final image (4)

Premium Tutorial: Retro Pin-up Girl

retro girl

In this tutorial you’ll learn to create a retro pin-up girl in Adobe Illustrator. We’ll use simple shapes, Pathfinder palette, some different Width Profiles in the Stroke palette, which are easy to apply in other illustrations. So let’s jump in and begin creating!

Difficulty: Advanced
Requirements: Adobe Illustrator

What will you get?

    • Instant download of PDF e-book (47 pages, 48 steps)
    • Comes with Ai file for easy reference
    • Detailed step by step tutorial to draw a nice realistic retro pin-up girl

Tutorial Preview:

Create the Hand

22. We are going to create the hand. With the help of the Pen Tool (P), create some objects as shown in the images below.

retro girl

retro girl

retro girl

23. Once your objects are drawn, select the black object and make a copy (Ctrl +C, Ctrl +F) of it, then hide the copy. Reselect the black original object and fill it with R=245, G=218, B=211, then remove the stroke of the resulting shape. Next show the copy hidden in this step, then add a 3px stroke (R=17, G=33, B=49) and apply the Width Profile 2 for the resulting object.

retro girl

retro girl

24. Likewise, follow the sequence of images and fill the remaining objects of the hand.

retro girl

retro girl

retro girl

25. You should end up with something like this:

retro girl

Add the Shadows

26. To give a more realistic look I'm going to be adding some hard shadows on some key places. Pick the Pen Tool (P) and create two black shapes like you see in the image below. Next select the left shape and reduce its Opacity to 20%. Select the remaining shape and reduce its Opacity to 10%.

retro girl

retro girl

27. Keep working with the Pen Tool (P), create three black shapes and then reduce their Opacity like you see in the images below.

retro girl

28. At this point the girl should look like in the next image:

retro girl



... end of preview. Sign up for premium membership to read the whole tutorial!

premium content lock



Scroll to Top