Beach Weddings – Invitation Tutorial II
In the previous beach wedding invitation tutorial, we made a fast and easy, 1970s-inspired, very informal invitation. Today, we’re making one with a totally different look which is a little bit more work-intensive, but definitely worth the effort.
As always, if you need to brush up on your Illustrator skills, go through one of my earlier tutorials (the Save The Date Postcards – A Step-By-Step Illustrator Guide post is particularly detailed) and take a look at the Illustrator Tools and problem solvers. For font issues, see the How To Add Fonts To Your Computer post.
OK, let’s get started. This is the invitation we are going to make:
and here’s how to do it.
1. First, download the illustration here.
2. Unzip and open in Illustrator. Select everything and make it the size you want it to be (I made mine 5×7). The easiest way to do that is to, with everything selected, type in the dimensions in the Transform palette (make sure the Constrain Width and Height Proportions is not active).
If you don’t see the Transform palette, go to Windows – Transform and it will open.
3. The next thing I did was to select all the fishes and put them on a separate layer. This is a bit time consuming, but you’ll be happy you did it when you need to move them around to make room for the text.
So select all the fishes with the Direct Selection Tool (white arrow), cut and paste on a new layer (to paste them in the exact same spot on the new layer, press CNTRL+F). Make sure you select their eyes too, otherwise they’ll stay on the “ocean floor” layer. If your new layer is above the ocean floor layer, drag it beneath it.
4. Lock both these layers and create two new layers. In the first one, type in your text. I used Papyrus 12pt (black) for the text and Papyrus 18pt (R 0, G 156, B 197) for the bride and groom (spaced at 30pt). Depending on your wording, you may have to space all the text differently to make it fit and look good.
5. Lock that layer and go to the next to add the ampersand. I used Dahrlin Regular at 48pt (R 0, G 117, B 139). Move it around until you like what you see.
6. Tweak everything until it looks good. Play with fonts, font size and word spacing, move the fishes around, resize items. Once you like it, you’re done!
Filed under Beach Wedding, Illustrator, Tutorial, Wedding Invitation | Comment (1)Beach Weddings – Invitation Tutorial I
Who doesn’t like the beach? Good things happen on beaches – parties, vacations, relaxation; all kinds of fun. My best friend got engaged on a beach. The more exotic ones are stunningly gorgeous with their palm trees, white sand and crystal clear, turquoise water.
And for those of us in the northeastern part of the US (mid-Atlantic too for that matter), a palm-fringed beach with balmy breezes sounds pretty good right about now. So what better place to have a wedding than in such a beautiful setting where people naturally relax and feel happy?
I personally love beach weddings, and today, I’m starting a mini-series of Illustrator tutorials on making your own beach wedding invitations, each with a very different look.
If you’re pretty new to Illustrator and haven’t done any of my other tutorials, you may want to read the Illustrator Toolbar and Illustrator Problem Solvers posts. Also, my first Illustrator tutorial post, “Save the date postcards – A step by step Illustrator guide” goes through the tools and steps more thoroughly than I do here.
We are starting with a 1970s-inspired sunset look, perfect for a more unconventional, informal affair. It’s super-easy and fast to make. If this is so not your style, don’t worry – the next beach wedding invitation will have a totally different feel.
1. Download the illustration here
2. Unzip it and open the ai (illustrator) file in Illustrator.
3. Lock the layer with the palm trees and sun, and change the size of the background layer to the size you want your invitation (I made mine an A2 – 6.25×4.5). Make sure you’ve selected everything on this layer before you do this – there is more than one part to this illustration. Once you’re done, lock the background layer.
4. Unlock the layer with the palm trees, select everything and drag it over to the left hand side of the background. Just somewhere over there is good, we’ll fine-tune it later.
5. Lock that layer and create a new layer for the text.
6. Select the text tool and type in you text. I used Braddon regular at 18pts for the “Join us” and “Mr & Mrs parts” and 14pts for the rest. As always, if you don’t have this font, read my post about adding fonts to your computer.
