Drawing a shape with the Pen tool
The Pen tool is one of the most commonly used tools for creating vector graphics on a personal computer. You find the Pen tool in many applications, including Adobe Illustrator (which first featured the Pen tool in 1987), Adobe Photoshop, and Adobe InDesign. Even video applications such as Adobe Premiere Pro and Adobe After Effects include the Pen tool because it provides such a high degree of control and precision when drawing many kind of lines, from shapes to masks to motion graphics paths. The Pen tool may not be easy to learn, but trust us: Knowing how to use the Pen tool is worth the effort and investment to master, partly because it’s a marketable skill across many creative digital disciplines.
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The Curvature Pen tool offers a potentially simpler way to draw precise vector paths; consider learning it if you find the Pen tool to be challenging to use. The Pen tool is taught in this chapter because it’s a traditional and industry-standard tool for precisely drawing vector graphics.
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The Pen tool works a little differently than a brush or pencil tool. We’ve created a practice file that you’ll use to learn how to draw a straight path, a simple curve, and an S-curve with the Pen tool.
CREATING PATHS WITH THE PEN TOOL
You can use the Pen tool to create paths that are straight or curved, open or closed. If you’re unfamiliar with the Pen tool, it can be confusing to use at first. Understanding the elements of a path and how to create those elements with the Pen tool makes paths much easier to draw.
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To create a straight path, click the mouse button. The first time you click, you set the first anchor point. Each time that you click thereafter, a straight line is drawn between the previous anchor point and the current one. To draw complex straight-segment paths with the Pen tool, click each time you want to add a new segment.
To create a curved path, click to place an anchor point, drag to create a direction line for that point, and then click to place the next anchor point. Each direction line ends in two direction points; the positions of direction lines and points determine the size and shape of the curved segment. Moving the direction lines and points reshapes the curves in a path.
Smooth curves are connected by anchor points called smooth points. Sharply curved paths are connected by corner points. When you move a direction line on a smooth point, the curved segments on both sides of the point adjust simultaneously, but when you move a direction line on a corner point, only the curve on the same side of the point as the direction line is adjusted.
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B. Direction point
C. Direction line
D. Selected anchor point
E. Unselected anchor point
You can move path segments and anchor points, either individually or as a group. When a path contains multiple segments, you can drag individual anchor points to adjust individual segments of the path, or select all anchor points in a path to edit the entire path. Use the Direct Selection tool (
) to select and adjust an anchor point, a path segment, or an entire path.
Creating a closed path differs from creating an open path in the way that you end it. To end an open path, press Enter or Return. To create a closed path, position the Pen tool pointer over the starting point, and click. Closing a path automatically ends the path. After the path closes, the Pen tool pointer appears with a small *, indicating that your next click will start a new path.
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When you first draw a path, it appears in the Paths panel as a temporary object called Work Path. Save any work path you want to use again in the future, especially if you want to use multiple paths in the same document. To save a work path, double-click it in the Paths panel, type a name in the Save Path dialog box, and click OK. It’s added as a new named path in the Paths panel, and remains selected. If you don’t save a work path, it’s lost as soon as you deselect it and then start drawing again. (Saving the path isn’t necessary when you draw a path as a shape, because a shape is created as a named layer.)
First, you’ll configure the Pen tool options and the work area.
In the Tools panel, select the Pen tool (
).In the options bar, select or verify the following settings:
Choose Shape from the Tool Mode pop-up menu.
In the Path Options menu, make sure that Rubber Band is not selected.
Make sure that Auto Add/Delete is selected.
Choose No Color from the Fill pop-up menu.
Choose a green color from the Stroke pop-up menu. We used the green swatch in the CMYK presets group.
Enter 4 pt for the stroke width.
In the Stroke Options window, choose Center (the second option) from the Align menu.
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The Align stroke option controls whether the stroke width sits entirely to one side of a path or the other, or is centered over the path.
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Drawing a straight line
You’ll start by drawing a straight line. Anchor points mark the ends of path segments; the straight line you’ll draw is a single path segment with two anchor points.
