How to Make a Perfect Seamless Vector Pattern
I have always wanted to know how to do this (and I’m sure mine isn’t the only way) but through a little practice, I’ve come across a somewhat simple method to making seamless vector patterns without headache. This is a VERY useful thing to know, so I wanted to share with you my method, and help you bypass some of the frustration I have long endured.
Overview:
Instead of zooming in and aligning, zooming out, etc, to try and get your pattern to seam (while pulling your hair out and wasting your time), we are going to use some precise tools to do everything for us. Specifically, Illustrator’s Transform Palette, Align Palette, and Blend Tool. I’ve found that making seamless patterns is much easier in Illustrator than Photoshop. We have more control, and can always take our vector pattern into Photoshop and apply it to artwork that way, at any size, to make Photoshop Pattern presets, or even Photoshop Brushes.
First things First:
We are going to be using the palettes/tools mentioned above to make our pattern, but to make things work, we need to make sure the document is set up correctly. If you are going to follow this tutorial word for word (reccommended) you don’t need to worry, but if not, your document size must be an exact square. I’ll explain why later on in the tutorial.
Make a new Illustrator document and set the size to 400px X 400px.
Make sure your rulers are set to pixels.
First, if you rulers aren’t showing, hit Command + R (Mac) or Control + R (PC) to reveal your rulers. (Or you can go to View > Show Rulers). Now, Right/Control + Click on the ruler itself to change the units to Pixels. The reason we want our rulers to show pixels is because we will be using the Transform Palette. Whatever units your Rulers are set to, is what your Transform Palette will display. (From my experience)
Make A Seamless Vector Pattern:
Create a circle on the artboard and size it:
With your circle selected, use the Transform Palette to set the width and height to 20px. Also, in the Transform Palette, make sure the middle “Reference Point” is selected. This is the point that Illustrator will use to align your shape. Set your X and Y to “0″, and you circle should be perfectly sized and aligned in the upper left corner of your artboard:
Duplicate your circle and align it to the opposite corner.
Use the Transform Palette to align the second circle by changing the X value to 400px. (the width of the document) Note: If you have the correct “reference point” for your shapes, you can use the align palette for this, and some future steps, but the Transform palette is better for visualizing the coordinates and sizes of your shapes. Once you have both of your circles aligned, it should look like this:
Set your Blend Options:
We are going to use illustrator’s blend tool to create all the dots in between for or pattern. To do this, we need to set our blend options first. Go to Object > Blend > Blend Options.
Blend Options Dialogue:
This part is really up to you but I chose “Specfied Steps” and set the value to 12. Choose your options and Click OK. (”preview” only works if both shapes are selected)
Apply your Blend:
Now that the Blend Options are set, all you have to do is select both dots, like this:
And hit Command + Option + B(Mac) or Control + Option + B(PC) to apply your blend. Or go to Object > Blend > Make.
Expand your Blend
Now we have or dots spaced perfectly along the top edge of our document. Before we go any further, we need to “expand” or shape to the rest of the dots and get an actual path for the rest of the dots. To do that go to Object > Expand.
You will be prompted with the following dialogue box. Just click OK.
Now your top row of dots should all have a path around them:
Duplicate the Dots and Align to the Bottom
Now that you have your top row of dots for your pattern, we need to make the rest of the dots. To do this we are going to make another blend, exept this time, we’re gonna blend the entire row vertically. Duplicate your group of dots and use the Transform Palette to make the X value 200px and the Y value -400px. (you can also use the align palette, and align ‘center’ and ‘bottom.’) Your artboard should now look like this:
Blend the Rows Vertically
This is where the square document size pays off. Because we make our document a perfect square, we don’t have to change the blend settings. You can simply hit the keyboard shortcut or go to Object > Blend > Make, and your rows will be perfectly spaced Vertically AND Horizontally. The width and height of the document are the same, so the same amount of space will be given to a ‘row’ as would be given to a ‘dot.’ This is what your pattern should look like after you Blend the rows:
Expand your Pattern
Just like we did earlier, go to Object > Expand, then click OK in the dialogue to expand your shape and get a path around each dot. Here is the pattern “expanded.”
Create a 400 X 400px Square
Make a square on the artboard, anywhere, anysize.
Now use the Transform Palette to make the Square 400 X 400px, same as the document size:
Align the square to the artboard.
Open your Align Palette and make sure you have “align to artboard” enabled.
Click these 2 buttons in the Align Palette, to align your square perfectly with the artboard. Make sure it’s ON TOP of your pattern.