7. Make sure the text is placed exactly where you want it, and lock the text layer. Unlock the palm tree layer, select everything on it, and move them around until they look good to you. As you can see, my trees are hanging over the edge, but that’s fine, because I am going to cut the card to size so that part will just be trimmed off.
Make Your Own Engagement Invitations – Another Illustrator Tutorial
With the holidays (and soon Valentine’s Day) behind us, I know that there are many of you who are newly engaged (Congrat-ulations!).
Statistics tells us that 2.3 million couples get engaged every year in the US; 19% of all those engagements take place during the month of December and 10% on Valentine’s Day.
With those facts in mind, I thought this would be a good time to do a tutorial on DIY engagement party invitations.
I call today’s invite “Damask Engagement Invitation” and we are using free vector art (x 2) and Illustrator. As always, if you get stuck or are unsure of where to find a tool, read through a previous tutorial, and look at my posts about the tools and Illustrator notes and problem solvers. For font issues, see “How to add fonts to your computer“.
Now, let’s make the invitation:
1. Download the free vector file “seamless pattern” from seamless megapack 2 at designious.com.
2. Download the free vector file “framedoodle” from Pixels & Ice Cream.
3. Unzip the files and open them in Illustrator.
4. Create a new document, any size you want, I made mine 6.25 wide x 4.5 high (a size A6).
5. Go to the seamless pattern document. Select the background and damask pattern (not the text). Copy and paste into your new document. Size it to fit by typing in your document’s dimensions in the transform palette (with the entire design still selected). You may need to click the “constrain proportions” to make it work properly.
6. Select the background only (by clicking somewhere in between the damask pattern). Cut it and paste in place on a new layer (CNTRL + F will paste it in the exact same location on the new layer). If the new layer is on top of the pattern, pull it below.
7. Lock the layer with the damask pattern; we won’t be touching that again.
8. If you want to change the color of the background like I did, select it and pick any color you want (I used R207 G235 B242).
9. Lock that layer and create a new one on top of both layers. Select the Rectangle tool and click once on the artboard. A window will pop up where you can put in the desired dimensions of your box. I made mine 6.25 x .05″ and filled it with the same color as the background. Pull the colored bar to the middle of the card.
10. Go to the document with the framedoodle. Select the entire design, copy it and paste it in a new layer in your document. We only want the outer part of this frame, so with your white arrow, select and delete the inner part (the dots).
11. Once you have just the outer portion of the frame left, select it and group it. I wanted it to match the color of the damask pattern on the bottom of the card, so I selected it and picked a matching brown. Even though it seems like it is the stroke color that should be changed, it is actually the fill color.
12. As you can see, the frame is transparent, and we want a white background. Select the frame and look at the Fill and Stroke section of the toolbar. You’ll see that it has a brown fill and no 
stroke (even though it doesn’t look that way). Click the Swap arrow to reverse that. Then, select the paint bucket, set the fill color to white (either in the colors palette or in the fill and stroke part of the toolbar) and as you hover over the frame, you’ll see a text that says “click to make a live paint group”. Click and the frame will be filled with white.
13. Re-size it if needed (I made mine a bit larger) and place it where you want it on the card.
14. Create a new layer and add the text. I used Carleton 12pt for the top and third row, Carleton 9pt for the fourth and fifth row, and Ribbon 131 Bold at 24pt for the names.
All set! If you want to be really budget-minded when printing this, you could make them smaller, and put four on a page. I suggest making them 5.25×4 – that way you can fit four of them on a standard letter sized page with a little bit of a margin around the edges (since many printers don’t print all the way to the edge). Print on nice heavy cardstock and cut to size. They will fit in a size A2 envelope.
If you don’t want to or can’t print them yourself, ask at a local print shop or office store – they will most likely be able to help you.
Filed under Engagement, Illustrator, Tutorial | Comment (0)