Design Process of Phoenix Illustration
March 23rd, 2007 Filed in: Design, Tricks & Tips Jump to comments
Numbers of people have asked me how to do the phoenix illustration on my site. Was it vector? Did I use Illustrator or Photoshop? Well, here I will tell you my design process from concept sketch to final illustration. Hope you will find this useful.
1. Concept Sketch
Like most other designers, I like to brainstorm and sketch out my ideas.

2. Research
Then I will go to Google image search to get design inspiration. Notice the color theme used on my site is very similar to the images that I found?

3. Tracing
Normally I will do a fine sketch and import it in Illustrator for tracing purpose. Check out my Illustrator vector tracing tutorial. Here I experimented with different color variation.

4. Illustrator Files
Here are the Illustrator files that I traced from sketches. These vector illustrations then imported into Photoshop for composition.

5. Effects
I used Photoshop to add FX effects like: rainbow, glow, particles, and gradient. One of the frequently asked questions is how to do the particles effect on the tails and flowers. To make the particles, just set the layer’s blending mode to "dissolve".

6. Final
Here is the final illustration. Download the full size wallpaper.



October 31st, 2007 at 3:38 pm
You are awesome man. I really appreciate your effort to teach the masses. I am going to frequent your site for more tutorials as time goes on. Keep up the good work. I definitely admire them.
October 28th, 2007 at 12:05 pm
Yeah I lıke Thsi You awsome Designer
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AHmet Doruk from TURKEY
October 18th, 2007 at 6:11 am
you are a genius and humble.thanks for giving us free tutorials.
nairobi kenya
October 12th, 2007 at 12:05 am
Amazing! Thanks for showing us how it’s done, mate. You shame me and my shabby portfolio.
October 11th, 2007 at 3:05 am
i hate the disolve effect thingy it hurts my eyes it doesnt seem smooth to look at.. but u make it all different u rilly make it part of a wonderful dream.. damn i wish i cud do those swirlies on my own.. the phoenix is amazing i like dat smooth pinkish thing on its neck hahaha whoa… ur simply great!!
October 9th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
Damn you are amazing men… i like so much your website, i’m a desinger too but you are out this world… if you can put more tutorials of Adobe illustrator Cs2… See ya later, n’ ..::WeelDone::..
October 9th, 2007 at 11:10 am
i am new illustrator user and work with CS3,
but you are a real great designer.
October 6th, 2007 at 9:51 am
Very Nice.. I like that. Nice Work Guys
September 28th, 2007 at 8:30 pm
非常喜欢 有中国元素
September 18th, 2007 at 5:30 am
Hi there,
I would like to use this and you as part of my graphic design project, I am working on what graphic design means to me, to me a big part of that is taking hand draw illustrations to digital productions. Would it be possible to have the concept sketch through to the tracing in a bigger format. I am making an A1 poster. You can watermark the image if needed, but I will be giving full credit to you. As its part of my research :)
Many thanks,
Josh