How to Create a Vector Silhouette in Illustrator

Using silhouettes of people in design layouts is a great way to incorporate a human element without having to use a specific “face.” Here's a simple way to do it.

Beginning designers will benefit most from this tutorial. You should already know the basic commands and tools in both Photoshop and Illustrator as well as how to adjust the Levels of an image in Photoshop.



To create a vector silhouette of a person, start with a photo of your model on a completely white background. In Photoshop, adjust the levels to make the white background completely white and darken the clothes and skin of the model. Don’t worry about making the photo “look bad”; it is going to be completely black soon anyway. The goal is to create as much contrast between the white background and the model as possible.



To make sure the black and white areas really stand out when you convert the image into a vector, you may need to go into the areas that you want to keep black and touch them up with a black paintbrush (such as highlights on the skin). The same applies to the areas you want to keep white (like this guy’s shirt) but this time you would use a white paintbrush. You don’t have to make it absolutely perfect here because the final conversion will be done in Illustrator.

An important tip: make sure any inner areas you want to keep white are not open to the white background, like the image below. If you want to keep the white shirt, then create a dividing line between the two areas with a black paintbrush. This will be important later.





Once your image is all touched up, paste it onto an artboard in Illustrator. Click your image with the Direct Selection Tool and you will see the Live Trace button become active at the top of the screen. Click Live Trace. Live Trace converts a pixel-based image into a Tracing Object which then can be easily converted into a vector shape automatically. Now that the image is a tracing object, the properties bar at the top of the screen will give you new options. Adjust the Threshold value until you get the results you like.



The Threshold setting changes all color values under that setting to black while all color values above that setting will be changed to white. In this image, my threshold setting is 240. You can do additional fine tuning to your conversion using the Tracing options dialog box.



Once you get exactly the look you are going for, click the Expand button on the properties bar. Your image is now converted into vector shapes and can be further edited in Illustrator. Experiment with colors, gradients, scaling, etc. Please note, all the white areas of your design are white vector shapes. If you don’t want any white elements, simply select those white shapes and delete them.