Forming Symmetrical Shapes photoshop

First make the ruler visible. To get a ruler hit Apple + R (CTRL + R on Windows). The ruler menus will appear at the top and left of the screen. Move the mouse over the left ruler and then click and drag to place a ruler on the canvas. Then, with the pen tool draw the shape.



Select the path (use the selection tool or V). Then, pick the Reflect tool (O). A small blue target icon will appear. This is the point at which the reflection will occur. To get the reflection on the line, click once on the blue line and the target will move. You should end up with something looking like this:


To make the reflection click hold and drag to the upper left of your path. Hold down SHIFT while dragging to constrain the rotation and ALT to copy the shape. If the shape moves to the other side you have forgotten to hold ALT which will copy the shape creating a mirror.



Currently we have two separate paths. We need to join and average the paths together. Averaging means that the two end points will be averaged before they are joined. There is a handy shortcut to join and average at the same time. To do this, choose the Direct Selection Tool. Select (A) the end point of your shape. The end point appears as a small blue rectangle. Hold shift and pick the end point on the mirrored shape.

Now hit Apple + SHIFT + ALT + J (Ctrl + Shift + Alt + J on Windows) to average and join the paths. If you get an error message saying "To join you must select two endpoints...” this means that you have chosen other anchor points rather than just the end points. Check there are no other anchor points with blue squares rather than white squares (blue means they are selected and will cause the error.)



If you have done everything you now have a complete, joined path which you can fill, use as a symbol or pattern swatch.

Posted in Photoshop