Inkscape for Beginners: Vector Coins Tutorial

this is Nick with logos by Nick comm and in today's tutorial I'll be demonstrating how to create these vector coins using Inkscape and any point in this tutorial you could look down at the bottom left hand side of my screen to see which mouse clicks and keystrokes I'm using so we'll minimize this and get started the first thing we'll do in Inkscape is set the view to custom and then we'll zoom in at a hundred percent it will open up our align and distribute menu with this button up top and we're gonna want the last selected chosen from this drop down and then we'll open up our edit objects colors gradients and Stroke menu so the first thing we'll do is create any lips so let's come over to the circles and ellipses tool click on that and just click and drag on the canvas to create a little ellipse like that maybe about that width and height somewhere in that general area doesn't have to be exact and we're gonna take the opacity of this and drop this about in half and then we'll go to path and you will choose a linked offset and we're gonna turn that red and then we're gonna grab this little note up top here and just click and drag this upwards so it's about I'd say about that much thicker and then we'll finalize that by converting it to a path so we'll get a path object to path and then we were going to create another linked offset so we'll get a path linked offset and we'll turn this one green and I'll grab this little node up top and again we're gonna pull this one up a little bit but not as much as previously just a little bit like that and that should be good and we'll get a path object a path to finalize that and now let's go to edit and duplicate so we can create another copy of that and let's grab our select tool and I'm gonna turn this blue just so we could differentiate it from the other elements and I'm gonna hold ctrl on the keyboard and just click and drag this down about that much and we're gonna send that to the bottom by clicking this button up top this is lower selection to the bottom and then we're going to do is I'm going to zoom in over this left-hand portion to do that I'm just going to press + on the keyboard to zoom in and I'm gonna press down on the mouse wheel and move the mouse to move the page around like that so what we'll do now is we'll grab the Bezier pen you can grab the tool right here you could just press B on the keyboard and we're gonna turn this we're gonna click this little green squiggly line that says snap the pads we're going to turn that on and that's gonna snap the cursor onto the edge of any graphic and we're going to need that here so we're gonna snap the cursor onto the very edge of the far left side of this bluey lips and then click and then hold ctrl and bring this line straight up until it snaps onto the left edge of the green ellipse and click and still holding ctrl we're gonna bring this all the way over to the right and I'm actually gonna just press down on the mouse wheel and move the mouse over so I could see this and it's gonna snap onto the right side and still holding ctrl we're gonna bring this line straight down until it snaps on to the right edge of this blue you lips and then click and then we could let go of control and bring this back to the starting point and click that first node to create that shape and then we'll go to worse I'll go back to our select tool and then let's turn off the snap two pads we don't need that anymore and I'm gonna hold shift in the keyboard and grab this blue oval down there and go to path Union okay and what I'll do now is I'll press one on the keyboard to zoom back out to a hundred percent and I'm gonna click and drag over this entire thing and bring the opacity of it all the way up and that we can click off of the graphic to deselect everything so let's click on this blue shape right here we're gonna start coloring this thing in now we're going to start with this blue piece down here and the base color I'm gonna use here is this shade of yellow down here in the color picker I think it's ffcc zero zero and go ahead and click on that and then we'll give that a linear gradient come up to the fill tab up here I'm gonna click on this box this is a linear gradient and then we're gonna grab our gradient tool by pressing G on the keyboard and I'm gonna click on this stop down here on the right and bring the opacity of that all the way up and I'm actually I'm just gonna bring this node down to about here and I'll take this node and bring that down as well and once I get it down there I'll to control so it goes straight horizontally if we don't hold control it's gonna be off a little bit but if we hold control it lets it either go straight up it straight left and right or straight up and down so I'm gonna put this over here to the left edge and again I'm gonna zoom in on this a little bit I'm just going to press plus in the keyboard to zoom in a little bit and I'm gonna double click this line right about here to add a new stock double click and I'm gonna add another one and then another one and maybe one more and I'm gonna take this stop and I'm gonna drag this over to the left-hand side and I'm gonna come up here to the HSL tab and under the H column I'm gonna slide that to the left a little bit to give that a shade of orange then I'll take this stop right here and click and drag this over to where that orange stop is maybe about that far away and I'll go to the L column and slide that to the right a little bit just to make that a little lighter and then I'll take this stop right here I'll put this somewhere right about there and I'll take this stop click on that and I could think I think I'll leave that right where it is and I'll bring the H column to the left a little bit as well for that one make that a little orange as well and then let's click on this green shape with our gradient tool still selected we're going to click on that green shape and you'll know you have it selected when you see the green show up in the bars here if you accidentally click the red you're gonna see the red so make sure you grab the green one and I'm gonna give that a linear gradient as well actually no at first before we do that I'm gonna give that the same shade of yellow that I used for the base of this one so I'm going to click this ffcc zero zero and then I'll give that a linear gradient and then I'll click on this stop to the right over here bring the opacity all the way up bring the L column all the way