You will now create what will soon be the mouth shape (when it is subtracted from your ellipse shape).ġ Click and hold down on the Polygon tool ( ) in the Tools panel to select the hidden Ellipse tool ( ).Ģ Choose View > Snap to Point to uncheck that feature. The triangle and ellipse are combined into one shape.Ĭlick and drag with the The resulting combined shape. Click and drag from one shape to another. You will now start the process of combining your shapes.ġ Using the Selection tool ( ), click on the triangle shape if it is not selected, then Shift+click on the ellipse.Ģ Select the Shape Builder tool ( ) in the Tools panel. Keep it open for the next part of this lesson. Overlapping the ellipse on the left side.ġ4 Choose File > Save or press Ctrl+S (Windows) or Command+S (Mac OS) to save your file. Position the triangle so that it is slightly 8 in into the H: (Height) text field.ġ3 Using the Selection tool, click and drag to position the triangle so that it is on the left side of the ellipse, making sure it overlaps slightly. 8 in into the W: (Width) text field, then press Tab and type. If you would rather enter an exact amount, choose Window > Transform the Transform panel appears. In our example, the tail is approximately. Resize the triangle until you think it would make a good fit as a fish tail. Position your triangle so that it creates the shape of a fish tail.ġ2 With the Selection tool still active, position your mouse on a corner point and click and drag to scale the triangle either up or down you are now visually resizing the triangle. If the bounding box is not visible, make sure that you are on the Selection tool and choose View > Show Bounding Box.ġ1 Position your mouse around an outside corner, and, when you see the curved arrow cursor, click and drag to rotate the triangle. Do not be concerned with the angle or size for now.ġ0 Choose the Selection tool ( ) and notice that a bounding box appears around the triangle. Release the mouse when you have a triangle shape. Instead press the down-arrow on your keyboard several times until the polygon is a triangle. Click and drag to create a polygon shape, but do not release it. This circle will serve as the body of your fish.ĩ Zoom in so the fish’s body fills your window, click and hold on the Ellipse tool ( ), and select the hidden Polygon tool ( ). The Ellipse dialog box appears.Ĩ Type the value of 1 in into the Width text field, and then press tab and enter 1 in into the Height text field. If you inadvertently create an ellipse, press Ctrl+Z (Windows) or Command+Z (Mac OS) to undo your last step. When the Illustrator Options dialog box appears, click OK.ĥ Press D to confirm that the fill and stroke are set at the default of white and black, respectively.Ħ Click and hold on the Rectangle tool and select the hidden Ellipse tool.ħ Click anywhere on the artboard (don’t click and drag). Make sure that you are in the ai03lessons folder, and keep the type Adobe Illustrator. Choose Letter from the Size drop-down menu, if it is not already selected, and set the Units to Inches. Choose Print from the New Document Profile drop-down menu.

In the New Document dialog box, type ai0505_work in the File name text field. You will start out by creating the fundamental shapes that will be used to create the fish in the illustration.ģ Create a new Illustrator document by choosing File > New. You will create this shape by using the Shape Builder tool.Ģ Choose File > Close to close this file, or keep it open for reference.

When Bridge comes forward, navigate to the ai03lessons folder and double-click on the file named ai0505_done. By using the Shape Builder tool, you can create unique shapes by adding, subtracting, and intersecting one shape from another.ġ Choose File > Browse in Bridge. In this section, you have the opportunity to create an illustration using a drawing feature called the Shape Builder tool ( ). For more Adobe Illustrator training options, visit AGI’s Illustrator Classes.Īdobe Illustrator Tutorial: Combining shapes using the Shape Builder tool in Illustrator It is the first lesson in the Adobe Illustrator CC Digital Classroom book. This tutorial provides you with a foundation for working with Adobe Illustrator panels.

What you’ll learn in this Illustrator Tutorial:

Adobe animate mouth shapes