In this tutorial, I’m going to show you how to use the Pen tool in Photoshop to create your own custom shapes. I’ll take you through a series of exercises that will guide you through the basic, essential functions of the Pen tool.
About The Pen Tool
The pen tool is one of the few tools available to you in Photoshop that works with Vector Graphics as opposed to Raster Graphics. Vector Graphics use mathematical statements and points in order to define their shape and other characteristics, and therefore are very scalable. In other words, vector graphics can be scaled to any size without ever losing quality.
With the Pen Tool, we can create lines and curves that can be put together to create custom shapes. If we combine the pen tool with some of the other vector shapes, we can create some intricate, scalable objects (I’ll be covering additional vector tools in other tutorials).
Getting Started
In order to help familiarize yourself with the pen tool, I’m going to take you through a series of examples that will show you how to draw and create some custom shapes.
To begin, Create a New Document (I’m using 284×284 in my example, with default Photoshop Preferences).
Next, let’s enable the Grid. Go to View > Show > Grid, or Ctrl + ‘. Also Enable Snap (View > Snap, or “Shift + Ctrl + ;“).
We enable grid + snapping so that when we draw using the pen tool, we can easily make precise shapes, and curves with little effort.
Now select your Pen Tool from the toolbar, and set it up to work on Shape Layers in the Options Bar.
Select a foreground color of your choice.
Drawing with the pen tool is easy. Simply position your cursor where you’d like to begin drawing, and click to create your first anchor point. Subsequent anchor points will all be connected to the last point drawn, allowing you to create custom shapes. To complete a shape, click the first anchor point.
Go ahead an try it. See what you can create using basic anchor points. I managed to make a very primitive star.
That’s simple enough, right?
Drawing Curves with the Pen Tool
You may have already noticed that something interesting when drawing curves, and dragging after clicking to create an anchor point. The lines begin to curve!
Go ahead and try it. After creating an anchor point, hold down the mouse button and drag in the direction you want your line to curve.
If you follow the below layout, you should be able to create a primitive circle shape.
If you’re still having trouble, here’s a video that illustrates how to create the circle. When you see the icon change into a black pointer, that means that I’m DRAGGING once I create a point.
The curves characteristics are based on the length of these direction points, and at what angle they are drawn at. After some time practicing with them, you should become more familiar with drawing more complex curves. It should also be noted that you can change any directional points with the pen tool by holding Ctrl, or Ctrl + Alt.
Example:
Example Shapes
Let’s take what we’ve learned so far, and apply it in some basic design. If you’re using the same sized document as I am (with default Photoshop grid preferences), you should be able to Copy + Paste these templates in your document, and follow my anchor points easily.
First let’s make a Rounded Rectangle. We already have a custom shape that does this, but sometimes designs call for modified rounded boxes of sorts.
The Rounded Rectangle Shape uses basic curves, and is very simple to create. With some slight modifications, we can make rectangles with only 1, 2, or 3 of the corners rounded, while keeping the rest sharp corners.
Here is another template that focuses on “S” shaped curves, as seen in frequency waves.
“S” curves are used all the time in more complex shapes. They are created by dragging the Directional Points of two sibling anchor points in the same direction.
For our last example, let’s make a “Pen Tool” custom shape!
Creating an exact copy of this shape will require you to have some knowledge of the “Convert Point Tool” as well. Once your points are made, go back with the Convert Point Tool, click a point, then click and drag out the point so that you can manually modify the direction handles for custom curves. Try following the video below:
See how easy it really is? With a little practice and imagination, you can literally design anything you wish with the pen tool.
Conclusion
The Pen Tool provides a very simple way to work on custom shapes and paths inside of Adobe Photoshop, and allows users to easily create scalable objects. There are limitations to what can be done in Photoshop in terms of vector graphics, but that’s what we have Adobe Illustrator for!
It only seems fitting to end this passage with a quote by Edward Bulwer-Lytton, “The pen is mightier than the sword.” In this case, I’d compare the sword to an ordinary brush used in Photoshop. However, each serves its place in Graphic Design, so it’s up to you as the designer to decide where to utilize each respectively!
Amazing Retro Rainbow Curves
Drawing and Type Tools
Installing Custom Shapes and Brushes in Photoshop
Tip: Use The Grid in Photoshop
*Sniff* Greycobra colours.
Great tut though, very useful for me (I never use the pen tool).
Great stuff!
Fantastic tutorial, this cleared a few things up for me.
Thanks!
Very useful tut. Im going to rock this joint…
I’ve been using the pen tool for a while…but i’ve never used the grid. Im deffinately gonna try that from now on.
