How to Make an Eyeball in Illustrator

Make an eyeball in Illustrator by drawing a series of concentric ellipses with the "Ellipse" tool, arranging these shapes with the "Move" tool, and coloring the eye with the program's coloring tools. To increase the appeal of your eyeball, draw eyelids for it, or the eyeball on the other side of the face. You can also use the "Paintbrush" tool to paint red lines on the eyeball. These lines suggest bloodshot, tired eyes.

Instructions

1. Click the tool palette icon shaped like an ellipse to run the ellipse-drawing tool, and then press and hold "Shift" to indicate you want to draw a circle. Drag near the center of the canvas to create a circle whose diameter is about one-third the width of the canvas. This shape represents the eyeball's outline.

2. Press "Ctrl" and "C" simultaneously, and then press "Ctrl" and "V" simultaneously to duplicate the circle. Drag a handle on the bounding box surrounding the ellipse until the duplicate's height is one-half that of the eyeball circle and its width is about one-third the eyeball's width. This action simulates an iris that's foreshortened, as though you were seeing the eye from the side. Such a viewpoint enhances the perception that the eyeball exists in 3-D space.

3. Click a blue, green, brown or other color swatch from the leftmost drop-down control above the canvas to color the iris. Press "V" to run the "Move" tool, and then drag on the iris to place it near the left edge of the eyeball outline.

4. Use step 2's instructions to duplicate the iris ellipse to form the pupil ellipse. Use the same step to shrink the pupil so it measures about one-third the size of the iris. Drag the pupil to the center of the iris, and then color the pupil black with the previous step's instructions.

5. Press "Ctrl" and "V" simultaneously again to create the ellipse for the highlight, and then shrink this ellipse until it measures about 1/8 the size of the pupil. Drag the pupil to the upper right or left, or lower right or left portion of the pupil to complete the eyeball.

References

• Illustrator CS5 Bible; Ted Alspach
• How to Draw What You See; Rudy De Reyna