We'll be using Adobe Illustrator to create this tutorial. A water ripple effect can easily be achieved using a radial gradient. Besides this, I will be showing you how to create realistic water droplets using the gradient mesh tool.
Final Image Preview
Before we get started, let's take a look at the image we'll be creating. The source file for this tutorial is not currently available, though we are planning on releasing this in the future.
Step 1
Let's get started by drawing a circle using the Ellipse Tool. Hold Shift as you drag on the canvas to make it a perfect circle. Next, change it to a gradient fill in the tool palette. By default it is a white to black gradient.
Step 2
Open up your Gradient Palette (Window>Gradient). Change the Type to Radial and select the gradient end point (square with an arrow icon). Set it to blue using your Color Palette.
Step 3
Select the first gradient point and set it to a dark blue. Click beside it to create a new gradient point, and set it to white. Repeat this to create a new gradient point beside this new point, and set it back to blue.
Step 4
Let's continue repeating the steps until we have something as shown below. You will notice the darkest point is set in the middle. Don't worry too much how the ripple will look like at this stage, as we can tweak it later on.
Step 5
Select the circle and you will see a bounding box appear. Drag a corner and squash it into a an oval shape.
Step 6
Now we will start creating the background. Draw a new Rectangle Shape. By default it will use the radial gradient we have created.
Step 7
Open up your Gradient Palette again. Change it to a Linear Type this time. Keep the start and end points. Delete the rest of the unnecessary points. Finally, select the start point and change it to a lighter blue.
Step 8
Send the background to the back by pressing (Ctrl/Command + Left Bracket). Resize the background so that we have more space on the top. Select the Gradient Tool and click and drag from top to bottom to change the gradient direction.
Step 9 - More Ripples
Let's draw more ripples to make it look more realistic. Draw a new oval shape using the Ellipse Tool. Select the Scissors Tool. Then cut it at the bottom left and top right. This will break it into 2 segments.
Step 10
Drag the 2 segments into the ripple. You can resize it by dragging the bounding box. Repeat the above steps to create more ripples, as shown below. Have fun adding new ripples until you achieve a great looking ripple effect.
Step 11 - The Ripple Brush
Let's start creating the brush for the ripple. Draw a long thin oval with the Ellipse Tool. Select the Pen Tool, hover it to right corner, and hold Alt/Option. It will change to an arrow icon. Click the point to change it to a corner point. Do this for the left corner and bottom pont.
Step 12
Click the bottom point and press the Arrow Up key to move the point until the baseline becomes straight as shown below. Open up your Brushes Palette (Window>Brushes). Then drag your shape to the palette to create a New Art Brush.
Step 13
Select all the ripples and choose the new art brush. The brush effect will be applied to the ripples. If the ripples appear too thick you can change the stroke weight to make it thinner.
Step 14
Now we will need to expand it so that we can fill it with a gradient. Select all the ripples, and go Object>Flatten Transparency. Set the Raster/Vector Balance to 100 and click OK. It is grouped by default after your flattened it. Press Ctrl+Shift+G/Command+Shift+G to ungroup it.
Step 15
Select each ripple and give it a different color gradient effect. With the Gradient Tool, we can select and drag to change the gradient directions. We can also also use the Color Picker to pick colors from our main ripple. To do this, select a gradient point first, then select the Color Picker and hold Shift as you click the main ripple to sample the color. With this in mind, we can quickly apply the gradients to all the ripples.
Step 16
Here is the final ripple. I have set the darkest ripple in the middle and it get's lighter towards the edge.
Step 17 - Water Droplet
Let's create the water droplet. Draw a blue circle using the Ellipse Tool. Go to Object>Create Gradient Mesh. Use the settings shown below.
Step 18
With the Direct Selection Tool, select the second point from the bottom. Set it to white using the Color Palette. Next, select the second point from the top and give it a lighter blue.
Step 19
Select the 3 points in the middle row and set it to a darker blue. Next we will start to edit the gradient mesh. Select the point beside the white point and drag it away from the white point. Do this for the other side and the 3 darkest points. Our goal here is to make the white highlight more oval instead of circle.
Step 20
Finally we move the water droplet above the ripple. Click and hold Alt/Option as you drag to create a duplicate. Repeat it until you have 3 water droplets above the ripple.
