This magazine is dedicated to my family, friends,

and classmates
 Editor’s Letter
3
Editor’s
17
Artist:
32
Artist:
Table of Contents
Letter The purpose of this magazine is to demonstrate how students
Brett Katelyn use Adobe Illustrator to make stunning pieces of art. Also, to show the
reader the process of a certain art work narrated by the artists them-
Ratajczak Peters selves.
I wanted to show that you can truly let out your artist inside
without so much being an artist. I am not the greatest of artists, but I
have all these ideas inside my head of an image that I would like to draw,
unfortunately, I lack the skills to make it. Adobe Illustrator opened a new
world to me and now I can make the image I had in my head and make it
into a reality. I became an artist that day, something I would never have

7 23 38
even thought about being. Adobe is easy to understand and very fun to
use.
Along with Adobe Illustator, Indesign is another program that
helps students be able to create a magazine. This is another purpose of
this magazine.
I thought I was never going to become an artist, especially
over a couple of months with only using a computer, but Professor Peck
opened up a new world and I am glad that I took computer graphics.

Artist: Artist: Credits I can create art and be happy with what I made because I would have
never have drawn this art by pencil or paint.
I want to thank my classmates and Professor Peck for an enjoy-
able class and fun time making these images. I am certain that I am go-
Abel Jesus ing to use Adobe Illustrator again, but not for a class, but to make art and
show off to everyone else what I learned.
Velasco Tapia

2 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 3

Computer Graphics

Image by:
Abel Velasco
4 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 5
 Artist Information:

Name: Abel Velasco

Major: International Business

Year: Junior

Hello everyone! My name is Abel Velasco. I am current-

ly a junior enrolled here in Saint Xavier University and majoring
in International Business. I like to play video games in my spare
time or hang out with my buddies. I speak two languages ( Eng-
lish and Spanish) and learning a third language (German). When
it comes to work I try my best at everything and like to help oth-
ers who have problems. I want to learn what I can do more with
computers and so I took this class to have some art experience
because I have no art experience.

6 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 7

 Inside
To be able to make this kind of drawing, I needed Adobe
Illustrator first. After choosing my picture that I was going to

“--think about this building as being

sketch, I started using the pen tool to draw the sky. Anything in
the background will be replaced later so I made it big and wide
enough to fit, while at the same time made sure it was a good

Looking a place where students reside.”

color for it to be the sky. Once I finished tracing the sky, I went
to the next thing that was in the background, the Warde Center
building. I used the pen tool and started tracing around the edges
of the building, then made it into a brown color to make it a simi-
lar color in the picture. Lastly, I started tracing the back building

out:
along with the tree (I should of drawn the building, then the tree,
but I did not know much about Adobe Illustrator). I made the tree
and building a dark brown color to match the color in the picture.
The start of the second week of Adobe Illustrator I start
Once everything inside the window was all drawn and After using Adobe Illustrator and the many tools that it
done, I needed to start making the window along with part of the has, I finally completed my picture. I did a few minor changes
stairs. I tried to be very detailed about the green window by using were there was pieces of white (nothing there) and I did not want
the pen tool and basically trying to re-create it as best as I could. the picture to look bad. I traced in the missing details and did the

Art
with the grass and snow in front of Morris Hall. I started drawing
the snow and sidewalk with the pen tool tracing along the edges
then later filling them in with either white, blueish/grayish, and
dark brown. Then, I started drawing the trees, lamp posts, and
garden around the sidewalk. I tried to go into more detail by add-
I traced the lighted parts and made it into a light green while the
parts in the shadow a darker green. I tried to make the wall on
the left a little more bright than the one on the right because it is
receiving some light and I had the same idea with the wood panel
on the stairs. Lastly, I had different shades of light and dark on
finishing touches for it. The concept is Morris Hall in the view of
a student’s eye
This picture was taken in a snowy day and I wanted to
show the viewer and try to make him feel that it truly is winter

process
the steel bar that held the barrier and then I was done with my and at the same time think about this building as being a place
ing the pictures that are within the signs and also making it look picture. where students reside.
like it is really winter. I added the little garden structure next to
the brick sidewalk and adding snow on it also.

8 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 9

 Inside
Looking
Out

“It made my bland Morris Hall picture

into a more realistic and interesting
picture.”

Image by: Abel Velasco

Process by: Abel Velasco

Once I made the day version of Morris Hall, I wanted

to experiment with the gradient tool and my Morris Hall pic-
ture. So I changed the picture from day to night (sunset). I be-
gan by taking the gradient tool and made the colors darker but
at the same time be able to reflect the sunset on the surround-
ings. The sky and windows had to reflect the different light
coming from the sunset so I mixed the colors and tried to make
a blue/orange/red kind of color to simulate a sunset. Everything
else was made into a darker color in the picture.

