From the course: Deke's Techniques (2018-2021)

818 Carving cubical holes into cubical objects

From the course: Deke's Techniques (2018-2021)

818 Carving cubical holes into cubical objects

Welcome to Deke's Techniques. This week, we're still in Illustrator, and we're going to take our cubical design from last week, and we're going to carve cubical holes into it. See these shades holes right here? Why? Because look at this thing. It doesn't look right, right? All right, I'm going to start things off with a little bit of housekeeping here. Notice that I have open the Swatches and Layers panels over here on the right-hand side of the screen. And you can get to either one of them by going to the Window menu and choosing the corresponding command. And notice I'm kind of running out of room in my Swatches panel so I'm going to click on the default pattern, Jive, and I'm going to Shift + Click on this gradient called Gold Dust in order to select those three swatches right there, and I'll Alt or Option + click on the trashcan icon in order to delete those swatches without incurring an alert message. All right, now I'm going to target the drawing layer right here by clicking in its so called meatball on the right side of the Layers panel and then, I'll go up to the Window menu, and choose the Appearance command to switch over to the Appearance panel. I'll click on that Outer Glow effect and then I'll just click on the trashcan icon to get rid of it because otherwise, it's just going to get in our way. All right, now switch back to the Layers panel and I'll lock the pattern layer for the time being by clicking in its second column right here. And now, I just want to select this center concave cube and so, I'll go up to the View menu, and choose Outline in order to switch to the outline mode. Notice that it has a long-standing keyboard shortcut of Control + Y here in a PC or Command + Y on the Mac which allows you to toggle back and forth between the outline and preview modes. All right, now click off the shapes to deselect them and armed with my black arrow tool which is selected up here at the top of the toolbox, I'll just go ahead and partially marquee that cube so I'm just marqueeing the central area like so. And then, I'll press Control + Y or Command + Y on the Mac to switch back to the preview mode, and I'll go up to the Select menu, and choose Inverse. And that way, I'm selecting everything, but that cube, and I'll press the Backspace key, or the Delete key on the Mac to get rid of it. And then I'll press Control + A, Command + A on the Mac in order to select that entire cube right there which is actually two blends along with three independent shapes. And I'll go up to the Object menu and choose the Group command or you can just press Control + G or Command + G on the Mac in order to group those shapes together. All right, now you want to go up to the View menu and confirm a couple of things. First of all, this command should read Show Bounding Box. If it reads Hide Bounding Box, go ahead and choose the command to do exactly that, hide the bounding box, that is to say. And then, we want the Smart Guides turned on. Mine are turned off so I'll go ahead and choose the command. And now, I'm going to drag this guy like so by its bottom-left point. You can see that, until it snaps into alignment with its right-side point. So at this point, it's literally snapping into alignment with itself and you should see a white arrow head which is the snapping cursor. At which point, just go ahead and release. You don't need to press the Alt or Option key. We're not duplicating the shape this time around. And then, go ahead and select the Rotate Tool which you can get by pressing the R key. Width and Height values of 150 points each. At which point, I'll go ahead and click OK. Currently, we're looking at a shape that has no fill and a stroke. I don't want that stroke so I'll go ahead and click on this second swatch on the far-left side of the Control panel and change it to None, and then, I'll click on the first swatch on the far-left side of the horizontal Control panel, and I'll change it to this remaining gradient, White, Black. And we'll end up with this pretty darn ugly effect right here. All right, I'll go ahead and press the Escape key to hide that panel. Then, I'll go up to the Window menu and choose Gradient in order to bring up the Gradient panel. Currently , I've got a Linear Gradient as you can see right here. I want it to be Radial. I want it to be Radial. And in the most version of Illustrator, And in the most version of Illustrator, you select an icon. you select an icon. In previous versions, you'll see a popup menu. In previous versions, you'll see a popup menu. All right, I want to reverse these colors All right, I want to reverse these colors so I'll click on the Reverse Gradient icon right there. so I'll click on the Reverse Gradient icon right there. I'm going to go up here to the Swatches panel I'm going to go up here to the Swatches panel to this dark shade of blue to this dark shade of blue that begins R=27 and I'll drag it that begins R=27 and I'll drag it and drop it onto the black color stop. and drop it onto the black color stop. And then, I'll go up to the Control panel, And then, I'll go up to the Control panel, and click on the word Opacity and click on the word Opacity in order to bring up the Opacity panel, in order to bring up the Opacity panel, and I'll change the Blend Mode to Multiply and I'll change the Blend Mode to Multiply which is going to drop out the white, which is going to