The Vector Lab Blog

Confession time: I have never taken a class in typography or even created a proper font. But… I love creating logotypes and customizing typography! This is a tutorial that shows you some of my methods for creating interesting type that is 3-dimensional. I created some antique-style New York logotypes for my new vector stock art collection on TheVectorLab: New York 001.

First of all, start out with your plain logotype. I traced over some printed antique typeface to create this New York font. If your logotype starts out as a system font, make sure you “create outlines” to convert it to vector points before proceeding.

The next step is to select your logotype, then copy and paste another one right underneath. While the bottom object is still selected, apply a stroke. This is represented by the magenta outline.

Next, expand the stroke so it becomes a fill.

Copy, paste behind, and move another copy of the magenta type to create your desired 3-D look. There are some automated ways to do this with various software programs, but they usually create a billion extra vector points that you don’t need. And those 3-D effects tend to look a little “canned.”

My favorite tool in Illustrator has got to be the Merge Function in the Pathfinder Menu. It is the 3rd button from the left on the bottom row. It allows you to flatten layers of objects and get rid of unnecessary points.

The next step is to select your magenta type objects and merge them. After your magenta object is merged, deselect just the magenta portion. Hit delete to remove any extra strokes that were created by the Merge Function.

You will need to go in and manually remove points in order to finish up a proper 3-D look.

If you are doing things right, it should start to look something like this. Don’t worry, your font won’t be magenta forever!

Here I have assigned the magenta object a white fill and a grey stroke.

My second favorite tool in Illustrator is the Blend Tool. Here, I made two diagonal strokes. Then use the blend tool and click on each diagonal stroke.

The blend tool takes two or more shapes and creates “in between” shapes. Set the Blend Options window to “Specified Steps” so you can control how many steps you want in your blend. Here I have set it to 125 steps between the original diagonal strokes. You can always go back and adjust this number later by selecting the blend and then double-clicking on the blend tool.

In this step, I have copied and pasted another 3-D type layer behind the one we just made. I assigned it a magenta color again just for fun. Next, select it and make it a compound path. This is necessary so that we can use it to mask out our diagonal line blend-shape.

Now move your blend shape behind your compound path. Then go to Object > Clipping Mask > Make to clip out the blend shape with the compound path.

It’s getting there, but we need to go in and adjust the thickness of the stroke and the angle of the diagonal lines. You can do this by double clicking on your object to get it into isolation mode so you can tweak it the way you would like.

Here in isolation mode, you can also go in and readjust the number of steps in your blend shape, as I was describing earlier. I increased the steps from 125 to 200 to give it a more detailed/less clunky look.

Get out of isolation mode to check your results. Now your logo is looking pretty cool! But wait…

You can apply an arch.

Or instead for a really nice tricked-out look: Arc the lower edge of your type.

Keep going! Apply an Arch on top of the Arc Lower effect you just applied.

See how the result is curved more on the bottom than the top? It’s looking pretty custom now; just a little bit vertically challenged.

So just stretch the logotype vertically using the bounding box and you are done! If you are satisified with your creation, go ahead and expand all the shapes. I ususally go in and merge everything then get rid of any extra paths just to make it all neat & tidy.