Glad you guys learned something new! Just remember to have the “Snap”, and Snap to Grid options enabled, or else it won’t snap to the lines and intersections on the grid.
Also, you can set up your Grid in Photoshop’s Preferences. I’ll go over that in another tutorial though
Haha I’d never thought of using the grid, gonna have to try that out!
The problem i was trying to solve using this tutorial was not solved.
Lets say in the pen example, by the 3rd anchor, the entire thing looses any shape, its as if the poon tool is trying to save a certin proportion… i dont know, if anyone knows what im talking about, and knows which function will change that, please respond, thanks allot!
sweet tut, keep up the good work
@ Nir B -make sure that all of your pen options are set of correctly as shown.
@ andreic - thanks mate! We will surely keep writing more great tutorials for everyone!
Thanks, Great Website
Keep up the Great Work!
Truely the Pen is mightier than the sowrd. I find it ver difficult to use the Pen, but with the help of this tutorial, I’m able to draw our school logo into 3D format. Now the jobs are flowing like river. Thanks for your powerful, successful, useful and helpful tutorial. Respect. From Ghana with love.
Wow this tutorial is amazing, helped me so much with the pen tool. I was always scared to even try it out because i could never use it properly. This clears everything up and is going to be bookmarked for a while. Thanks!
Only because you’re a noob Ben
Dude..
…
i cant express how thankful i am to you. O.O
thanks man, this is AWESOME, i learned alot from this, i knew pen tool is powerful and it was hard for me to master it. This tute is gonna be handy for my next sigs. Cheers man.
thank youuuuuuu very match
This is a very cool tut. I have used the pen tool in the past but often just get frustrated with it’s complexity. I appreciate this wonderful tutorial that clearly laid everything out and simply showed us how its done
Keep up the awesome work!
Jeffrey
I don’t know how you make such beautiful thumbnails.
Was the pen coloured in Photoshop or Illustrator ???
Very beautiful. 10/10.
And indeed the pen is mightier than the sword. (thoughAdobe does’nt have one yet.)
Very good tutorial.I really learnt how to use pen tool and give curves by studying this tutorial
How do I make a line with the pen tool and then make another line that is not connected to the first one? Thanks
To go about doing that Kirk, create a new layer, and then begin drawing a new path/shape on top of that layer.
@ Binesh - Thanks mate! I just make sure to spend lots of time polishing the thumbnails so that they look nice!
Appreciate all the feedback, and very glad that so many of you found this tutorial useful!
Great tutorial! I’ve been looking for a “Pen” tutorial. Before I knew about this tutorial I sucked at using the pen tool, after this I am MUCH better with it! Thanks a lot!
-Dan
Hi David,
Great tutorial. I’ve learned already about the Pen in my photoshop/After effects class, but you can never read enough about it to get a better grasp on it.
I had a difficult time doing the rounded rectangle at first, but eventually got it (hard to tell which direction lines for which). The pen tool shape has got me a little stumped. Again, hard to decipher which direction lines go with which point. Hopefully I’ll eventually get it. :OP
Great tutorial, but once i finished a shape and might want to apply some changes later after i deselected the shape, how can i come back to the anchor view and work with the pen tool on the same object?
Cheers
@ Martin - You can come back and move point(s), adjust curves, and transform points using the Direct Selection Tool (It’s the white arrow above the Pen Tools).
To convert points into a curved segment, you use the Convert Point Tool under the Pen Tools.
To Add Points, or Delete Points, use the Add Anchor Point and Delete Anchor Point Tool. You need to make sure your path is selected first, which you can do by clicking the path icon (shape outline) in the Layers palette.
I may add this up into the tutorial soon for better reference Martin, until then, I hope this helps you!
Your tutorials are great! I’ve learnt a lot since I’m a noob to Photoshop. Anyway, I managed to create every of the shown shapes but I couldn’t do the pen shape, something went wrong every time I tried. I guess I’ll figure it out somehow.
I couldn’t make the circle and I don’t even get how you made the shape before it. Basically I’m still a zero in Pen Tool section lol
@ Jana - Sometimes, reading, and viewing static images just isn’t enough to explain something, so that’s understandable. I’d suggest playing with the tool yourself some, reading over this again, and then seeing if things are working for you.
I’ll see if I can put together a better animation so that you can actually SEE what I’m doing!
Update: Jana, I’ve added a video underneath the Circle Diagram for you! Hope this helps you out!
very great tutorial. now i know how to use the pen tool. thank you
I never knew a grid view was available in Photoshop, let alone the “Snap” option. Great tutorial!
My first circle didn’t really do justice to the term, but there was improvement from this point on.