Step 21
Squash the second water droplet and resize it smaller using the Transform Tool. Also make the top water droplet the smallest. Finally, I make my final tweaking to the ripple by transforming it bigger as I felt it is too tight.
Step 22
If you are unhappy with the color for the the water droplets, you can further adjust it. Here's how to do it. Select the 3 droplets and go Filter>Colors>Adjust Colors. Check Preview and increase the Green to make it look turquoise.
Step 23
Below is our final image of a serene water ripple effect.
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User Comments
( ADD YOURS )Michael Castilla June 16th
Very nice tutorial. I like the end result. Thanks for sharing!
( )Eric June 16th
Very nice to see you guys launch a vector site I will be bookmarking this and coming back often. Hope to see some great tuts.
( )Frietkot June 16th
Great one…
Good luck with vectortuts!
( )yens June 16th
At last! Vectors!!!
( )Jee June 16th
First Comment
Nice work
( )Curtis June 16th
HOLY CRAP VECTOR TUTS!
( )koen buysse June 16th
nice but not “WOW”…
( )Jeff June 16th
Cool.
Nice site by the way.
( )Aloke Pillai June 16th
Nice! Love it! Need more!
Thanks guys!
( )andre June 16th
neat!
( )Adam June 16th
That’s cool, cant wait for more.
( )Tim June 16th
Excellent first tutorial!
( )Hope there will be many more like this to come!
MD June 16th
The first great tutorial! Thanks
Love your work!
cheers!
keep up the good work!
( )Greg-J June 16th
Great first tuto ! I hope that it will continue in this way !
( )koma June 16th
Nice
( )Roger June 16th
need to catch up with the standard with PSDtuts.
but it’s a good start.
Keep it up.
( )callegg June 16th
Yay first comment this website will be freakin awesome xD
( )Seraphim Collective June 16th
Nice tut, for some of the beginners.
( )Rudegato June 16th
Fantastic!
I’ve been waiting for a resource like this to open up for quite a while now.
Thanks so much for all your work.
( )Dante June 16th
AWESOME!!! I love the final result. Vectortuts has started with an abnormal strength
( )Gabriel SIrbu June 16th
Nice tutorial, thanks!
( )Edgar June 16th
Thanks a lot! I will be here every day!
( )Diego June 16th
first cool tut
( )Dullface June 16th
Good stuff, my knowledge in vectors is slim so hopefully I can learn as much here as on PSDTUTS!
( )Looking forward to all the new stuff, godspeed.
Nate June 16th
Pretty cool effect. Maybe I could use for a banner ad that I’m doing next week.
( )kaiser June 16th
hmm. not really some good tricks in here. doesn´t rock as much as the psd tutorials… sorry.
( )acus June 16th
A very fresh vector tutorial…^^
( )DanOhh June 16th
Thanks guys! High quality Illustartor sites are very rare and knowing that you’re putting one out will fill a large hole. Thanks again!
( )Tom Ross June 16th
Nice tut! I’m keen to get into more vector work myself and am sure VectorTuts will be a fantastic resource!
( )justin hale June 16th
can’t wait to see this site get going, congratulations!
( )Osiriums Ventaka June 16th
Great!
I hope that we have a big nice source with a lot of tutorials as good as psdtuts!
( )Alex Cue June 16th
Good to see the first tutorial is up on this site! Can’t wait to see what more I can learn from everyone here! Hopefully I’ll have some time to get a tutorial of my own submitted sometime soon…summer’s always so busy!
( )Kiran June 16th
Let me congratulate first..
I’m very happy to see the vectortuts.
thank you guyz..
( )varioke June 16th
Nice tutorial, might be usefull
( )Germen June 16th
Nice! first comment of the first tut. Nice one.. i’m gonna check it out here often
( )Tim June 16th
First!
( )salmen June 16th
thanks
( )Rob June 16th
Very good kick-start to what will become a great site!
( )MONSTER June 16th
Can’t wait for more. I really need to learn Illustrator.
( )Callum Martin June 16th
Great launch tutorial!
( );D
Ndrey June 16th
better tutorials in the future. great
( )Ali Salem June 16th
Thanks a lot guys!
( )teddy June 16th
very nice tuts
( )thankssss!!!!!
Alvaro Guzmán June 16th
Congrats for the new site! I’ll be looking forward to see more good quality tutorials like this one.