Your pattern should look like this, with the square on top: (my square is filled with white)
Get Rid of the Excess
This is the easiest part of the tutorial. In order to get rid of the shapes that are hanging off the side of your document, you only need to hit one button in the Pathfiner Palette (Window > Pathfinder), with all shapes selected, aligned, and the square on top.
With both the pattern, AND the Square selected, hit the “Crop: button in the Pathfinder Palette.
Illustrator deletes everything that isn’t “underneath” the square, and gets rid of the square at the same time! Here’s our perfectly seamless vector result:
From here, you can do virtually anything with your pattern. Take it into Photoshop, Use it as a Pattern Swatch in Illustrator, convert it into a Brush. The possibilities are endless. The One thing, if you can only take one from this tutorial, is to utilize the Transform Palette for accurate alignments, and changing “reference Points” for easier aligning.
Related Tutorials:
The Power of Patterns in Illustrator
Been going through the tutorial. Is this for just CS3? I don’t have align to artboard on CS2.
@Doug Owens,
In previous versions, the “align to artboard” is in the palette options. Click on the little arrow/carrot in the upper right of the Align palette.
Sorry, I probably should have mentioned that in the tutorial.
~BittBox
Very handy tutorial. Just in case you mind, Veerle has a tutorial too, done in Photoshop Instead. Do you have a way to do what she did in PS but in Illustrator?
http://veerle.duoh.com/blog/comments/creating_patterns_in_photoshop_cs2/
Got it after I left the comment. So, do you recommend CS3? Thanks again.
Ah yes! A great tutorial. But how do you do something more complex? Say something like the Paisley Pattern you mentioned? Maybe thats a tutorial I should take on.
Great job non the less. Thanks again!
-Gautch
@Doug Owens,
Ive seen major performance improvements since I was running CS1 on an Intel Mac. I can have 4 apps open at once with no sliggishness, and I’ve been impressed with the flexibility of the new workspace options. (ex: Auto-collapsing palettes, etc.) For me it was a time saver on my intel. CS3 just works faster for me, since it’s native on my machine now.
~BittBox
Very nice! Finally my tedious way has been laid to rest!
starvingyoungartists.com
I might need a little more time to conjour that one up Gautch. Still trying things though.
~BiittBox
Where was this a month ago!? I definitely was pulling out my hair trying to make the simplest of patterns. This is so easy! Thanks for pointing the not-so-seemingly obvious ways to do thing!
Hi, Thanks! It “seams” like a great tutorial. Just one question, what is the difference between “Expand” and “Flatten Transparencies” ? I tend to use the latter at 100%.
Aah.. I did get a headache many times to create something like this.. thnx man!
Thanks for pointing this out!
Bitt, how long does it take you to set up and actually do one of these posts, time wise?
those screen shots must take time.
thanks! but what about floral seamless pattern?
Thanks. I’ve been reading BB since I found it via a link-of-a-link. Keep up the great work!
Thanks. I was hoping for a more complicated pattern.
I am just getting into designing patterns and the first several alwys had a hairline inbetween the Base pattern.
A previoues pattern I worked on had two overlapping colors and that was a bit more difficult for me to Clip and keep teh colors intact.
The latest one I did is more of a Floral/Baroque type of pattern and I got it right on the second try. I do like the Document size part as I think that could help but I find for more complicated patterns, say a paisley as mentioned above that zooming in and out is good. Mainly just zooming in.
thanks
wow! again you prove yourslef as a most useful of person to us! thankyou
this had nothing to do with this post, but dose anyone know how to create outlins on an out line. Like if i wanted to Add to shape(pathfinder) to an object. A triangle onto a brush stroke, to create flowing arrows? Cant seem to get it right. Can anyone help?
Awesome tutorial! I love to come here and absorb the design greatness. If you’re polling the audience, I would agree with BJMRamage. I would love some instruction from you on more complicated patterns (floral/baroque, paisley, etc). However, don’t let that detract from the glow of the current tutorial . . . : )
Thanks Bitt
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i do it with 4 circle !! very easy , without blend &… , your way is too bad.
Very nice tutorial, although i agree with yashar. You could do it without the blends. Is there a disadvantage of doing it this way?
Looks VERY similar to a tutorial I posted approximately 6 months ago. For the record, you only need 4 circles, not a whole mess of them.
@Scott,
Well let’s have a look at your tutorial then. Link?
