ABDZ Paper - Photoshop Tutorials

I've recently written about Google's newly launched visual design language called Material Design. The goal of this new design is to create a visual language that synthesizes classic principles of good design with the innovation and possibility of technology and science. The idea is to create a UI that has the best of both worlds, digital and physical. Some of the imagery they presented in the spec share some common characteristics, like depth, paper style effects and vibrant colors.

Vector Polygonal Background - Illustrator Tutorials

A couple of weeks ago I posted an image with a polygonal background that I discovered on the Pattern Library website and got some requests to recreate so herein lies my attempt. So in this tutorial I will show you how to create a vector polygonal pattern using Illustrator and the Pattern make a feature. The process is quite simple but there are some details that are very important to make sure your pattern is tileable. Step 1 Open Illustrator and create a new document. With the Rectangle Tool create a square like the image below.

Playing with Ligatures - Photoshop Tutorials

Last week I posted a couple articles on typography, more precisely ligatures, and despite the fact I have never been a huge fan of this style it is extremely popular. With that in mind I decided to practice and learn more about it. For this first image, I've created a simple composition in Illustrator using a popular quote. The process is quite simple, I just played with text sizes and tried to connect the ligatures albeit in different rows. So for this post I will walk you through my process very briefly though I must admit it took me quite some time to achieve a work that satisfied.

Illuminating Motherboard - Photoshop Tutorials

For this week's tutorial, I will extend the Chrome Effect in Photoshop tutorial and add a super cool light effect simulation featuring a fan hole in a computer. We will use some images and Photoshop's layer styles for the whole tutorial. The process is quite straightforward but it is a little time consuming, roughly one hour to create your own image. Step 1 Open Photoshop and create a new document, as usual, I am using 2880x1800 pixels for the dimensions so I can use it as a desktop wallpaper. Using the Paint Bucket Tool, fill the background with #201E1E for the color.

Chrome Effect - Photoshop Tutorials

A couple of weeks back we featured an image for the wallpaper of the week that was the Abduzeedo symbol with a chrome effect. Quite a few people asked me how it was composed so this weekend I decided to write a simple tutorial on how to achieve a cool chrome effect using Photoshop. I am using the Photoshop CC but you can create a similar effect with pretty much any new version of Photoshop.

Playing with Triangles in Photoshop

It's been quite some time since I've experimented with new ideas. Today, I decided to go through my personal library of inspiration, likes on Pinterest, etc and found some really good images from various artists, in particular the work of Sarah Mick. I am also still in love with the game Monument Valley, so this post also has much inspiration drawn from that visual language. Let's get to it. In this tutorial I will show you how to create a super simple wallpaper using Photoshop and Illustrator. The process is very straightforward but the result is quite good in my opinion.

2014 FIFA World Cup Poster

The 2014 FIFA World Cup is about to begin in Brazil this week and I couldn't be more excited. Brazil hasn't hosted what is considered the biggest sporting event in the world since 1950. To celebrate the return of Brazil as host country, I decided to create a little artwork inspired by this momentous event on the horizon. Instead of using the organic forms seen in the official logo I went with an old school, modernist and geometric style. So in this little post I will walk you through the creative process behind this poster.

Impossible ABDZ in Illustrator

Last Friday I bought the game Monument Valley and got hooked an an instant. The art direction is fantastic, full of beautifully designed puzzles playing with impossible forms, you feel it could be a game designed by M.C Escher. A few hours playing and I was inspired to create an artwork for Abduzeedo, just to have some fun.

Low Poly Illustrations in Photoshop by Breno Bitencourt

We have seen quite a few illustrations with the low poly style, it looks like a very difficult technique but Breno Bitencourt put together a very complete Photoshop tutorial showing the process, including a video. I will really give it a try and now you have the chance to try to, check it out. Here I'll show you step-by-step how to create a stylish low-poly portrait in Illustrator and Photoshop. The secret to creating works in this style is working from the best reference photos – and first off Breno reveals how to capture these (using himself as a model).

San Francisco Skyline in Illustrator

A couple of weeks ago I decided to practice my Illustrator skills to create a simple skyline of San Francisco for a print material I am working on. I loved the style that Ryan Putnam explored on some of his illustrations of city skylines so I decided to give it a try. I have to say, I didn't have that much fun doing illustrations since I was in high school I think. So in this short post I will walk you through my basic creative process behind the San Francisco Skyline illustration.

