Learning the Tools
FIRST, View this video, headphones preferred.
Vectordiary.com is a great resource to follow for the basic uses of Illustrator, even some of the best Illustrator work out there. 30 days of anything is pretty daunting so we will be breaking this Tutorial up into about 5 weeks of activities over the next few months. Essentially, it says 30
1. Create a NEW Illustrator Document, letter sized, RGB color mode. Further below is a listing of items that have to be drawn on this practice sheet. The tutorial NEEDS to be READ in order to catch all the details, course expectations require this. Keep this blog open to refer to through out your activities in the tutorial.
REMEMBER just because it says a ‘DAY’ in the tutorial doesn’t mean you have to take the whole class period to go through it, you are expected to make earnest efforts at practicing with the tools they present. You are at a minimum, expected to accurately describe, create or use the tools and Illustrator options that the tutorial goes over.
WEEK 1, Part 1: Days 1-5: Day 1: What is Illustrator | Day 2: Getting Started in Illustrator | Day 3: Drawing Basic Shapes | Day 4: Drawing with Pencil Tool | Day 5: Drawing with Pen Tool
Your first Practice sheet should include the following See Sample to the right); square and rectangle, oval and circle, pentagon and triangle, 20 point star, left and right ‘cartoon’ hands drawn with the pencil tool. The old Key, dog bone, poison ivy leaf, clover, speech bubble, rabbit, shamrock, and the puzzle piece. When you are finished, move on to Week 2 Below.
Helpful CS5 Tip Video:Compound Shapes with the Shape Builder Tool
WEEK 2: Advance color, fill and shape options.: Day 8: Using Brushes | Day 9: Creating Compound Paths | Day 10: Working with Color and Strokes | Day 11: Editing Objects, Layers & Groups | Day 12: Transparency & Graphic Styles
On the second practice sheet, show examples of your practice by showing the: Pear with a brush stroke, Calligraphy letter, Border, new pattern brush, the pathfinder results, Submission: As you finish each section, Save your practice (saved as a jpg file) on your Tumblr Account, tag it #AI30day. For complete instructions on how to set-up your Tumblr Accounts See this post. To submit the practice sheets, complete the following:
- Save both of the practice sheets into a folder named FirstLast_AI30day.
- Create a Tumblr account and post a JPG file. Tagged #AI30days1 and #AI30Days2. Illustrator files will not post onto the internet. You have to save them as JPEGs, Gifs, or PNGs. In this case, we will save as a JPEG by completing the following steps:
- You will have to go to FILE>Save for web and devices.
- Change the preset (left side, top of window) to “JPEG medium”
- Then click save, and choose your Progress Folder on your Desktop (a folder named First_Last_ProgressQ1)
Alternate Challenge:
Assessment:
- All parts of the project are represented in the progress folder files
- The time spent on work in class was not wasteful or distracting to others.
- Project was carefully assembled and thoughtfully presented.
- the student engaged the challenge and the purpose of the experience and did not rush though the task.
Other Tutorials or videos you can watch:
- SuperMario with Layer set-up http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLNeMODvOYA&feature=fvwrel
- The old way of inking Sketches. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ozicnw3nDs8&feature=fvwrel
- Inking with the brush tool (Marilyn Monroe Sketch) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehaT90RCJCA&feature=related