David, the video really helps here. Thank you.
i cant make the last shape and it pisses me really off
someon pleaze make a vide of making that f-ing pen tool icon with the anchors.
Nothing to worry about mate. Just uploaded a video that shows how to create the Pen Shape in the tutorial.
Hope it helps!
Nice one! Very useful to learn how to use the pen tool. I was confused cause I did the last one backwards and didn’t know about the convert tool, so I was following your motions and it gives a wrong curve, so I did it opposite and it worked. Powerful tool indeed!
greatt wonderfull tutorial , im peruvian maravilloso!!!
Hey David, thanks for this great tutorial. I had never really understood pen tool before, be it in Photoshop, Illustrator or Flash. You kept it simple and it was really easy to get hold of it, and thus, really easy to get hold of the pen.
Nice , thanks
It’s a amazing website
really helped me
thank u very much
Absolutely fantastic tutorial. Thank you for the time and effort spent into educating us pen shy designers!
I have been searching the net for a useful tut on using the pen tool and I feel lucky that I stumbled upon this one. I specially like the video clips which you inserted cleverly in the areas that needs a visual demo. Thank you David for a job well done.
Hi! This tutorial was very useful, but I’m still confused as to how to use the pen tool to cut out pictures?? I’m working on the Apple Coldplay iPod commerical tutorial, and got kind of counfused…
@ Nicole - We don’t have a specific tutorial here covering technique for that, but it’s definitely something we can try to teach in the near future. Until then, I’d try a quick Google Search for “Extracting Images in Photoshop” and see if you can find any useful lessons.
I’m wondering if you know how to make a pen tool shape that has a section cut out of it. You can see what I mean by looking at some of the default custom shapes (the “circle frame” or “blob 2 frame” for instance). There are transparent areas within the rest of the shape. Without rastering it…by the way.
David, You should look into making your entire tutorial videoed.
Me, being an amateur would be static about that.
Thank you for this wonderful tutorial. This was very helpful even if I’m already familiar with the Pen Tool.
Best tut I’ve ever seen for the pen tool, which admittedly is one of ‘the’ most important tools in the PS arsenal. I even have the Total Training for PS and I find your style much clearer and concise. Kudos for creating excellent tuts.
DB
Photoshop CS3
the best tut I’ve found so far… seriously!
David never emailed with an answer about my question (5 comments ago). I guess it’s a path thing…and if anyone needs to know, I figured it out—in a round about way (after much reading)—here:
http://books.google.com/books?id=BKX2yekYVIAC&pg=PA360&lpg=PA360&dq=Photoshop+sub+path&source=web&ots=P0fB1yYLM_&sig=qC3oVwl_13iEIKGzR-MqBp0hyEo&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=8&ct=result#PPA358,M1
by searching “photoshop sub path” in Google books. hope that helps someone.
@Laura G.: Sorry Laura, I’ve been busy moving recently, and have let some comments slip by unanswered
I think I’ll publish a more detailed Pen Tool tutorial soon to compliment this one for users who want to learn more about it like you. I’ll do my best to make it video centered, since so many people seem to learn these tools more easily through that medium.
No apologies necessary! I just wanted to help someone if they found your blog because they had the same question I had. Nonetheless, it would awesome if you published another tutorial. I’m sure we would all learn something! Reading that book made me want to scream!
Thanks again.
New question :: maybe you can help
Can I make two separate custom shapes into one shape/one layer. I need to be able to apply layer styles to a shape, but I need them to be one shape (and one layer style) rather than 2 shapes with 2 separate versions of the same layer style.
The part that confuses me is that these are already two separate shapes, two separate layers. I am not taking a shape I created and adding another path to it. I have two already and I need them on the same layer.
Help!
By the way, I know how to do this if I merge the layers…but then it’s not a custom shape anymore…but rastered.
I think this one of the best guide-line I’ve came across to design powerful graphics. With this skills I can transform any graphic to any form.
Hi!
Thanks for the video-tut. My english wasn’t good enough when I tried to read the tut.
I’ve tried other pen-tuts earlier but this one was simple the best. Thank you!
Zara
hey um, i just started using the pen tool. im trying to cut out a photo, after i make the path how to i copy and paste the photo in it and not just the path?
Thanks so much !!! Very helpful. Nice job.
This has been something that I have been looking for. The basics for the basics so to speak. Thanks a lot. =D
Loved this tutorial, excellent teaching!
For a beginner this is the best tutorial for a tool I’ve seen so far.
Men you really help with this, you are great!!!! I learned a lot today…thanks bro (sorry for my english I from Mexico)
Brilliant Tutorial. Now I can finally understand how to use the pen tool. Keep up the good work. Thanks.