drop out the white, and burn in the blacks. and burn in the blacks. All right, now I'll press the Escape key. All right, now I'll press the Escape key. Now, we've got a problem Now, we've got a problem in that the gradient is covering in that the gradient is covering not only the exposed area of the hole, not only the exposed area of the hole, but also this area out here but also this area out here which is not really a hole. which is not really a hole. It's just a divot. It's just a divot. And so, I'll press Control + X And so, I'll press Control + X or Command + X on the Mac in order to cut that shape or Command + X on the Mac in order to cut that shape to the clipboard, and then, to the clipboard, and then, I'll press the V key to switch back I'll press the V key to switch back to my black arrow tool to my black arrow tool and I'll click on this shape and I'll click on this shape and Shift + click on this one. and Shift + click on this one. So you want to click on one of these triangles right here, So you want to click on one of these triangles right here, and Shift + click on the other one like so, and Shift + click on the other one like so, and then, press Control + F or Command + F on the Mac and then, press Control + F or Command + F on the Mac in order to paste that gradient in order to paste that gradient in front of those particular shapes. in front of those particular shapes. All right, now you want to go ahead, All right, now you want to go ahead, and switch back to the Rotate Tool and switch back to the Rotate Tool which again you can get by pressing the R key, which again you can get by pressing the R key, and you want to Alt or Option + click right there and you want to Alt or Option + click right there in the center of that concave cube shape, in the center of that concave cube shape, and that'll bring up the Rotate dialog box. and that'll bring up the Rotate dialog box. Just go ahead and change the Angle to 120 degrees Just go ahead and change the Angle to 120 degrees and click Copy. and click Copy. Now, my problem at this point Now, my problem at this point is it's too far down the stacks is it's too far down the stacks so I'm going to have to press Control + X so I'm going to have to press Control + X or Command + X on the Mac or Command + X on the Mac in order to cut that shape once again in order to cut that shape once again and then, I'll press the V key and then, I'll press the V key to switch back to my black arrow tool. to switch back to my black arrow tool. And I'll go ahead and click on this forward cube, And I'll go ahead and click on this forward cube, the last one I created, the last one I created, and then, I'll Shift + click on this one, and then, I'll Shift + click on this one, and Shift + click on this one and Shift + click on this one so that these three guys in the center are selected, so that these three guys in the center are selected, and then, I'll press Control + B and then, I'll press Control + B or Command + B on the Mac or Command + B on the Mac to invoke the paste-in-back command. to invoke the paste-in-back command. All right, now I'll press the R key All right, now I'll press the R key to once again switch over to the Rotate Tool, to once again switch over to the Rotate Tool, and I'll Alt or Option + click and I'll Alt or Option + click at that same location I did before, at that same location I did before, right there at the center of the art board. right there at the center of the art board. And that will once again bring up the Rotate dialog box And that will once again bring up the Rotate dialog box complete with that last Angle value of 120 degrees. complete with that last Angle value of 120 degrees. At which point, I'll click the Copy button At which point, I'll click the Copy button in order to create a copy of that gradient. in order to create a copy of that gradient. And then, I'll go up to the Select menu And then, I'll go up to the Select menu and choose the Deselect command and choose the Deselect command which has a keyboard shortcut of Control + Shift + A which has a keyboard shortcut of Control + Shift + A or Command + Shift + A for deselect all. or Command + Shift + A for deselect all. And that friends is how you create the effect And that friends is how you create the effect of having cut holes out of the center of having cut holes out of the center of your orthogonal object of your orthogonal object whether it's a Rubik's cube or cubical gobstopper whether it's a Rubik's cube or cubical gobstopper here inside Illustrator. here inside Illustrator. Okay, so I never showed you what's in the holes Okay, so I never showed you what's in the holes which is why if you're a member of LinkedIn Learning, which is why if you're a member of LinkedIn Learning, I have a follow-up movie I have a follow-up movie in which I again, don't answer that question, in which I again, don't answer that question, but I do show you how to integrate the radial gradients but I do show you how to integrate the radial gradients that make up these holes that make up these holes into this seamlessly repeating tile pattern. into this seamlessly repeating tile pattern. Pretty cool, huh? Pretty cool, huh? If you're looking forward to next week, If you're looking forward to next week, I'm going to show you how to create this pattern I'm going to show you how to create this pattern of 3D isometric arrows inside Illustrator. of 3D isometric arrows inside Illustrator. Deke's Techniques each and every week! Deke's Techniques each and every week! Keep watching. Keep watching.

Contents