A few times a each month we revisit some of our reader’s favorite posts from throughout the history of Vectortuts+. This tutorial by Irmi Arieli was first published on March 9th 2009.

One of the most amazing and confounding tools in Adobe Illustrator is probably the Gradient Mesh tool. Working with this feature allows the user to divide almost any shape into a mesh. Each intersection of two lines (horizontal/vertical) can be colored with a solid color. This tutorial takes a different format than some of our other tuts, and will help you work with the Mesh tool better.

In this tutorial, we’ll show you some tips that will improve your Mesh work. We’ll also show you a proper workflow to get outstanding results with this tool. We’ll take a close look at creating a layer within the detailed file of a meshed boot. The final design is available for review in our freebies section, and is titled Army Shoe. Let’s get started!

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