Awesome How to Create a Photo Frame Social Icon Set – Illustrator Tutorial

Following on from our last tutorial (Creating a Realistic Torn Photo Effect – Photoshop Tutorial), today we focus on Illustrator and how to create a classy social bookmarking icon set.

How to Create a Photo Frame Social Icon Set with Illustrator

In todays tutorial you will learn how to create a social bookmarking icon set that are wrapped in a photo frame and much just be good enough to hand on your wall.

The image on the left is what your finished icon will look like.

OK, over to todays author, Helen Gizi, she will guide you through the tutorial …lets get going…

Source Files

Before we start, you can download the source files, which include all the .ai source files…

• Photo Frame Social Icon Set Source Files (ZIP)

Step 1

Select the Rectangle tool and press and hold Shift and draw the square below.

Step 2

With the Pen tool click the top right anchor point of the square. This will remove the top left anchor point of the square and produce a triangle.

Step 3

Having the new shape selected, select the Rotate tool, press and hold Shift + Alt to duplicate and rotate the triangle 45 degrees.

Step 4

And here is the result of the previous step.

Step 5

Press Ctrl + D to create two more triangles and create the below square. Select them all and rotate them 45 degrees (Object > Transform >Rotate > Angle > 45)

Step 6

Let’s bring it to life with some color. Select the two opposite shapes and choose a color that you like. Do the same for the other two but this time select a color from the same palette in a darker tone. Now group them.

Step 7

Duplicate the shape (Ctrl + C) (Ctrl + V) and apply a gradient as shown in the gradient window. In other words, create a gradient with a dark color at the end and at the beginning and a lighter color in the middle.

Step 8

As we already have the gradient selected, create a new rectangle on the top of our previous shapes and make it a bit smaller. The result will be something similiar to the image below.

Step 9

Repeat the previous step but this time apply a vertical linear gradient and make the shape a bit smaller once more.

Step 10

Again, draw a small rectangle on top of everything but this time apply a gradient with two shades of green. One light and one dark. Also apply a thin stroke.

Step 11

Now select the green shape and go to Object > Expand and select the stroke check box. Press ok and this will transform the stroke into a shape. Apply to the new shape (which was a stroke) a gradient of dark blue at the bottom and light green at the top.

Step 12

Now let’s create our reflection. Grab the pen tool and create a shape similiar to the one below. Select the last two boxes in our stack and our curvy shape. Go to pathfinder and click “intersect shape areas”. This will create the shape that you will see in the next step.

Step 13

Change the gradient of the curvy shape to something like the image below (a green to white gradient).

Step 14

Now in the transparency box lower the opacity down to 20%.

Step 15

Now let’s create the RSS icon. Using the arc tool and the circle tool, create a shape like the one below. In order to make the arcs thick, select them and apply a stroke of 20pt.

Step 16

In your selection (the two arcs) go to Object > Expand, select the stroke check box and press ok. Select the circle and remove the stroke.

Step 17

Now put the RSS icon on top of our previous shape but before our reflection (select the reflection and go to Object > Arrange > Bring to front).

Step 18

Now put the RSS icon on top of our previous shape but before our reflection (select the reflection and go to Object > Arrange > Bring to front).

Step 19 – Finished

With this method we can create several other shapes like the ones in the image below.