( )Brandi Pierce June 16th
YEA!! I am so excited about this site. Maybe I will have to contribute! =)
( )dan June 16th
Great tut. If there turns out to be a premium or “plus” thing - give me/us an all-in-one rate for all the TUTS sites. (please)
( )Grant Friedman June 16th
Nice tut! I’m really excited for this site!
( )andreserra June 16th
great!
( )good luck with vector tuts!
i hope vector tuts to be as good as psdtuts, they’ve done a great job there!
James - D-Sign Graphics June 16th
Thanks for this site, I really enjoy PSDTuts, and look forward to utilizing this as one of my resources.
( )SureShot June 16th
Great start to the site. There are a lot of people on here, I would wager, that are at a very beginner stage and something like this is perfect.
Thanks for the hard work!
( )Laura June 16th
Nice Cool!
( )Sam June 16th
Will you only post illustrator tutorials? :/
( )Ben Griffiths June 16th
Nice first tutorial
( )Barry Ryan June 16th
brilliant! great tutorial, vectors! vectors! vectors!
( )Nico June 16th
Simply awesome. This site is gonna be sweet!
( )Ralph June 16th
Cool effect thanks!!! And wiiiiii his is my first post in vercortuts….. keep doing cool stuffs!!!
( )Danny June 16th
Cool tutorial! Looks so different from photoshop… Time to learn!
( )Tripeiro June 16th
Hey, what a awsome tutorial! Finally some vector tutorials :DD
Cumpz from Portugal \o/
( )Daniel June 16th
Very nice tutorial. Thats a good start ! good luck for vectortuts.
( )Has.n June 16th
Finalyyy!!!!
( )Markos June 16th
Nice!
( )Goyo June 16th
Amazing!! I Love PSDTuts and now we got VECTORTuts! Nice for your firts tutorial!
( )D. Carreira June 16th
Good tutorial. I’m not a fan of vectors, but this tutorial is simple to understand.
David Carreira
( )Erik Diamond June 16th
How can you manage with so many sites at the same time, Collis? High powered Red Bull?
But Good job with PSD-, Net-, Vector-, Fla- and God knows whats next? How about site for graphic/web designers gathering together for network (job, portfolio guides/ideas, experience)?
Erik
( )Alex June 16th
Very nice!
( )Shane June 16th
Hey there - congratulations on the first tutorial.
Let’s hope this site will go from strength to strength. Thanks for posting!
( )Gilberto Saraiva June 16th
very sweet!
( )Qvectors June 16th
off to a good start :), only thing I did not like are the water drops, they could have been better shaped much better than plain unrealistic circle drops.
( )Epic Alex June 16th
A good start, and its nice to see your family growing. Maybe this effect could have been a little more lifelike though.
( )Ryan June 16th
Great first Tut!
( )Sheikh Adnan June 16th
NICE TUT. Watr drops are not realistic.
Expecting something great from this new site. Thank you Collis for developing a new site based on vectors.
( )Andrew June 16th
Vector tuts, first tutorial, I love it! Keep ‘em coming!
( )Joefrey Mahusay June 16th
Wow this is really great.
( )iStockdiary June 16th
Thanks for all the feedbacks. Qvectors made a good point, the water drops could also be done with layers of shapes to mimic the water reflection. If you pull it off well, it might look more realistic than done with gradient mesh.
( )Christian Mejia June 16th
Thanks to you guys I spend more hours on all of your tut sites than doing actual work! Congratulations!
( )Anthony Ettinger June 16th
Looking forward to poking around Ai.
( )Leventhan June 16th
Sweet tutorial!
I’m still wondering of how you can manage so many quality sites though.
Great job!
( )Ash June 16th
good launch!!
alas the wait for vectors is over!!
xpectin greater tuts frm yeh!!
godspeed!!
( )Arun June 17th
Great start! Congrats on the new site!
( )moh June 17th
Another great tutorial site! Thanks a bunch.
( )kamel June 17th
im SO excited for this site
i love you all Collisand all other for workin hard and putting all these great sites
Collis is makin history, its already happening!
( )Lee June 17th
I would like to thank you for your wonderful job and for every advice! Keep going this way!
Ciao from Italy
( )Ariful Alam Khan June 17th
Nice site to start. Keep it up.
