Hands-on Tutorial

Intermediate

5 min

Hide part of artwork with a mask

Masking is a technique that lets you hide unwanted areas of your artwork. Discover how to use any shape to hide or reveal parts of your design.

Start with core concepts

This video introduces the concept of hiding parts of artwork or images by masking them with a shape rather than deleting them.

What you'll learn

Draw a mask shape

Draw a new shape—or leverage an existing one—to use as the mask. Artwork inside the shape area is visible while artwork outside the shape is hidden or masked.

Create the mask

With the shape over the artwork to be masked, choose Object > Clipping Mask > Make. The shape now masks the artwork.

Edit the mask and artwork

Learn how to edit both the mask and masked artwork by double-clicking to enter isolation mode. This editing is similar to editing a group of objects.


Instructor

Brian Wood

Designer

Cameron Wray

October 4, 2023

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