I just got a subscription to Adobe Illustrator and am a little lost. I've used Adobe Fireworks before, but my computer just died and the old software was just a little too lame to continue using. So, the basics are the same, but there are some differences.

I really just want to take a beard from Google that I like, erase the face, and use it as a template to draw a beard for YoWorld. Ideally, it would be good enough to win a slot in an upcoming design contest and then I could wear my own beard. How cool would that be?

So, if you have any thoughts, tips or tricks for me, I'd love to hear them!

Thanks guys!

As a newbie artist and freeware user, here's a tip I tresure when I have no clue about what to do...
Get a "template layer" - it's a layer with picture you are trying to recreate. Fit it in way to be closest approximation of Yo face - that can be a pain but you'll eventually get the hang of it.
Shift all other layers so that it goes like this - Yo face (full opacity), template face (30-50% opacity recommended) and after it all your layers for design. You can easily hide any or all of those and see how it looks raw or on your Yo face.
Mind the ordinary lips/eyes/nose positions on Yo face and available face shapes.
Play with brushes - I'm not familiar with AI's toolset, but learn to use blendings, shading, textures, smears and smudges.
That's it, hope you enjoy your time creating stuff!

TL MidgetSasquatch (187264144) wrote:As a newbie artist and freeware user, here's a tip I tresure when I have no clue about what to do...
Get a "template layer" - it's a layer with picture you are trying to recreate. Fit it in way to be closest approximation of Yo face - that can be a pain but you'll eventually get the hang of it.
Shift all other layers so that it goes like this - Yo face (full opacity), template face (30-50% opacity recommended) and after it all your layers for design. You can easily hide any or all of those and see how it looks raw or on your Yo face.
Mind the ordinary lips/eyes/nose positions on Yo face and available face shapes.
Play with brushes - I'm not familiar with AI's toolset, but learn to use blendings, shading, textures, smears and smudges.
That's it, hope you enjoy your time creating stuff!

Thank you Kira! I'll do that with the layers. I was thinking of keeping them in separate files, but you're right just show/hide would work as well. The part I'm after I think I have the answer, but it's not what I want. The image is basically raster and I need it to be vector. So, I think I'll just do some interim steps to change it to a path and go with that. Probably I should just post in the Adobe forum since those folks are just about as awesome as they come.

Anyhoo, thanks again Kira!

Erwyle (187240896) wrote:

TL MidgetSasquatch (187264144) wrote:As a newbie artist and freeware user, here's a tip I tresure when I have no clue about what to do...
Get a "template layer" - it's a layer with picture you are trying to recreate. Fit it in way to be closest approximation of Yo face - that can be a pain but you'll eventually get the hang of it.
Shift all other layers so that it goes like this - Yo face (full opacity), template face (30-50% opacity recommended) and after it all your layers for design. You can easily hide any or all of those and see how it looks raw or on your Yo face.
Mind the ordinary lips/eyes/nose positions on Yo face and available face shapes.
Play with brushes - I'm not familiar with AI's toolset, but learn to use blendings, shading, textures, smears and smudges.
That's it, hope you enjoy your time creating stuff!

Thank you Kira! I'll do that with the layers. I was thinking of keeping them in separate files, but you're right just show/hide would work as well. The part I'm after I think I have the answer, but it's not what I want. The image is basically raster and I need it to be vector. So, I think I'll just do some interim steps to change it to a path and go with that. Probably I should just post in the Adobe forum since those folks are just about as awesome as they come.

Anyhoo, thanks again Kira!

Oh, was I not clear yet again? Pooh, my words are lame nowdays...
Sorry, I meant that you need to recreate the beard afterwards. So no matter if your initial file import was raster, you are supposed to remove that layer with template in the end and export your drawing as vector. Like I said, I'm not quite familiar with AI, but I hope I didn't misinterpret the response.
There are also online image vectorizers... As far as I know.
Thank you for asking, I'd love to wear your beards or whatever you'd want to design.