I found the gradient tool to be very useful and fun to

mix different colors with each other to make a better more real-
istic effect on the picture. It made my bland Morris Hall picture
into a more realistic and interesting picture. I like both of the
new version of my picture and hoped to connect with the reader
on what certain time it was that I tried to simulate. Overall, I
thought I came close to connecting the picture with a certain
time of the day and the different shadows/light contrasts that it
made.

10 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 11

12 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 13
The Escape from Ordinary Radio:
Art Process
by: Abel Velasco
I chose the spaceship sketch to be my drawing because I
thought of it as my best sketch on “Escape from ordinary radio.”
I used more of the shapes tool rather than the pen tool because
I wanted to try something different. I used the rectangle tool to
make the Ipod (and the sound bars) and radio and the circle tool
to apply the various little knobs within them. I also put 88.3 in the
Ipod to show the client how they are being represented. At first, I
drew the spaceship coming out of the antenna of the old radio to
show that it is escaping from it and going to something that is not
ordinary. I made the stars with the star tool and the colors using
the gradient tool and made the background black so that it can be
the space.
The concept is to show “Escape from ordinary radio”
I made the background black and the stars so that I can
show the viewer that the setting is in space. The two radios are
supposed to be planets so that the rocket is not out of place. I
tried making everything equal, but more emphasis on the rocket
so that it can show that it is escaping from the orange radio into a
different one.
14 April 2011 Velasco
After receiving feedback from my classmates, I started
to make adjustments to my picture. I changed the background
to make it seem more like space, but at the same time not take
away the viewer’s eye from the foreground. Also, I changed the
grays smoke because it was blending in into the background so I
changed it to make it look more like the fire from the spaceship.
To show a realistic escape, I made the orange radio have little
rockets or missiles trying to prevent the rocket from escaping, but
at the same time, 88.3 radio is shielding them from it.
The concept is: Escape from ordinary radio
I tried using missiles and shield to make the viewer
think of an escape in space. I thought of it as a nice touch, but at
the same time it might stray away from the topic. The stars and
radios are the same, but there is more emphasis on escape on this
picture than on the last one. I hoped it was enough to illustrate
“escape from ordinary radio.”
Velasco April 2011 15
 Artist Information:

Name: Brett Ratajczak

Major: Marketing

Minor: Graphic Design

My name is Brett Ratajczak, I am a senior marketing
major with a art minor concentrating in graphic design. I play
baseball and look to graduate in May 2011 and move downtown

Year: Senior Chicago where I look to pursue a career in a marketing agency on

a advertising team or copy write team.

16 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 17

 Trump Tower
Art Process
Image by: Brett Ratajczak
Process by: Brett Ratajczak
I opened a pictures of Trump Tower in Adobe Illustrator
and began creating new layers and painting over the parts of the
building using the pen tool. Each layer was created using a new
color and edge to give it the geographic features. I created each
layer and color starting with the back layer which was the light
blue for the sky and then moved forward until the third and low-
est piece of the tower was drawn.
The idea behind the picture is to illuminate the style and
infrastructure of the buildings of the city. The different shades
of colors show the direction of the sunlight reflecting off of the
building.
I like to show the great edges and the great detail that
many miss in the City. The City of Chicago has some of the
largest buildings in the world and Trump Tower stands as one of
them. The sunlight in the pictures shows great reflection off the
windows.
18 April 2011 Velasco
“I like to show the great edges and
the great detail that many miss out
on in the City.”
I began creating new layers and painting over the parts
of the building using the pen tool. Each layer was created us-
ing a new color and edge to give it the geographic features. I cre-
ated each layer and color starting with the back layer which was
the light blue for the sky and then moved forward until the third
and lowest piece of the tower was drawn. Each layer I used the
pen tool with a fill to complete the different colors of the build-
ing. Each section of the building starting with the top has a wider
base which illustrates a great deal of character to the building.
The west wall is illuminated by a light color to show the sun bal-
ance and shade compared to the other part of the building. I used
a new layer pen tool to draw lines with zero fill to show the detail
in the windows and there are different size lines to show distance
and focus points of the levels in the building.
Velasco April 2011 19
 Trump Tower
Remix
“I liked the use of the
moon as a direct visual
brightness”

The craft used in these two recolors were mostly used with layers of solid colors
and gradients along with the opacity tool to make the Trump Tower stand out with different
hues in the night. I used the original painting I did prior and added new layers with different
hues. Each layer was added color and then using the opacity tool to blend the hues into the
buildings original format. The picture on the left uses a gray gradient and transparency to il-
luminate the brightness of the moon off the west side of the building. The sun is created with
a radial gradient with a black and white hue.