to the right and then I'll take this stop and put it down here at the bottom and I'll take this stop and put it at the top and once I get up here I'm gonna hold ctrl on the keyboard so it goes straight up like that and then we'll go back to the Select tool I'm gonna click on this red ellipse right here I'm gonna give that the same base color as well I'm gonna make that I'm gonna I'm gonna take the a the H column and slide that to the left a little bit to make that orange maybe like that and I'm gonna give that a linear gradient as well press G on the keyboard to get back to the gradient tool click on that stop bring the opacity all the way up and I'm gonna double click this line right here to give that a new stop and I'm gonna bring that stop into the middle and I'm gonna take the H column and slide that back over to the right a little bit just to give you that a little bit of a lighter shade than the outer edges there and then let's click on this black oval in the center here and we'll make that our base color of yellow again and I'm gonna give that a linear gradient as well click on this stop right here bring the opacity all the way up and I'm gonna make I'm gonna click this one over here on the left I'm gonna make this one slightly lighter maybe about that much and we'll put this stop at the top up here I'm grab this stop put it at the bottom and then once you get it down there just hold ctrl so it goes straight up and down you want to go and straight down we don't want it going off to the side a little bit we want going straight down like that and then we go back to the Select tool what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna right-click this and go to duplicate and I'll turn that black just for now bring the opacity down a little bit and then I'll right-click this and go to duplicate and turn that red and then I'll hold ctrl and click and drag this up about that much and then I'll hold ctrl and grab this little arrow down here and click and drag that down a little bit as well let me bring this back down a little bit maybe up a little bit like that we want it sized and positioned about that much right there and then I'm gonna hold shift in the keyboard and click on the blacki lips beneath it and go to path difference and what I'll do now is I'm gonna bring the opacity all the way up and I'm gonna give it our base color again which is that yellow and once again I'll come up here to the H column and slide this over to the right a little bit but we want this to go be a little darker than the shade beneath down here so that's pretty good right there I can leave it we could leave that just how it is then we go back to the Select tool actually we already are in the Select tool let's click on this piece down here let's click and select that and we'll right-click that and go to duplicate and turn that black and take the opacity and bring that down about in half and hold ctrl and click and drag this down a little bit maybe about that much and then we can send that to the bottom with this button this is lower selection to the bottom and I'm gonna bring the opacity down a little more this is gonna make this is gonna be like a little shadow that we're gonna use so yeah that's pretty good let's press 1 on the keyboard to zoom back out to a hundred percent I'm gonna click and drag over this whole thing and group it together and then I'll right-click it and go to duplicate and hold ctrl and click and drag this one up about that much and then I'll right click duplicate that hold ctrl click and drag this up about that much and let's click and drag over all three of them and click this button down here in the distribute panel that says make vertical gaps between objects equal just to make sure that they're spaced out evenly and then we can click off of the graphic to deselect everything so let's take this middle coin right here and hold ctrl and click and drag this off to the right so that it's sticking out a little bit and then we'll take this coin right here we'll right click that and go to duplicate and put this off to the side for now and let's click and drag over these three coins right here and ungroup them with this button up top on group selected objects so we have all those little individual objects available for us to use so what we're gonna do now is you notice these this shadow is sticking out beyond this coin beneath it we're gonna need to fix that so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna click on this outer oval right here and with that selected I'll go to edit I'll right click and duplicate and what I'll do is I'm gonna grab the bezzie a pen by pressing B on the keyboard and I'm gonna draw a shape going around this part of the shadow too because we want to keep this part of the shadow as well so let's start the the line that we're going to draw right here and then click and let's just click and draw a shape going around that little piece of the shadow and into the oval like that and then we go back to the Select tool you could hold shift in the keyboard and click on the oval we just duplicated and go to path Union and then hold shift and click on that shadow down there and go to path intersection so now as you can see that shadow does not stick out beyond the coin it's just it's just being cast on the coin right there and speaking of which let's take this shadow down here and just press Delete on the keyboard to get rid of that we don't need that one and we're gonna do it we're not to do the same thing with this one down here so let's let's click on this outer ellipse right click that go to duplicate and then we'll go back to our Bezier a pen by pressing B and actually you know what now let's go to the Select tool now let's click on this shape right here right click that and go to duplicate and then hold shift and click on the other shape beneath it and go to a path Union to unify them together so we have this one solid shape and then we could hold shift and click on that part of the shadow right there and go to path intersection all right so now it all makes sense so let's press 1 on the keyboard to zoom back out and I think we could click and drag over all three of these now and group them together and then we could take up this coin right here let's ungroup that and click off of it to deselect and let's take this little piece down here this shadow let's take that and press Delete on the keyboard to get rid of that and we'll click and drag over this group it back together and then