Playing with type and images in Photoshop

Following our new series of positive thinking wallpapers today we will show you how to create a simple and soothing image using Photoshop. The author we feature today is Confucius and the quote is "Everything has beauty, but not everyone can sees it". We will also use a stock photo from Unsplash. So in this little case study/tutorial we will show you how to play to some basic masking, photography and typography to create a beautiful wallpaper. The process won't take more than 45 minutes but I am sure you will have a lot of fun.

Positive Thinking Wallpaper in Illustrator

I always change the wallpaper of my computer, not so much on my mobile devices, I don't know why. The only thing I know is that I look at my wallpaper quite a lot because of the second monitor. In order to get some inspiration, I decided to start a series of wallpapers with positive thinking quotes. The first one is from Mark Twain and the theme is inspired by an ad from the 80s, my favorite decade for sure. In terms of tools, for this one, I will use Illustrator and Photoshop but my goal is to use Sketch and other apps as well.

Reader Tutorial: The Voyager Artwork by Moe Pike Soe

The Voyager artwork was created as a Ten Dollar Fonts showcase for a brilliant font designed by Maarten Van’t Wout. I used Cinema 4D and Photoshop to create the atmospheric photo manipulation. The technique is to use different blend modes and adjustment layers as combo to create dynamic lighting for each elements in the composition. I will be showing you these simple techniques to create the artwork. The tutorial includes a part of Cinema 4D but I’ve also included the already rendered pictures for people without C4D to follow.

ABDZ Weave Pattern in Illustrator

I have been taking a lot of pictures since I decided to do a photo a day project this year. I got a good camera and started taking pictures of pretty much everything that inspired me. I was in Bloomington, Indiana and I was really amazed by the pattern of the bathroom floor. I took a photo and decided to recreate it as a pattern in Illustrator. So in this little tutorial, I will show you how to create vector patterns in Illustrator. The process is quite simple but you will be able to create really amazing patterns for future projects.

Typographic Logo in Illustrator and Photoshop

I have been playing more with simple stencil style logos in my spare time, especially because it requires a lot of practice and attention to detail. I surely have a lot to improve upon and that's why I have been spending time trying to recreate this style using Illustrator and Photoshop. For this tutorial, I will show you how to use simple Illustrator tools to create a very trendy logo. The process is quite simple and can be applied to all sorts of logos and illustrations for your future projects.

Offset Path Effect

Last week Adobe release some new updates in the Creative Cloud apps, including Photoshop and Illustrator. The best new feature for me was the live corner effects in Illustrator. It is a simple little feature but it will make my job so much easier, especially when creating logos, icons and symbols. To give you a little overview I decided to create a new Abduzeedo wallpaper using Illustrator and Photoshop applying some offset path effects and of course the live corner.

Water Drop Effect in HTML & CSS

The best way to learn anything is by doing it, plain and simple, trial and error. With the explosion of mobile devices and the evolution of HTML5, CSS3 and browsers, knowing to code is almost a requirement to anyone willing to work with web. I have been playing more and more with CSS, trying to create simple things like basic typography styles to more complex ones, like water drop effects. In this post I will show you how to create a simple water drop effect using CSS. The process is quite simple but it will require some basic knowledge of CSS and a little bit of jQuery.

Vintage Stencil Style in Photoshop

Last week we posted a tutorial showing how to create simple artwork in Illustrator and then in Photoshop we added a few effects to make it look old and with that vintage/hipster feel. Some people asked about some of the steps in Photoshop so I decided to make a simple walkthrough about how to use Photoshop to create this kind of effect. It's a simple technique but it can be very handy for this kind of artwork.

Abduzeedo Happy Holidays Art in Illustrator and Photoshop

One of the best ways to learn is by practicing and trying to recreate styles and effects that you like. We have been doing this here on Abduzeedo since the beginning, always adapting a little bit to add our own unique flavor. The goal is to learn the details behind a style or composition so we can apply some of that to our future work.

Abduzeedo 7th Anniversary Poster in Photoshop

This December Abduzeedo celebrates its 7th anniversary. In the end of 2006, after the robbery of our design studio, I decided to start a simple blog to share inspiration, experiments and to try to be more active in the community. Today, after 7 years, we have met so many amazing people but most importantly, we have learned so much together with everyone that visits the site. To celebrate the anniversary I created an image to illustrate our journey, a simple idea acknowledging how time flies.