Photoshop Illustrator pattern making lesson

Skill level: easy (you only need to be quite good at using pen tool)
Note: This is written with PC. If you are using Mac, Ctrl key = Cmd key and Alt = Opt.

1. Pick a picture. In this example I will use this red snapper picture that almost look like a pattern in its own right.


2. Open the image in Photoshop. Then either a)increase the contrast or b)adjust the level to make the outlines more prominent for tracing.


3. Save it as a jpg and open it in Illustrator for tracing so it will be scalable without losing resolution.

4. Choose a stroke color that is of contrast to your image and pick 'none' for fill for the moment. Select the pen tool and outline the fish.


5. Next, add a bit more details within the fish outline, whatever takes your fancy. (You can even fill the fish a solid color and use it to mask an image, but we won't go into that this time)
I would like to keep the drawing subtle thus joining bits of details with one line. Fill the fish body with white, so it won't see through when overlapping.


6. Now you can change the stroke color if you want and put the fish on the plate for presentation. Hide the fish photo. Select the whole fish, then go to Object > Group or Ctrl+G

7. With the Selection Tool(V) and fish selected, hold down Alt and drag to duplicate. Draw some guides for the copies to line up nicely. There're some spaces inbetween, so I've added some ginger as garnish.


8. Now refer back to the photo, I will sample some fish scale. The circled part looks good, draw it with the Polygon Tool, then add some lines and dots. Extend the top and bottom lines so to fill a squarish/rectangular shape.


9. Select the four fish with ginger (from step 7), Copy/Ctrl+C and paste/Ctrl+V as a smart object into a new photoshop file with transparent background.

10. Edit > Define Pattern (give the pattern a name eg. snapper)

11. Back to illustrator, copy the fish scale shape into photoshop, a new transparent background file. Use the Marquee Tool, select along the blue guidelines (see below) and crop.


12. Edit > Define Pattern (give it a name eg. scale)

13. File>New/Ctrl+N, width and height best to be at least two times of the snapper pattern we have defined in step 9.

14. Paint Bucket Tool (G), select 'Pattern' instead of foreground at the top options bar. Select the snapper pattern from the next box on the right. Now mouse click on the new file.


15. Almost there! Now add a new layer below this and Paint Bucket Tool (G), with 'pattern' selected, pick the scale pattern and click on the new layer.
*Note: Advantage of keeping the background transparent with line art is that you can change the color anytime via blending options in photoshop (right click on the layer > blending options)

16. Pour a background color on a new layer set at the bottom, do some gradient. Done!
(seperating the snapper and scale pattern is because having them two together don't line up. if you've created something that will line up then you can just define it as one pattern)