( )Tom June 17th
Really simple, nice work. I don’t like so much the white tone on the wave, but it looks good anyway.
( )Ali June 17th
So what are the categories gonna be for this, coz I could do illustrations in vectors and such, check it out at http://www.swaymedia.com.
How will you teach somehow to draw is the question? isnt that like a pre-requisite to any a vector illustration tutorial..
( )Blue Buffalo June 17th
Nice tutorial! I like the ripple brush. I am excited to see more.
( )D. Carreira June 17th
I’ve do this in ilustrator (or I’ve try to do
) and the final result is not so good.
I’ll need to learn more tutorials
David Carreira
( )G. Leblanc June 17th
Really nice effect!^^
( )Thanks you for the tutl!
TraffiK June 17th
Shame on me, I should try more often Is.
Thanks for sharing this great tut!
( )Burtence June 17th
Really cool, I’m gonna try it in the vacation.
Vectortuts 4 the win.
grtz
( )Wouter June 17th
Thankx
( )VertigoSFX June 17th
Haha, thats really funny, yesterday I was checking out psdtuts and nettuts (like I do at least 3 times a week) and I wasn’t thinking to myself “they have photoshop and web development, and they’re missing illustrator/vector tutorials” and here we go! Pretty awesome…you guys just read my mind, impressive.
( )misterbremer June 17th
nice. please keep some simple tuts going here as I personally have no clue on illustrator. I’ve learned a lot over at psdtuts, so I’d definitely love to increase my skills on illustrator as well.
( )Web Design June 17th
Great! I cant wait for more vector tutorials.. Thanks!
( )Kenneth June 17th
Very nice.. Love the transparent options.
( )Good work.
valmir June 17th
great!!
Vectors are awesome.
( )James Kurtz III June 18th
Fantastic! Very much looking forward to future posts!!
( )Mark Abucayon June 18th
that was cool Im gonna try this one, thanks for sharing.
( )Ovais June 18th
nice tutorial..real nice result.
( )Horus DB June 19th
hi! i dont know why, but in the Step 22, i cant find the effect ‘color’ in my Illustrator. why?
( )thanks, the tuto is really nice!!!
congratulations
;D
misterbremer June 20th
Illustrator is tough!
( )Thanks for the website, I’m going to learn illustrator the same way I’ve learned photoshop–mostly from you guys!
Khawla June 23rd
Nice tutorial! Thanks for sharing
( )Kello June 23rd
VECTORTUTS! Very much looking forward to future posts!
( )mustafa ali June 23rd
Very Good technique excellent use Illustrator tools, looking forward for more such cool stuff!
( )Arun June 24th
This is great but you could have toned down the saturation a little.
( )IsaacS June 24th
Hmmm… Well, I’m glad to see a vector version of PSDTuts as I want to improve my non-existent vector skills, but … this lacks any realism. Maybe it’s just me expecting vectors to be as good as pixels in their final effect, but this looks *very* much like something someone did to first see what the features of Ai are.
Thankfully the flower tutorial looks pretty sweet, but really this thing should never have got on a xyzTuts site!!
Isaac
( )Daniel June 27th
cool!
( )Anand Sah July 1st
nice design
( )serpentemx July 10th
Graeat tut there’s always something new to learn. Thanks!
( )Limon July 13th
Its really a good creation…..carry on pls
( )Limon July 13th
A great creation……..I like it……..carry on pls
( )Mansoor July 24th
Excellent.
( )Vector Graphics August 26th
That`s a good start. However ripple effect is not to realistic. Thanks !
( )Imran November 10th
Great…
( )Manuel December 3rd
Its helpful..thanks
( )Rashmi Jain December 27th
TOO MUCH INTERESTING…..EXCELLENT
( )MikeM January 14th
This is a great vector tut to start. Though it is not too realistic as stated above I think the tutorial is a great way to get started with experimentation and playing around with illustrator. Our chicago website design studio have been trying to provide more tutorials like this one as a starting point.
( )Fanny Choi April 5th
hi! i can’t find the effect “color” in my filter. How come????
( )thanks!
Abdur Rahim April 30th
very good one
( )LamechD7 May 29th
Great! I’m a beginner and i’m learning very much with your site. Thanks! One!
( )noushadgd June 30th
..:: NICE ONE ::..
( )