The concept in these pictures were to change the original day time picture into the
building in a night scene with one non realistic colors and one that highlights the brightness
of the moon at night.

I wanted to create a night scene of the Trump Tower and I liked the use of the moon
as a direct visual brightness and illumination of the buildings west wall.

20 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 21

 My name is Jesus Tapia. I was born and raised in Chicago.
I went to high school in Saint Lawrence Seminary in Mt. Calvary
Wisconsin. I am a computer studies major and computer graphics
minor. I live off campus. I like to play xbox 360, fix computers, and
play football in my spare time. I also help my brother record music
videos and independent films.

Artist Information:

Name: Jesus Tapia

Major: Computer Studies

Year: Freshman

22 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 23

 Getting in
the Shower:
Art Process

Image by: Jesus Tapia

Process by: Jesus Tapia

Now in this picture I got a lot done on the first tray. I

finished tracing the shampoos on top first because I wanted to
work from top to bottom. When tracing the shampoos I was not
worrying about a lot of details but more on getting the shape and
color so others can see what it is and tell the difference between
the other shampoos. I put more time and effort in the shampoos
after the green one because when I did the green one it was when
we first began to start the project and we had only ten minutes
to work on it. After the green shampoo I zoomed in more on the
one shampoo I was working on so that I can get the figure as per-
fect as I could. What I also did was when I clicked with the pen
tool on curves I would click many times to get the nice full curve.
I also did a second layer on the shampoo caps so I can give it a
different color and make the shampoo look more realistic. Now
with the towel I found a little harder to work one because there
were so many different twists and turns and also lights and darks.
What I started to do was trace the outside curb that was a lighter
color than the rest of the towel. I found this tricky because the
towel edges would curb inside and made the tracing confusing.
With the light edges finished it is noticeable that the outline is a
towel.

24 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 25

 “My favorite
trace was the
bar code be-
cause it seemed
funny to go into
that much details
for a bar code.”

A lot of time was used to finish the work and lots of eye
pain to get the details I wanted. The major change is the gray
tray. From the start I was always unhappy with the way the tray
turn out so after I finish the major tracing on the main objects
I deleted the old tray and traced the new tray again. For the
tray I had zoom in almost to the point where the pixel were all
mashed. I also had the color taken off so the color would not fill
in as I traced. Another change that is noticeable is the dark spot
on the towel. I felt the dark spot made the towel look unreal and
unsatisfactory to my taste so I took it out and made the towel look
better. Now this is the first time the sandals are seen and though
the color is not the original color of the real sandals I felt though
that this color look better and had the correct amount of shad-
ing. After I traced the main components of the picture the details
came into the picture. I decided to make the first shampoo more
true to its real look. The shampoo white blended in to the wall
so I made the wall a little darker but still white. For the details in
the shampoo’s I had to zoom in until the pixels were mashed up
but still noticeable. The tracing process was hard because I could
not always get the perfect circle or shape that I wanted but when
I zoomed out it looked good. Making the flame on the Infusion
shampoo was one of the hardest details to trace because it was
all connected and kept fluctuated up and down. My favorite trace
was the bar code because it seemed funny to go into that much
details for a bar code. On the bar code I just made small black
rectangles inside a big white rectangle. Tracing the words were
the easiest because basically it was straight lines most of the
times and easy curves.

26 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 27

Getting in the Shower:
Advanced
I had to change a lot of the colors of the shampoos be-
cause the color did not match the actual color of the picture. Two
of the shampoos on the bottom tray have a white shading because
that is the color of the shampoo the bottle contains. To create
the white shading I had to create a second layer and change the
transparency of the second layer. The color of the second layer
is white and when I change the transparency settings it creates a
white appearance over the orange and purple color. I also created
a little shading on the white shampoo on the first tray. Creating
the shade required me to make a second layer on the bottle and
color it light grayish tone. The metal bar in the middle has a
white rectangle what that is the flash when capturing the image
on my camera. I also had to change the infusion shampoo colors
on the first tray so that shampoos can match the actual colors seen
on the picture.

Finding the right color was a bit tricky but was found.
The towel was what I spent to most time on trying to show the
shading. I did multiple layers and in the final draft is how it came
out the best. When making the layers I had to take of the outline
color and also change the transparency so that the colors can try
“I did multiple layers and in the final
to blend with one another. Though the layers to not look great I
left it that way to show the audience that their is multiple shades draft is how it came out the best.”
in the towel. The layers were so that it can have the illusion of
shade. Another object I change were the sandals. I tried to make
the sandals close the actual color as possible and also since there
was a glare from the flash I tried to put white on the front and
back of the sandal mixing the colors.

