How to Create a Vector Horse

One of the simplest ways to create a drawing of a horse is with a vector program such as Adobe Illustrator. Using vector shapes, you can build a horse and easily change things, such as the colors and size of the horse. Because it is a vector, you can size up your finished drawing or scale it down for any design work.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Vector-based drawing program

1. 
    

   Draw your basic shapes with the ellipse and rectangle tools. Having a locked reference photo on a separate layer underneath your working layer can help you get your shape right if you are not accustomed to drawing a horse traditionally. Draw the legs as lines with the pen tool, as well as the tail.

2. 
    

   Choose your color and fill all of the shapes with the same color. You should be able to see what your horse's main shape will look like. Select all four legs and increase the stroke size on your palette. If your stroke palette is not already up, go to "Window" and "Stroke."

3. 
    

   Select all of your shapes and take away the strokes. You should now have all the shapes as if they are one big shape. Take your basic tail shape, select a color for it and copy and paste it to build up a nice tail. You can also draw in the tail with your pen tool instead of building it up.

4. 
    

   Select points within your shapes with your direct select tool (the white arrow) and tweak them to make the main shape nicer and more consistent. With your rectangle tool, select the same color as the tail and create hooves at the bottom of the legs. Select the legs (just the legs, not the hooves and the legs) and go to "Object," then to "Path" and "Outline Stroke." Now you can tweak the leg shapes with the direct select tool.

5. 
    

   Draw the horse's mane with your pen tool, in the same color as the tail.

6. 
    

   Add the eyes and nostril with the ellipse tool and the mouth with the line tool.

Tips & Warnings

• If you are experienced with the pen tool, you may choose to draw the shape with the pen tool instead of building it up with individual shapes. You can add patterns such as spots of different colors if desired.

Resources

• Adobe Illustrator