In my very first post I highlighted how much I love the New York Public Library's digital collection. It is a great source of inspiration for pattern designers (and history lovers too)!

Today I thought I'd show you how I used one of the collection's public domain images in a pattern.

NOTE: Some designers will manipulate images in Photoshop and then transfer them over to Illustrator to create the repeat. Since I don't have Photoshop (yet!) I'm going to show you how I do it all in Illustrator.

STEP 1: I find a public domain image that has a motif or element I'd like to use in my pattern. Ideally, I'll find one with a central image and a pretty neutral background. A good example is my fish friend here, who I will use in this pattern. I save the image at high resolution and open in Illustrator.

STEP 2: With the image selected, I go up to windows > image trace. The image trace box will pop-up. From here I select the following options:

MODE: I always select color. If you just want a black and white motif you can select black and white.

COLORS: You can adjust this based on how many different colors you want Illustrator to use when converting your image to vectors. To start, I usually just leave this setting as is, and see how my first trace turns out. Then I reduce it down to somewhere between 3 and 9 colors to see how it looks. I do this for two reasons (1) It will be easier to remove the background with less colors and(2) it will help create a simpler pattern that is easier to print.

ADVANCED: Under this setting I check the box 'ignore white' so that any white in the background is not present.

Finally I select preview and let Illustrator do it's thing. Based on how my fish looks once image trace is done, I'll adjust the colors up and down until I'm happy.

STEP 3: Because this is an effect, I go up to the menu and click on object > expand. When the box pops-up I make sure that ‘object’ and ‘fill’ are checked and click ‘ok’. Now my tracing has been converted to vector paths. I then ungroup the image. Sometimes I have to click ungroup several times to ungroup everything.

STEP 4: Now that all of the elements that make-up the image are ungrouped, I’ll go in with my selection tool and select one of the elements in the background that I want to get rid of. Then I go up to the menu and click on select > same > fill color. Now all of the elements in my image that are that color will be selected. I make sure that no parts of the image I want to keep are selected (if so, you can deselect that element by holding down the shift key and clicking on it) and then I click delete. Presto! That part of the background is gone. I repeat this step until all of the background is gone and all that remains is the fish I want to use in my pattern.

STEP 5: I’m almost done, but before I start using the motif in my pattern I make sure that all of the background is truly gone. I do this by drawing a box around the motif, sending it to the back, and filling it with a dark color. When I do this I can see if there are any small specks of the background remaining that I need to delete. (extra credit if you can find the speck of background in the image below)

STEP 6: Finally, I delete the box, group the motif and get ready to start building my pattern.

Here’s the pattern I ended-up making with my fish friend. I arranged a bunch of fish into a one directional pattern, painted in some water, and created the repeat.

I hope this inspires you to play around with using public domain images in your patterns. I’d love to see your work!

Hey Fishy, Fishy! Making A Pattern Using Public Domain Images

Today I thought I'd show you how I used one of the collection's public domain images in a pattern.