This leaves our cool retro style vector robot character complete. Use the shortcut CMD+Shift+[ to send the shadow to the bottom of the stack. Squash the shape down and position it under the robot’s feet. Begin with a circle filled with a soft grey to transparent gradient. Repeat the process for each shape across the robot’s body to add subtle light reflections to add more depth and a touch of realism to the design.įinish off the design with a little shadow. Draw a temporary shape that cuts through the circle then clip out the shape with the Pathfinder palette.Ĭhange the opacity of this clipped shape to around 20% to create a soft reflection which gives the impression of a shiny or glossy material. Copy and paste a duplicate of the antenna and fill it with white.
We can also add more depth by creating a series of subtle highlights. Adjust the angle of the gradients where necessary with the Gradient tool.
Create swatches for each of your colour selections with a light-dark gradient tone and replace the fills. To add a little more depth to the otherwise flat design, we can switch out the solid fills with cool gradients. I’m using two tones of grey for the body parts, red for key areas and blue or yellow for buttons and dials. Use 3pt for important objects like the head, 2pt for no-so-important elements and 1pt for the finer details. Go through each individual element and adjust the stroke weight according to its prominence in defining the profile of the character. Clear out the fill and bump up the stroke to 5pt aligned to the outside.
Change the Spacing to Specified Steps then alter the number to suit.įinish off the robot with a couple more rectangles and heptagons as legs and feet, then clip off the bottom of the feet with a temporary rectangle along with the Pathfinder tool.ĭraw a selection around all the shapes that make up the robot, copy and paste in front then click the Merge option from the pathfinder palette. With both lines selected go to Object > Blend Make, then head back to Object > Blend > Blend Options. Copy/Paste and flip the line and position the duplicate on the opposite side. Toggle on Outline mode (CMD+Y) for a clear and precise view.ĭraw a diagonal line running parallel to the lower half of the body with the line tool. Before releasing the mouse increase or decrease the number of points to 5 with the keyboard cursor keys.Īlign this pentagon exactly with the lower corners of the body rectangle. Grab the Polygon tool and click and drag a shape onto the artboard. Go to Object > Transform > Reflect and select the Vertical option to flip the objects, then position them on the opposite side.Įven though we’ve only used standard tools with just a couple of custom shapes our robot is starting to look pretty cool! Select all the shapes that make up an arm, copy and paste in front. Use the Pathfinder once again to punch out this square selection. Toggle on Smart guides to make the alignment easy (CMD+U). With both objects selected use the Subtract option from the Pathfinder pallete to punch out the smaller circle from the larger circle.ĭraw a square, rotate it by 45 degrees then position it centrally over the circular ring. Copy (CMD+C) and Paste in Front (CMD+F), then hold ALT and Shift while scaling the new circle down. Group pairs of elements like the eyes then align everything up centrally.Īdd various buttons and dials to the body of the character with more basic shapes, keeping everything centered with the head.ĭraw the basic outline of the hand with a large circle. Use a mix of basic shapes such as rectangles, circles and rounded rectangles to finish off the robot head with a range of features. Enter 1.5mm in the Offset option field to create a slightly larger circle aligned exactly to the original. Press CMD+Shift+[ with the lower circle selected to send it underneath the rectangle.ĭraw a circle to form an eye, then go to Object > Path > Offset Path. Switch to the circle tool and add shapes to either end of the antenna. Select the rectangle tool and draw the basic head shape and an antenna. Open up Adobe Illustrator and create a new document.
It’s essentially made up of lots of basic shapes such as rectangles and circles, but we’ll bring it to life with varied stroke weights, gradient fills and subtle highlights. Here’s the simple vector cartoon robot character we’ll be making in this tutorial.