Create a simple Mandala in 5 minutes - Adobe Illustrator

Create a simple Mandala in 5 minutes

[Brooque]

For all the English speakers having trouble:
1. (0:30) Create a Vertical line
2. (0:36) Duplicate that line with shortcut keys and then rotate it holding shift so it's horizontal
3. (0:42) Ensure the lines are 100% centered of each other by selecting both and using the vertical and horizontal centering buttons
4. (0:46) In the layers panel, click on the little button next to the layer color - if you hover over a note will pop up that says "Click to target, drag to move appearance" (If you have your appearance panel open, you'll see the options change in there when the button is clicked)
5. (0:49) Go to Effects > Distort and Transform > Twist and set your angle to 60 degrees and click ok
6. (0:57) Go to Effects > Distort and Transform > Transform and make sure the only two boxes checked are "Transform Objects" and "Reflect X" then set copies to 1 and click ok
7. (1:09) Go to Effects > Distort and Transform > Transform, you'll get a warning that you're creating a new instance, so tell it ok. This time set your angle to 30 degrees, "Transform Objects" should be the only checked box, and then set your copies to 11 and click ok.
8. (1:24) Select your brush tool and then open the brush panel to change your brush of choice and/or the thickness of your brush. If your object is selected (which at this point it probably still will be) changing your brush will probably affect the thickness of your current object lines.
9. (1:39) When you brush on your object, because of all the previous settings you've applied, it will now brush into each of the 11 "copies" you've created, which will fill in your mandala as you draw. You only need to draw in one segment to see the changes apply to all the segments. You can also use the pen or pencil tool or even add shapes to add designs, though it may distort the way they look, because you still have "Twist" applied to the entire mandala. There are ways around that, but it would take too long to describe them here. For now it's probably best to just figure out how to get the best images you can with the brush or pencil tool.


When you're done you can save your mandala in a variety of different ways, but the way they show in the video is Export > Save for web and then make the background transparent.
They then take it into photoshop to apply color filters.


Good luck!

[sylviavivanco]

what did u select to make the paintbrush repeat in each section simultaneously?? it doesn't work on me

[khart]

This was driving me insane since it wasn't duplicating. Trick is - click on the little circle to the right of the layer name until it becomes a double circle (and if you hover it will say, "Click to target, drag to move appearance."). NOW do the distort and transform and it should work!

[williamjaygrimes]

Answer Found!!! When you start your rotations and transformations make sure the whole layer is clicked. He talks about this in step 4: In the layers panel, click on the little button next to the layer color - if you hover over a note will pop up that says "Click to target, drag to move appearance" (If you have your appearance panel open, you'll see the options change in there when the button is clicked).

Be sure this is clicked and then start your rotations and transform so that everything applies to all of the artboard and not the just the objects.

[jasonbecker]

Do you show how to make the brushstrokes mirror around the shape and I missed it? That’s kind of the most important part of the tutorial.

[migueldcosta]

when i paint, it doesnt do the exact same thing, it just paints in that one spot

[iTheNemsis]

Thank you, this was the best and easiest tutorial on YT

[cinziafadini]

Guys I followed the instructions but mine doesnt mirror, so the calligraphy brush is not applied to all sections!!How do I get it to do it?

[KellieMcRaeHurricaneInHeels]

A bit frustrating that the explanations are in another language. Your brush did something funky at 1:46 and I can't tell how you fixed it. Looks like someone below had the same issue and it was responded to in your native language. Translator won't convert this to English :-( Waste of my time if I can't get the brush to do straight strokes again, only making little flowers.

[HarborInsightCoaching]

This is perfect. I can't get the calligraphy to replicate like that, it keep making it's own mini mandala like 1:46, I think I'm following your steps to get it to replicate in the sections but it's not doing it.

[photohd]

الله يوفقك مبدع ما شاء الله تبارك الله
اتمنى تنزل درس تطبيقي خطوة بخطوة ويكتب لك اجر الي يتعلم منك

[yurany]

at minute 1.46 it shows how to right-click and the option to call off the calligraphic trace is given, but it does not

[mohamadalwen]

ماشاء الله مبدع .. يا ريت لو تنزل شرح عملي و تتكلم فيه
بالتوفيق 😍😘

[ryanicus]

I’m super confused - what did u select to make the paintbrush repeat in each section simultaneously??

[anuragjyoti]

not able to get 1:52 the strokes not getting replicated

[rebeccabrooks]

Hello, thanks for making this, but how do you do the process at 1:57.... my brush marks are not doing the same as yours. I have followed instructions exactly. Not sure what I am missing? Thank you.

[fauziangilang]

Awesome, can u tell us how can you do on 1:52? They mirroring what you draw

[GemmaWeirs]

Lack of automatic subtitles means I cannot follow along. These are easy to enable in your video manager, and YouTube creates them for free.

[amiramokhtar]

لما بستخدم الفرشاة مش بيعمل زي عند حضرتك
بيعمل شكل دوائر مزخرفه ؟ ايه احل مش عارفه اعمل الرسمه

[mirvatdaas]

في الدقيقة 4:22 ثانية لم تشرح كيف تم تكرار الزخارف الداخلية في الشكل؟؟