Rockstar Icon Designer - Kate McInnes [34]
If you have the time to make a document with these guides you will have an invaluable resource for your glyph designs.
How to Set Custom Guides in Adobe Illustrator
1. Turn on the gridlines. Mine are set to be 1px squares. Draw a diagonal line from one side of the grid line to the other. Make a larger one from the bottom left of the artboard to the top right of the artboard, and make another line the same size as the first one in the bottom right pixel square.
Create three diagonal lines to make a blend with.
2. Make a blend between the three shapes using the Blend tool (W) and set the Specified Steps to the number you need to intersect each pixel square. My artboard is 32px so I will be using 30 steps, which will draw 30 lines between each blend line. You will then have 32 lines across the top (the small line + 30 blend lines + the large line) and 32 lines down the side (the large line + 30 blend lines + the second small line).
Define the steps for the blend depending on the size of the artboard. For a 32px artboard, make a 30 step blend.
3. With the Blend selected, go to Object > Blend > Expand to expand the blend. Turn these lines into guides by selecting them and going to View > Guides > Make Guides. Keep the guides selected, make sure Lock Guides is turned off and double click on the Rotation tool ( R) and make a 180 degree copy of the lines. You will now have the diagonal guidelines.
Make a 180 degree copy of the guide lines.
4. Lock this layer and make a new one above for the next set of guidelines. Make another blend with a line along the left and right side of the canvas space. Enter the number of steps you need (I've used 30 for a 32px grid) Expand the blend like before and make the guides. Select the guides and make a 90 degree rotated copy using the Rotate tool.
Draw a horizontal line across the left and right sides of the artboard.
5. Lock the second layer and then lock the guides by going to View > Guides > Lock. Make a new layer for the artwork and you're done.
Lock the guide layers and create a new layer for the artwork.
Adobe Illustrator CS4 Tip
If you're using CS4 and above, a trick to use with multiple artboards is the Move/Copy Artwork with Artboard. If your guides are unlocked, you can duplicate your artboard as many times as you need and it will copy the guidelines to each one.
Note: If you are using the multiple window setting for Adobe Illustrator, you may want to turn off the guides view on the second window.
Once your custom guides or grid is set, look at the icon you're creating. Can it be broken down into a collection of shapes? If it can, begin to draw these shapes onto the artboard.
Adobe Illustrator CS5 Tip
If you're using multiple artboards for Adobe Illustrator CS5 and above, you can name the artboards and export all images as a batch. When the images are exported, they will have the given batch name followed by the individual artboard names. This will save time exporting and naming each file individually.
Checking the Artwork for a Consistent Style
Once you've finished designing your glyph set, preview them all side by side on white, mid-gray and black backgrounds. By previewing your icons in this manner, you will be able to spot any stray pixels or bad anti-aliasing. Sometimes what looks good against a white background can show up as a light gray pixel on a black background. With all icon designs, testing against a variety of background shades is extremely important.
Vector icons by tabsicons.com.
Pathfinder
The Pathfinder tool will allow you to easily make shapes for glyphs and icons without having to draw them from scratch. The best use of the Pathfinder is in merging shapes together and cutting parts out.
When I was creating the magnifying glass, I used an ellipse to make the rim around the glass, and then with the offset path function I was able to make a smaller ellipse for the “glass” which I then subtracted from the first circle with the Pathfinder “Exclude” mode. Another way I used the Pathfinder was when I created the