web_2_badges

Illustrator Tutorial: 4 Stylish Web 2.0 Badges

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web 2.0 badges

This illustrator tutorial will touch on how to create 4 different stylish vector web 2.0 badges. We will start by learning how to create the basic sawtooth badge. From there, we will move on to produce other styles using some other filters.

So what is a Web 2.0 badge? It is a bubble used in modern websites that call for the attention about a service or message. Some common traits of Web 2.0 badges are bright colors, glossy effects, gradient fades, rounded corners and star shapes etc. Used correctly, it can help you market your website successfully.

Mastering the Star Tool

This will cover all the shortcuts of using the Star Tool. Click on the canvas and drag to create a star shape. Without releasing your mouse, press Arrow Up/Down to increase/decrease points. Other than this, you can hold Ctrl/Command and drag to adjust the radius until you get the shape you want. With this 2 shortcuts on hand, you can create any star shape you want easily!

illustrator star tool

illustrator star tool

1. Creating the sawtooth shape

Select the Star Tool, click and drag to create a basic star. Without releasing your mouse, press Arrow Up key to increase the number of points. Hold Ctrl/Command and drag to adjust the radius until you get the shape below.

web badge step1

3. Dividing the shape

Create a duplicate of the shape by pressing Ctrl/Command+C then press Ctrl/Command+F to paste it on top. With the Pencil or Pen Tool, draw a quick wave cutting across the shape. Select your top shape and your wave and open up your Pathfinder tool (Window>Pathfinder), click Divide to divide it into 2 pieces. By default, it will be grouped after dividing. Press Ctl+Shift+G/Command+Shift+G to ungroup it. Select the unwanted bottom half shape and delete it.

web badge step2

Divide function in pathfinder

3. Applying the gloss look

Now select the top half shape. Go Object>Path>Offset Path and select a value of -2mm. Apply a linear gradient from black to white and select Screen under the Transparency palette.

offset -2mm
Screen under the Transparency Paletteweb badge step3

4. Final web 2.0 badge

Select the bottom sawtooth shape and apply a gradient from light green to dark green and you are done.

web badge step4

3 Other Styles of Web 2.0 badges

Here is quick guide of using Round Corners and Pucker & Bloat effect to create more styles. Experiment with different settings and have fun with it!

3 different styles of badges tutorial

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Bonus: Web 2.0 Gradient Swatches

The guys at Dezinerfolio has created a collection 130 Web 2.0 Gradient Swatches for Illustrator. With the wide range of gradients, you can instantly try out different colors for your badges. But the sad news is that you need Illustrator CS3 to import it.

36 thoughts on “Illustrator Tutorial: 4 Stylish Web 2.0 Badges”

  1. Yolande

    I am using Verion 10, and i, um I kinda cannot find the star tool 🙁 sorry i’m silly, but where is the star tool please?

  3. Marten

    When i press devide, illustrator CS3 tells me I cant divide it because I have two shapes selected. What am i doing wrong here?

  5. Aaron

    I’m not able to make this work either…with CS3 the divide thing will not allow it to split up where I can select the bottom, it either selects it all or nothing…

  6. Tessie

    Hi,
    I tried to make this effect but it didn’t work, as I wanted to but after a few attempts I discovered that it only works in RGB color. Is there another way so that I can use it for CMYK color?
    Thanks

  7. Aaron

    I’ve been fighting with this for 2 days now, are there different steps for the CS3 version of this because it’s SO much easier to manipulate in Photoshop than it is in Illustrator, I can’t delete anything, do I have to group the objects together or what? It’s really frustrating, everything I’ve tried, even after ungrouping them after attempting the pathfinder effect it selects the entire thing and I can’t delete or move anything without moving everything. I’m really new to this I didn’t figure it’d be THIS much harder than photoshop

  8. Gabriel

    How do you use the screen tool? When i apply it the gradient disappears and it just becomes white. (CS3)

  9. iStockdiary

    Gabriel,

    You need to apply a linear gradient from black to white to the shape. Then set it to screen. Black areas will go transparent when set to screen. While white ares will turn white. This is the reason while it appears white if you didn’t apply a proper gradient.

  10. gfs

    look first of all i cant make the “glassy look” on this tutorial it just cant be done in the way it is explained

  14. kw

    not a good tutorial. step 3 seems incorrect. when i add the linear gradient and set transparent to screen i do not get a shiny look.

  15. hfng

    Nice tutorial. Maybe instead of using transparency, gradient would be better. At least it can be accepted on istock.

  17. iStockdiary

    I’m afraid this trick doesn’t work in PS. Although you can find a star shape in custom shape tool. But you can’t do much with that.

  18. RitchieB

    For everyone having trouble with STEP 3, changing the transparency type to SCREEN, the object turns solid white if your document colour type is set to CYMK.

    You can get it to work by going to File > Document Colour Mode > RGB Colour.

  20. JASS

    step 3 (transparency) dont work (maybe its de Ai version, i have CS3). Though i manage to resolve the problem. Just duplicate the cuted star and duplicate (same step as tutorial above, with big star). Give the 1 behind a solid color (white) and in the transparency change normal to screen. Then select the 2 objs (the 1 with the gradient must be in front), again in the transp box click on the upper right corner (options) and select Make Opacity Mask. Thats it. You can have some other cool effects with that, ex: instead of white choose other color like red and instead of change to screen, put multiply. note: you can do that after Making Opacity Mask. Hope that helped

  25. Suzanna

    What’s the deal with it only working in RGB? Took me forever to figure that out…. guess I should have read the comments more thoroughly 🙂

  27. Aumlette

    I think the tutorial is good but maybe not suitable for beginner. The gradient for the black, in CMYK you need to make sure that the black is really black (C=100, M=100, Y=100, K=100) and it will work just fine. 😀

    Thanks for the tutorial…
    Aum

  28. Eli Sand

    For everyone having a very hard time getting the gradient + screen to work (so you don’t end up with a completely white area), the actual problem isn’t in selecting RGB or CMYK… it’s in the *black* you selected for your gradient!

    If you look VERY carefully, you will see that the “black” in Illustrator sets *only* K (black) to 100%. However, for “screen” to work, you require CMY colours to all be 100%.

    When you apply your black->white gradient, after doing that click the black colour box and edit your colour to be 100% CMYK – this will allow the “screen” method to work properly.

    This should be noted in this guide, as this can be a very troublesome issue if you don’t know how CMYK colours work and how screen works either.

  29. Yami

    would you know how to get the star tool to make pentagrams? I’ve made them but i can’t seem to figure out what steps to take to make the star tool make them.

  30. Ale

    Does anybody knows where how they call the gradient “screen” in illustrator CS4 in spanish? Thank you very much.

  31. William

    Eli Sand,

    Thank you sooo much. You would not believe how much I wan’t to thank you. I was banging my head with this issue for so long. I was ready to reinstall Illustrator. can you imagine, it still wouldn’t have worked and I would have been clawing the walls.

    I did what you said, and it works a dream.

    Thanks.

  32. Stanley

    i wanted to cut the shape made from pluck and bloat effect but seems like it is running out of shape all the time. Can anyone help? Thanks..

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