AI sphere

To draw a sphere, I'm gonna
begin with my Ellipse tool.

Hold the Shift key as I draw a circle.

If the last thing you had selected
was filled with a gradient,

this will already be filled
with a gradient.

Over on the Toolbox, I can hit
the Gradient Fill.

That should make the gradient
panel pop open.

If it doesn't, you'll find it in the Window
menu with all of the other panels.

Make sure your focus is on the fill;
it's possible to stroke with gradients,

but we don't want to do that.

There are three kinds of gradients
you can have in Illustrator:

Linear, radial, and freeform gradients.

We're gonna use the radial gradient
to make this circle look like a sphere.

If I wanted it to look like a green sphere,
I might select the first color stop,

and over on the Color panel, I want
to choose a very light green color.

Since my color sliders aren't showing,
I go to the fly-out menu to RGB or CMYK.

And I can pick a very light green color.

If that doesn't change your shape,

double-check to make sure
the shape is selected.

You have to select things
before you change them.

If you ever see an alert on a color,

that just means that the
brightness of the color

does not show that way
in the CMYK color model;

it'll offer you the nearest CMYK
equivalent that's within the gamut.

Since I'm working in RGB,
I can ignore that.

I can click on this other color stop,

and as a shortcut to
converting the color model,

you can Shift-click on the greyscale
ramp to cycle right into RGB.

Another shift-click changes to HSB;

another Shift-click gets you to CMYK;

and it just cycles between
all of them by Shift-clicking.

So I'll choose a nice
dark-green color there.

The Gradient tool over on the Toolbox,
as soon as I click on that,

that shows a line; that's called
the gradient annotator;

and I can pick up and move that line

to relocate where the center
and the edge of the gradient is.

Those circles are actually the same as the
color stops over on the gradient panel,

so I can actually work on
the gradient over here.

The diamond up top,

both on the Gradient Annotator
and the Gradient Panel;

that's the color midpoint.

That's where it's halfway light green,
to halfway dark green.

So you can further change
the rate of fade

from one color to
the next in a gradient.

You can expand the gradient
by dragging that last handle.

Or you can ignore the Gradient Annotator,

and simply use the Gradient tool to
draw across the shape to reposition it.

I find spheres look a whole lot better
if you have a couple extra colors.

In addition to the lightest green—
I'm gonna slide that over.

Notice my shape is still selected,
so I'm making changes directly to it;

anywhere you want another colorstop,
just click right beneath the color ramp

and use the Color panel
to choose the color.

This is pure white right here.

That creates a nice, bright highlight.

I'm gonna add a medium dark green;

and then I'm gonna transpose
the positions of these guys.

And that creates the illusion
of some ambient light

bouncing off something behind the
sphere, and hitting the back side.

And I can further use the
Gradient tool to position that.

If I wanted it to look like the sphere
was casting a soft shadow,

I could start with an ellipse.

Since this is the second thing I drew,
it's laying on top of the circle,

so I'll send it to the back.

I'll remove the stroke
by setting it to None.

And back on the fill, I just need
a gray-to-white gradient.

I'll take away two of these stops
by pulling them off the panel.

I've already got the white one.

I'll just turn this one to gray;

again, by starting with black,

and holding the Shift key
as I drag any slider.

Radial gradients fill from the center at
the left end of the gradient ramp

outward in all directions,
to whatever your second color is.

So I need these two reversed.

And with the gradient tool,
not only can I scale;

I can rotate to the gradient,

and squeeze the gradient
with that top handle.

So I'll pick up the bar; try to get
it centered within that... ellipse.

Doesn't have to go all
the way to the edge.

And I can put a third color stop
that is a very dark grey.

To make it look like the sphere is
actually contacting the surface

directly beneath it.

And I can nudge this ellipse
around with my arrow keys.