Kendra Schaefer

Step 4: Shading

You’ve already got a basic candy cane, and if you’d prefer, you can use it as-is. But Illustrator has some pretty awesome coloring effects options, so let’s give them a go.

Select your red candy cane, copy it, and then go to Object > Paste in Front. Paste in Front puts a copy of the selected shape precisely over the original, so you won’t be able to see that your copy has appeared at first. But if you right-click on the red, and choose Arrange > Bring to Front, the new shape jumps to the top of the stack, and you can see it.

To the top shape, apply a grayscale linear gradient like the one below. the position of the lightness and darkness in your gradient is important. You need to add a little darkness to the edges, and lightness to the center of the object to create a rounded appearance.

NOTE TO ADVANCED USERS: If you know how, a better way to create this gradient is using the gradient mesh tool. Gradient mesh is a little outside the scope of this lesson, but you’ll get a nicer result if you go that route.

Now, with just that top shape selected, go to your Transparency panel, and change the transparency type to multiply, and set the opacity at 41.

Step 5: Gloss

You will need:

To add a few touches of gloss, first draw an oval set near the top of your candy cane shape. Apply a white-black linear gradient, with the white nearest the top, to your oval. Then, in the Transparency panel, switch the transparency type to screen.

Using your direct selection tool, select the oval, and click on the bottom-most node. Holding down the Shift key, drag the node upwards, creating a curve like the one below. Release the Shift key, and use your direct selection tool to grab the node handles, pulling the right one out to the right, and the left one out to the left, rounding out your curve.

We’re going to add one final touch before we’re entirely finished. Click on the multiply / gradient layer of your candy cane, copy it, and pull the copy off to the side. Change the color to solid black (color doesn’t really matter, we’re just removing the gradient right now and making our shape easy to see). Then, in your transparency panel, set the opacity back to 100%, and the transparency type back to normal.

Make one copy of this new shape, and make the copy a different color so it’s easy to see. Make your first shape slightly smaller, then set the smaller shape behind the larger shape at and angle, like below.

Select both the smaller and larger shape, then click the divide button in your pathfinder palette. You won’t notice anything happen after you press the divide button, but your shape has been split into separate pieces.

Using your direct selection tool, select each piece except for the black curve (shown below), and delete it. You want to be left with just that curved streak – we don’t need any of the other pieces. Below, you can see which pieces can be deleted.

Place the new black streak on top of the candy cane as shown below. Apply a white-to-black linear gradient on the streak. Using the gradient tool, change the gradient direction so that the white appears in the top right-hand corner of the streak’s curve, fading out to gray on either end.

Last things last, in the Transparency panel, change the streak’s transparency type to screen, and lower the streak’s opacity to about 60.

Congrats! You’re done.