This article provides a step-by-step guide on how to create a shopping cart icon using various tools such as rectangle, pen, and ellipse tools. It covers complex processes such as shaping the cart, adding a handle, aligning strokes, creating wheels, and grouping all the elements into a single icon.
Key Insights
- The creation of a shopping cart icon begins with shaping the cart using the rectangle tool, which is then transformed into a trapezoid shape using the scale tool.
- The handle of the cart is created using the pen tool and adjusting the intersect points to ensure a clean connection between the handle and the cart body.
- Adding wheels to the cart involves using the ellipse tool and duplicating the created ellipse, followed by grouping all the components into a single object for a completed shopping cart icon.
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In this video, we'll be creating our shopping cart icon. Let's begin by creating the cart using the rectangle tool. We'll go to our toolbar, and holding the ellipse tool, we'll access the rectangle tool from the tool gallery.
We'll then begin to drag our cart to create a shopping cart. Currently, we have a rectangle; however, we need more of a trapezoid with the bottom points coming in towards the center.
To accomplish this, we'll first need to select both points using the Direct Selection tool, shortcut A on the keyboard, and drag a selection box to select only the bottom two anchor points highlighted in blue.
We can then use the Scale tool, shortcut S on the keyboard, and by clicking and dragging these points, we can drag them inside or outside to create a trapezoid. In this case, for a shopping cart, we'll drag them slightly in to about this angle and hit V on the keyboard for the Selection tool.
Next, let's reshape our trapezoid a little bit, first zooming in. In this case, I'm simply going to resize it to look a little more like a shopping cart.
If you'd like to change the angle, you can use A to select the bottom two anchor points, hold Shift, and again use the Scale tool to drag either in or out. I'll hit V on the keyboard, and I have the base of my shopping cart.
Next, it's time to add the handle.
To do this, I'll use the Pen tool, shortcut P. I'll start on the top-left-hand side, click at the intersection, and drag up while maintaining the angle and moving to the left.
I'll then hit Escape on the keyboard once I've created the handle. I'll then hit CTRL + Shift + A to deselect, and looking closer, we can see there's a gap between the end of the handle and the shopping cart.
Even though I clicked when it said 'Intersect, ' they don't seem to intersect on the artboard. This is because I may have Snap to Pixel on. To fix this, we'll go to View and undo Snap to Pixel.
Snap to Pixel will allow each of these points to snap directly to the pixel grid within the artboard. However, sometimes when we're drawing, we don't draw according to the pixels and instead want to snap to the points only.
Therefore, I'll zoom in, and let's adjust this.
I'll hit V on the keyboard for the Selection tool, click the path of the handle, and drag it until it intersects with the end of the trapezoid. I'll then click outside to see that these two now intersect.
Next, as I click on the trapezoid, let's observe the stroke.
Within our control bar, we can see the type of stroke we have.
As we can see from our stroke, we have a butt cap stroke, a quarter that extends beyond the corner. For our aligned stroke, rather than having the stroke aligned to the center, it's currently aligning inside the shape.
Therefore, as we look at our trapezoid, all of the stroke is within the shape.
Instead, we want to change this to 'Align Stroke to Center.' We'll select 'Align Stroke to Center, ' click outside, and see that now our path and stroke line up.
Next, let's create the bottom of our cart.
To do this, we'll use the Pen tool and click the bottom-left anchor, clicking and dragging down to maintain the angle, and dragging to the right to about the end of the cart.
I'll then hit Escape on the keyboard.
As we can see, we have a little bit of white covering the trapezoid stroke.
This is because this line is filled with white, and instead, we want to have no fill.
So, with Fill on top, we'll select it and choose None, ensuring it's transparent between the lines.
Next, let's create our wheels.
We can do this with the Ellipse tool. So, we'll click and hold the Rectangle tool, navigate to the Ellipse tool, and click to create an ellipse of an appropriate width.
For now, I'll try 10 pixels by 10 pixels and click OK.
While this is a little big, we can reduce the size by clicking and dragging towards the center while holding Shift to maintain a circle.
I'll then hit V on the keyboard for the Selection tool and simply drag my wheel up towards the end of the shopping cart.
To create an additional ellipse, we can hold ALT and duplicate the circle we've already created by clicking and dragging it to the right.
I'll release when it's in line with the end of the cart bar and the other ellipse, and we now have our cart.
Let's drag a selection over all the items within our cart. For the stroke, let's go to the control bar, type 1, and hit ENTER.
Next, let's group them all as one object. To do so, we'll right-click and select 'Group.'
We can then click outside, and we'll see that the entire icon is now grouped together.
Let's zoom out using CTRL—(MINUS), and we'll see that we now have our search bar and shopping cart.
For now, let's hit CTRL + S on the keyboard to save our work. In the next video, we'll be aligning our icons and adding titles.
See you there!