Digital Media

Learning the Pen Tool

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The Pen tool is the best tool in your illustrator toolbox. Once you have master this tool, it opens up so many different drawing possibilities to you. It allows you to create very simple shapes to very complex ones. You have used this tool once before in Photoshop in the Graffiti project, but now we will explore it in greater depth.

Let's start with The Bezier Game, the link is to the right. We will spend 1 hour on this game. When the hour is up, Scoggins will record your score. The game is to help start you off with the fundamentals of creating basic shapes using the pen tool.

Next, download the pentool exercise .AI file to the right to start this lesson on using the Pen Tool. 

You simply follow the numbers and the instructions to complete the exercise. The point you need to aim at in each step is the center of each numbered colored dot. The top layer is the"working layer". This is the layer you'll be working on. Make sure your fill color is empty so you don't block the directions.

There are 3 different colors: blue, red and green.

• The BLUE ones don't require any dragging, but involve clicking.

• The RED ones, involve dragging, and sometimes a key needs to be pressed as well.

• The GREEN ones also involve dragging, but this time dragging one of the handles of the anchor point you've just created, while holding down a key first (alt/option).

Save your file as Last Name + First Name + Period + Pen Tool worksheet and put into your Intro to Illustrator Folder.