Mhh, why so complicated? You could do the same with 4 circles.
Or even better: just one. Put a square without fill/stroke around a circle to define the space around the circle and make a pattern from these two objects. Done!
I need help!
I have a complex flower pattern, set up as a square repeat. I want to use the bounding box to define the repeat, to be able to make a pattern swatch from it so it can repeat more times out, and without me hand copying…
I tried your tutorial, and for some reason, when I click on crop tool in the Pathfinder window, when it’s done a message pops up that says “this filter produces one or more complex paths that may fail to preview or print” when I click on the OK to make the message go away, the design is cropped, but all of my white floral outlines are gone.
Help!
kah-wren
kah-wren,
I’d be glad to help. Can you email me the file to contact@bittbox.com?
~Bitt
VERY COMPLICATED. ITS MORE EASY THAN THAT.
you are right u need the transform tool. first just create your perfect circle. then move the center of your circle in the transform palete the way that u like. ok? then, select your circles (the twon of them) and move them whit shift and alt to the same posicion but down the another ones.
(move them while presing ALT and shift its important to move then whitow mistakes and copy them)
select all and take them to the swaches library.
put your object and click to the swatch
sorry for my english im a mexican
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Great tutorial!!! I needed this a while back for overlapping circles! for those of you trying to do a more complex pattern, just duplicate your first line then offset it slightly underneath, then copy both lines and align to the bottom, blend and there you have it!
yeah, but how do I turn this into what Illustrator will recognize3 in my swatch pallette as an actual pattern?
I love you people.
Tutorial is stolen from another site.
Stolen or not .. there’s only so many ways to do a seamless pattern.
That’s a pretty complicated way of doing this there is a much simply way….
1. First create a tile, as if it was a piece of wallpaper. In this case a white square with a black circle in the centre of it.
2. Select the tile that you have just created and drag it into the swatches/patterns palette
3. Fill the object with the pattern you just created.
And you are done.
Thank you for the tutorial a few days ago I try the same thing… on my way….
It´s a complicated way but it´s very educational for illustrator newbies like me (I´m a freehand switcher)
Sorry for my english, I´m Spanish
[...] How to Make a Perfect Seamless Vector Pattern (en inglés) Comparte el artículo:Estos íconos enlazan con webs de marcadores sociales que permiten a los [...]
Hi All,
Repeating florals can use a similar principle.
Have a look at http://www.stencil.me.uk
Have some free eps files too just for fun
This was good, but I’d like to know how to make seamless repeating patterns in AI with more complicated shapes – like paisley.
WOW, BLEND TOOL!!!
its the best thing that ever happened to me.
ive been procrastinating and reading your site today and its great.
Im and architecure student, and we use Illy and PS asmuch as we use AutoCAD but (I) have never been told how to use the programs and websites like this make me able to actually do my work!
Blend tool question: I have CS3, how do I edit the blends (color lineweight) but keep the originals the same. Right now copying and placing under seems like the way to go unless ofcorse im using a blending effect…
Thanks!
NICE !!
This link is also very helpful. Explains how to make more complex seamless tiles. http://home.comcast.net/~ysbuys/aimages/seamless_patterns.pdf
GREAT TUTORIAL! BUT I HAVE A QUESTION.
WHEN YOU MAKE ALL THAT YOU SAID IS OK, BUT YOU NEED TO CARRY THE PATTERN TO A SWATCHES PALETTE.
THEN YOU MAKE ANOTHER OBJECT AND YOU TROUGHT THE PATTERN INTO THIS OBJECT BUT YOU CAN’T SEE WELL THE PATTERN. WHAT HAPPEN??
Muy bueno el tutorial. Sólo una consulta.
>> Una realizado tu tutorial toda esta perfecto, ya tenemos el patron realizado asi que nos lo llevamos a la Paleta Muestras ( lo lanzamos) y ahí lo tenemos cada vez que lo queramos utilizar, perfecto! PERO entonces realizas “x” forma, un trinagulo por ejemplo y lo rellenas con ese patrón y SORPRESA! no se ve bien!!! Que es lo que sucede, cómo podemos hacer que se vea bien?!?!?
Merci!!!
Thanks, very helpful.
Spasibo (russian),
For me the tip about Align to Artboard was worth stumbling a cross this page. I was also under the impression that function was solely for CS3 owners.
Thanks so much for sharing, been searching for this all the night.
Really well explained too. A must read!
