The CTRL key often will switch between the Selection or the the Direct
Selection tools.
So you can quickly switch to selecting something a different manner
it's
It tries to be in a very logical usage. The ALT key often will let you
adjust an individual handle
off of an anchor point. They try to make it is as simple to
understand the reasoning behind these modifier keys.
Try to get used to them.
Use them as much as can and really challenge yourself to use them a lot so you
get a lot of practice with them because
they are extremely important when working in Illustrator.
The Pen Tool in Photoshop is like 90% the same. It's kind
of water down a little bit
which I don't understand they could have just as easily just
reused the same Pen Tool there and
had it be just as effective in Photoshop.
But nonetheless,
whatever you were here is almost entirely applicable to Photoshop
as well.
So! Try it all out. As I said before everything you're seeing here is in the
Public Domain. I'm releasing this file (this Illustrator file) and all its contents
out there into the Public Domain.
It looks like, let me revert it one more time.
It should look like this. The file I'm releasing is for Illustrator CS2 and
above. So, anything from like 2002 and on you should be good.
Basically every version of Illustrator that's even out there in the wild
anymore.
Yeah, so... go ahead and give it a try and
if you have any comments leave them below. Let me know what you think if you
need help with anything
ask below and I'll shoot you a message.
Thanks for watching!