Drag the Paths panel tab out of the Layers panel group so that you can see both it and the Layers panel at the same time. You can dock the Paths panel with another panel group.
The Paths panel displays thumbnail previews of the paths you draw. Currently, the panel is empty, because you haven’t started drawing.
If necessary, zoom in so that you can easily see the lettered points and red circles on the shape template. Make sure you can see the whole template in the image window, and be sure to reselect the Pen tool after you zoom.
NOTE
If a tutorial pops up for the Curvature Pen tool, you don’t need to read it at this time. It will probably close on its own, or you can close it.
On the first shape, click point A, and release the mouse button. You’ve created an anchor point.
Click point B. You’ve created a straight line with two anchor points.
Press Enter or Return to stop drawing.
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NOTE
The new path appears in both the Paths and Layers panels because the Tool Mode menu in the options bar is set to Shape, so drawing a new path also creates a new shape layer. If the Tool Mode menu was set to Path, the new path would be added to the Paths panel only.
The path you drew appears in the Paths panel, and as a new layer in the Layers panel.
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Drawing curves
On curved segments, selecting an anchor point displays one or two direction lines, depending on the shapes of adjacent segments. You adjust the shape of a curved segment by dragging the direction point at the end of a direction line, and the direction line shapes the curve. You’ll create curved lines, using smooth points.
Click A on the semicircle, and release the mouse to create the first anchor point.
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The red circles indicate where you should stop dragging an anchor point’s direction point to form the desired shape of the curve. If you drag the direction point to a different location, the curve will have a different shape.
Click point B, but don’t release the mouse button. Instead, drag to the red circle to the right of point B to create a curved path segment and a smooth anchor point. Then release the mouse button.
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Smooth anchor points have two linked direction lines. When you move one, the curved segments on both sides of the path adjust simultaneously.
Position the pointer over point C, click and drag down to the red circle below, and then release the mouse button. You’ve created a second curved path segment and another smooth point.
Click point D, and release the mouse to create the final anchor point. Press Enter or Return to complete the path.
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What’s the advantage of drawing paths using points and handles, instead of drawing directly as with a real pen or pencil? For most people, it’s difficult to draw curves and straight lines without bumps or other errors. Points and handles let you draw perfect curves and straight lines. If you prefer to draw normally, you can use the Freeform Pen tool.
When drawing a freehand path using the Pen tool, use as few points as possible to create the shape you want. The fewer points you use, the smoother the curves are—and the more efficient your file is.
Using the same techniques, you’ll draw an S-shaped curve.
Click point A, and then click and drag from point B to the first red circle.
Continue with points C, D, E, and F, in each case clicking the point and then dragging to the corresponding red circle.
Click point G to create the final anchor point, and then press Enter or Return to complete the path.
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Each of the three shapes is on its own layer in the Layers panel. Only one path is in the Paths panel, because the Paths panel shows only the Shape Path for the layer that’s currently selected in the Layers panel.
Notice that the curves you drew with the Pen tool are much smoother and easier to precisely control than if you had drawn them freehand.
Drawing a more complex shape
Now that you’ve got the idea, you’ll have a chance to draw a more complex object.
Click point A on the shape on the right side to set the first anchor point.
Press the Shift key as you click point B. Pressing the Shift key constrains the line to 45-degree angles, which in this case ensures you’ll get a horizontal line.
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If you notice that you slightly missed the red dot on the template while dragging a curve point, you can reposition the point without starting over. Keeping the mouse button down, hold down the spacebar and drag until the point is in the right place. Then release the spacebar to continue dragging the direction lines of that anchor point.
Press the Shift key as you click points C, D, and E to create straight path segments.
Click point F, and drag to the red circle to create a curve. Then release the mouse button.
Click point G, and drag to the red circle to create another curve. Then release the mouse button.
Click point H to create a corner point.
When you move a direction line on a corner point, only the curve on the same side of the point as the direction line is adjusted, so you can create a sharp transition between two segments.
Click point A to draw the final path segment and close the path. Closing a path automatically ends the drawing; you don’t need to press Enter or Return.
Close the file without saving changes. You have successfully used the Pen tool to draw both curves and straight lines.
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