Commercial Art 2
Introduction to Adobe Illustrator
Soccer Ball Design
Objectives: In Adobe Illustrator, you will learn to create a vector graphic (a soccer ball) using: polygon
tool, fill / stroke, group / ungroup, effects, and clipping mask.
• In Illustrator, create a new, letter-sized document. The document should be set in inches for letter size
(8-1/2” x 11”).
• You will want your final project to fill up most of the space of the page.
• Draw a polygon using the polygon tool in the tools palette. Just select the tool and click once anywhere
on your page to bring up dialog box with options for the tool. Use the following
settings: Radius: 1 in, Sides: 6
• Fill this shape with the color black, and put a 2 pt. black stroke on it.
• Duplicate the black polygon and color it white, and leave the stroke at 2 pt. black.
(Do not rotate this shape in any way!) To duplicate, click and hold on the shape with
your Selection tool (the black arrow), then press the option key. You will see the shape
as you move.
• Use this duplicate method to create several more black and white polygons (Roughly 2 white polygons
to 1 black polygon)
• Align the polygons exactly edge to edge, top to bottom, until
your page is more than 3/4 full of polygons. (It’s ok for some
of your polygons to go off the edge of the page). If you use this
trick, you’ll be able to line them perfectly – View > Outline.
This shows only the shape of everything on your page - no
stroke weights or fills. Zoom in a little so you can see what
you’re working on up close.
• Draw an invisible square around all of your polygons with the selection tool.
• Go to Object > Group
• Draw an ellipse using the tool palette. Just select the tool and click once anywhere on your page to
bring up dialog box with options for the tool. Use the following settings: 7” in for both width and
height. Set the fill of this shape to none, but leave the stroke at 2 pt.
• Center the ellipse over your polygon shapes
• Duplicate the ellipse and
drag it over to the side, not
touching any of the polygons
• Select all of your polygons and we’ll edit their individual shapes.
Effect > Distort & Transform > Pucker & Bloat. Start with 3%, and click on the Preview button so
you can see what you’re doing. Play with it to determine what you personally like.
(Remember that the finished product will be a soccer ball!) Click OK when you’re finished.
• While your polygons are still selected, hold the Shift key down and select the ellipse that is positioned
on top of the polygons.
• Now you’ll make a clipping mask. Object > Clipping Mask > Make. You should see your ball start to
take “shape” at this point.
• Now you’ll drag the second ellipse back on top of the polygons. It may be hard to see exactly where
the placement of that ellipse is, so we’ll view things a little differently again (View > Outline).
This will show you the edges of all of the shapes on your page. Now you can easily line up the
ellipses (if they are perfectly lined up, the ellipse boundary will turn blue). Zoom in if you need to.
• After you’ve lined up the two ellipses, go back to your regular view. Select the top ellipse with your
selection tool. Change the stroke to 4 pt.
• With the direct selection tool (the white arrow) select ONLY the black polygons within the ball.
Remember to hold down the Shift key to add to your selections.
• Now, we’re going to add a “worn leather” effect to those black polygons.
Effects > SVG filters > AI_Gaussianblur_4
• When you have finished, save the Illustrator file as
“<your name> soccer ball.ai” and turn the file in (don’t print out).
Good luck!