I'm gonna click it a second time to get the rotation handles I'm gonna hold ctrl on the keyboard and grab the corner arrow down here and just bring this around to three maybe three steps like that and once you've done that let's hold shift and click on our little stack of coins here and to line the bottom edges with that button in the align panel go ahead and click on that and that's gonna put them on the same vertical plane down there and then we can click off of it to deselect everything and I'm gonna take just this coin and hold ctrl and click and drag this over here until it's until it looks like it's leaning up against the other stack of coins and then what I'll do is I'll right-click that coin and go to duplicate and then I'll ungroup that duplicated copy and then unify them all together by going to path Union and what I'm gonna do here now is I'm gonna create a shadow going underneath this coin being cast on the stack of coins that's why I'm doing this right here so once we've duplicated that and unified it all together let's turn that black and bring the opacity of that down and let's click this a second time to get our rotation handles and once we do that there's gonna be this little crosshair here in the center this crosshair represents the axis on which the object will rotate so if I rotate now notice how it's rotating relative to where that little cross is if I put this up here it'll rotate around like that so what I want to do is take this crosshair and put it on this upper right edge right here maybe about right there like that and I'll take this bottom arrow and just rotate this around about that much and then we could take this stack of coins right here right click it go to duplicate and let's ungroup them and go to path Union to unify them all together and then I'll hold shift and click on our black shape and go to path intersection and then we could lower that beneath that coin bring the opacity down a little bit and as you can see we have a little shadow now being cast on the stack of coins so let's press one to zoom back out actually we are zoomed out one final step that we could do is we can make it look like we have like this stack of coins is sitting on a surface like sitting on a reflective surface and there's a stack of coins being reflected beneath it like you see I did here in the thumbnail design so let me show you how to do that real quick let's click this stack of coins we'll right-click that go to duplicate hold ctrl and click and drag this down and then just drop them to the bottom with that button lower selection to the bottom and I'm just going to hold ctrl and move this up until it looks like it's sitting flush beneath the other stack of coins and it'll do the same thing with this one right here right click that go to duplicate only I'm gonna flip this vertically you can click on this button it says flip selected objects vertically and then hold shift and click on the other coin beneath it and we'll click on this button that says align top edges of objects to the bottom edge of the anchor and it's gonna put it right beneath there and then we can click off of the graphic to deselect everything so let's click on this coin right here and then hold shift and click on this stack of coins and group them together and we actually gonna have to send that to the bottom again lower selection to the bottom and with them selected let's go to the create rectangles and squares tool and I'm going to create a rectangle going over the shape of that duplicated coin graphics you notice the dotted outline there I'm gonna create this rectangle going over that dotted line we want to lead a little bit of area bleeding through like that that's pretty good you would want to make sure that the rectangle is covering all elements of that graphic you don't want anything sticking out of the side so let's go back to the Select tool we'll bring the opacity all the way up we'll give this a linear gradient and press G on the keyboard to get the gradient tool I'm gonna click on this stop right here on the right and I'm gonna bring the opacity up and take the L column and slide it all the way to the right to make that white and I'll take this white copy and put it up towards the top and I'll take this black stop and put this at the bottom down here I'm just gonna hold ctrl and bring that down right here and I'll go back to the Select tool let me take the opacity of this and bring this down a little bit what's gonna happen now is I'm gonna take this object and I'm gonna mask it over the second stack of coins right there and what's gonna happen once I mask it over there is everything that's white is going to be transparent actually know everything that's black is going to be transparent and everything that's white is going to show through so and everything in between is just gonna gradually fade out and I think it'll make a lot more sense when you actually see it happen so let me just hold shifts in alt and click on this right here in the middle so I could select that copy down there and go to object mask set and then we could take the opacity of that and drop that down a little more maybe that's pretty good you know what let's undo that let's go to object mask release let me click off of that to deselect let me take this rectangle right here and bring the opacity down a little bit just so I can see what I'm doing and then I'll go back I'll press G to get back to the gradient tool I don't like how so much of this graphic is showing through so I want to take this black stop and hold ctrl and bring this all the way up to here like that and then I'll go back to the Select tool bring the opacity all the way up and then again hold shift and alt click on that graphic and go to object mask set see how that looks and I'd say that's good enough for now we can take the opacity and bring that down and let me click and drag over the whole thing to select everything group it all together hold ctrl and shift and click and drag this inwards to scale that down and as you can see we are finished we now have our little vector stack of coins or tokens or whatever you want to call it so that's how you could do that using Inkscape if you have any questions let me know and as always thank you for watching

Channel: Logos By Nick

Views: 22,411

Keywords: inkscape, learn inkscape, inkscape tutorial, inkscape logo, inkscape logo design tutorial, inkscape for beginners

Id: UMFN1c8AOqg

Length: 19min 5sec (1145 seconds)

Published: Tue May 24 2016