Peace ‘n thanks again.
just found you today….. excellent, generous site, thank you.
i’m completely new to this, i managed this….but i’m wondering how i would do this with my own artwork…. a seamless vector pattern of baobab trees for example?
thnxz again
These sits are also good:
http://home.comcast.net/~ysbuys/aimages/seamless_patterns.pdf
http://www.digitalartsonline.co.uk/features/index.cfm?FeatureID=1675
Thanks sooo much
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I get through the entire tutorial without a hitch…until I get to the “easy” last step – cropping. I have the box on the top, everything is aligned correctly, etc, but when I crop, everything deletes. Any suggestions?
So frustrating… I know I need to do more learning about the Pathfinder palate and how it works :)
PLEASE I am having probs with this tutorial. When I enter the values as you have specified for the Transform tool to position my circles, they move the circle to a different position than where you have yours…also when I try to blend my line of circles, then copy themselves exactly on top of my last line of circles, they don’t repeat as you have shown. Pleaseeee someone advise me…Many thanks
this is awesome! first try and it worked like a charm, thanks so much for all your help – i’ve been looking for a tutorial on this!
This method is no longer needed since CS3.. If You start up a Web document and afterwards Save-for-web Illustrator automatically cuts everything that falls outside of the artboard.. at least it does overhere :P maybe i activated some handy options in my subconscious state of design :P
Superb!
Thnx so much for this wonderful tut. It’s been a great help!
Keep up the good work!!!
Thanks for this! Has been a great help so far. I would like to create a world map made up out of dots and wondered how do I do so that there are full dots making up the edges of countries rather than half cut ones like the example in the square above?
Many thanks for any help in advance!
Now… how to save and make it available in every other document without saving the whole palette??
really thanks!!! :)
GoPiano…
Hello ;) Thanks heaps for this indeed!… if anyone else has anything, it would be much appreciated. Great website Super Piano Links http://www.de.Grand-Pianos.org Enjoy!…
hmm…help please… i feel like an idiot getting stumped and not being able to get past the next step after ‘Duplicate the Dots and Align to the Bottom’. I mean, after I’ve got my 2 rows of dots at the top and bottom, I go to Object > Blend > Make and it just fills my duplicated row (at the bottom) with black and I have a black rectangular row…. some one.. please explain? thanks kindly.
I want to address the comments that imply, or allege, that this tutorial was “stolen” from another website. I haven’t seen the other tutorial, but I can assure you that it is certainly not the first tutorial to use this very simple, standard method, which uses a basic circle shape, to illustrate making a basic, seamless pattern with AI- as one commentor noted, “there are only so many ways to make a seamless pattern!”
A simple method such as this cannot be “stolen”- you cannot copyright or “own” ideas- although the expression of ideas CAN be copyrighted- so in other words, unless this entire tutorial- not just the ideas expressed within it- is a complete copy/paste of someone elses- word-for-word/image-for-image- then it is not, & cannot be, considered stolen- but even in that instance you could only really be certain if the tutorial contains distinct images &/or designs. As I said though, I have not seen the other tutorial that commenters are referring to…
shoot- i forget to ask my question though- it seems that the first steps involving the “Transform” palette are producing results that are kind of backwards for me- my first circle- with reference point set to center; 0,0 x/y coordinates, etc- is aligned at the BOTTOM-left corner, as opposed to the TOP-left corner that you have. Now, with the way the rulers are set up in Illustrator, the 0 (zero) of the horizontal (x-axis) ruler is on the left (thus, susequantly increasing from left-to-right); however, the 0 (zero) of the vertical (y-axis) ruler is at the bottom (increasing from bottom-to-top) – which, to note, is only strange to me because the grid systems or graphs that i am familiar with usually have the zero point of all axis’ (x, y, z) intersecting… Ok, so anyway, it makes sense, then, for my circle to be aligning at the bottom(0)-left(0) corner- zero,zero- so how is your first circle top-left (which would be [0, 400])? It’s driving me nuts! I even tried “moving” (dragging) my y-axis zero up to the top corner, but it doesn’t re-locate my circle to the top-left(?)
ah, I figured out my problem with the blend options: all I had to do was select BOTH top and bottom rows of circles, then select blend…duh. re:Christie, so if I’m interpreting your Q. properly, you’re saying you can’t get your circle aligned to the top left? Have you first manually aligned your rulers to the art board? To do this you can click on the white box located in the corner inbetween your ruler guides then, drag it to the top left corner of your art board.Its after you’ve done so that the transform palette should produce correct results. Hope that helps.