INFOGRAPHIC SERIES - Creating Pine Trees with the Symbol Sprayer

Pine Trees, snow, mountains and cold. 'Tis the season. And since I am up in Alaksa writing this blog post at -8°F, what better inspiration is needed. This is a quick way to create in icon of a tree, turn it into a Symbol then use the Symbol Sprayer to create a whole forest full of trees. Enjoy!

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Create a triangle by using the Polygon Tool. Draw the Polygon and while drawing, hold the DOWN ARROW key to reduce the number of sides. Fill with a lighter green, add a heavy stroke of a darker green. Use the Stroke Panel to round the corners of the Stroke.

Duplicate the first triangle, then increase the size and place it below the first triangle. Do not scale the stroke & effects while sizing; open the Transform Panel and make sure Scale Stroke and Effects is OFF before you scale. 

Double Click on the the Blend Tool in the Tool Bar. Set the Blend Options to Specified Steps and choose 3 steps. Steps are what are added in between the first and last items. Click OK.

With the Blend Tool, click the top triangle in the same location you click the bottom triangle so the blend is in line. (Shown by the red circles.)

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This is the result of the Blend Tool on the triangles. 

Choose Expand under the Object Menu. Check ONLY the Object button so it breaks it the triangles out of Blend Mode. Click OK.

Then, Ungroup the set.

With all the triangles selected, use the Pathfinder Panel to Unite all the shapes into one tree.

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Copy the tree, tun off the stroke then duplicate it over itself in a slight offset as show. 

Use the Pathfinder Panel Minus Front to leave just a sliver of the tree shape. Fill it with a slightly darker green. COPY this final shape.

Select the tree, and Select the Draw Inside Mode at the very bottom of the Tool bar. You will see the dashed line around the tree (indicating a Clipping Mask). PASTE the sliver of the tree you just copied into the tree and set the opacity of the cliver to 50%

Click back on the Draw Normal mode in the Tool bar to go back to normal drawing. 

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Add some horizontal lines with rounded (hot dogged) ends and throw in a circle or two for some character. Select the entire tree with the Selection Tool. 

Open the Symbols Panel from the Window Menu. Drag the Tree into a free space in the Symbols Panel. 

This will open the Symbol Options dialog box. Select the Type as Graphic from the drop down window. Set the Type as Dynamic, click OK. 

A + in the selected tree will indicate that the tree is now a Symbol. 

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You can use the Symbol Tools to Spray the symbol and play with the other Symbol Tools. 

Select the Symbol Sprayer and click and move the mouse around, "spraying" trees while you drag the mouse OR just click each time you want a tree to appear instead of holding the mouse down and dragging.

This is what the bunch of symbols will look like when you are done. 

Add the trees to any scene you create and you now have a winter wonderland!