28 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 29

30 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 31
Artist Information:

Name: Katelyn Peters Hi, I’m Katelyn Peters. I am a sophomore transfer stu-
dent at SXU. I previously attended Moraine Valley Community
College and graduated from Marist High School. I plan to get

Major: Secondary Art Education

my bachelors in Secondary Art Education and have future plans
to get my masters. Painting and drawing are my passions. I look
forward to learning and experiencing new things this semester.

Year: Sophomore

32 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 33

 Night Out:
Art Process
Image by: Katelyn Peters
Process by: Katelyn Peters
CRAFT:
Once I opened my in design document I needed to
refresh my memory of what work I had already done as well
as what the photograph I was working on looked like. To do
so I would go to the layers box and select/deselect the eyes to
examine my work. Once I knew what step I would do next I
would select the pen tool and begin to trace my next shape. It was
important to make it invisible while tracing so I could see where I
was tracing. I would then use the dropper tool to select the color I
wanted to make the shape.
After finishing the arm and hand of the photograph I de-
cided to make a new layer first. In order to make the beads I used
the circle shape tool. For each color bead I made a new layer to
keep track of all of the different paths I was creating. The circle
tool allowed me to make many circles quickly and easily. It was
easy to adjust the size and color of the circles compared to trying
to use the pen tool to trace each individual one.
Since some of my lines were jaged from the using the
pen tool I needed to smooth them out. To do this I went to the
pointer and selected the shape. Then I would select a certain point
to move up or down to smooth out the edge. The main area I did
this on was the leg.
CONCEPT:
A woman from the 1930’s coming home from a night of
partying.
COMPOSITION:
The leg is put off to the side to add mystery to the
composition while simultaneously looking appealing to the eye
because it is evenly balanced by the weight of the beam and the
textural interest of the flowers on the left .
34 April 2011 Velasco
CRAFT:
For the last few minor details of my illustration I worked
on refining edges. I would use the white pointer tool to select the
layer to manipulate I would then play with the shape and morph
it to my desire. I also smoothed out the edges of my layers by
taking the pen tool and clicking on unnecessary points that were
added to the shape. I did this mostly on the shadow and the outer
part of the leg. I also added another lighter shape layer to the leg
with the pen tool to make it look more dimensional.
Prior to this I focused on creating a gradient on the wall
behind the leg. I would make a diagonal block shape, make the
layer invisible and take the eye dropper too select the color I
wanted to make to allow the wall to fade from light to dark. Then,
I worked on adding more detail to the beam. For this project I
would trace areas with the pen tool that had a similar value. I
worked differently with the beam than I did with the rest of the
drawing because after I would be done making a shape I would
not have to make it invisible. I instead worked around the pre-
existing shapes. I found this a lot easier when it came down to
seeing what the end product would look like.
COMPOSITION:
“I worked differently with the beam than
The composition shows balance between the leg and the
beam now that they are fully detailed, I created a gradient on the
wall to make the appearance of a light source.
I did with the rest of the drawing.”
CONCEPT:
A woman from the 1930’s coming home from a night of
partying.
Velasco April 2011 35
 Night Out: Remix
CRAFT:
How I made the this illustration was first by selecting
a shape with the white pen tool. Then I would go to where you
select the color and use the bar on the side to drag the color up to
a magenta. Once I was done selecting all the shapes and changing
the color I began to use the gradient tool. I would select the radial
type and chose white for the center and a purple for the outer
color which I made about 20 percent transparent by clicking on
the color and moving the dial. Then I selected the area I wanted
to put the gradient burst of light in then just click and drag until I
got the desire shape.

CONCEPT:
The concept is that a purple light is shining on the com-
position. I wanted everything to look very mystical and fantasy
like. I then added the little bursts of light to look like the shoe so
bright that it was creating little twinkles in the air. The overall
effect I wanted was something that transported you to another
place where everyday normal objects like shoes could have this
magical power.

COMPOSITION: “I wanted everything to look very mystical and

fantasy like.”
Compositionally I stayed with what my original photo-
graph was. I liked how the beam evenly balanced out the weight
of the leg and the shoe on the right side. For the bursts of light
I wanted them to look scattered and of different shapes. I made
some bigger and some duller that others for this. Also, I created
the bursts of light to sweep across the illustration to guide the
viewers eye through the composition.

36 April 2011 Velasco Velasco April 2011 37

Credits:

Brett Ratajczak

Jesus Tapia

Katelyn Peters

Nathan Peck