Images used in this tutorial are property of RepeatPatterns.com and may not be copied or used without express written permission.

With this Tutorial we will assume that you have some working knowledge of the Photoshop program, and now you want to build a repeat pattern for yourself. With that said, we’ll keep it simple and hopefully informative for all levels of ability.

There a lot of different ways to bring a repeating pattern to life and as many different ways to lay one out. For now we will use some basic shapes and go through one process for building a successful pattern. Later if you want you can discuss techniques and style in one of our forums.

Getting started

To use this tutorial you’ll need to set up a few tools. Regardless of how you may want to draw or like to piece your work together. It will help later in the tutorial.

• Have your layer palette open. Window>layers or press F7.
• Set your selection/move tool so the two boxes are checked for auto select layer and auto select group.
  
• Be sure to select the transparent option for your background when you set up your new document.
• Set up the rectangle marquee tool to the “fixed size” option from the style drop down menu. And type in the repeat size you’ll use.
  

Size

Most designers when using vector programs don’t have to worry about the set up size of their image too much to start with.  With bitmap programs like photoshop you may want to consider some things.
Images and icons will not scale up or down in photoshop without some break down in your image quality.


This break down may be harder to see at a scale of 300-350 dpi though. Anyway you should still think about your starting size in relation to the size of icons or shapes you want to repeat.  Here we like to start off with a division of 25.25 inches.  For example: 12.625, 8.4166, 6.3125 and so on.  That way we know what our image scale will be when we look at it and it will fit a common printing size for fabric.  Also the pattern will be ready for print on fabric without having to go through the resize issue. The size 5.05 is what we’ll use here to give us enough room to put some shapes into it.

 

• Open a new document in Photoshop. File > new.  For now we’ll work with document size of 10 X 10 inches at 300 DPI in RGB color. Also choose a transparent background.
  
  
  Shapes will be difficult to select and move around if you don’t have the transparent background.10 inches should give us lots of room to work around.
• Select the rectangle marquee tool. Select “fixed size” from the style drop down menu. Here we will put in our size of 5.05 by 5.05 inches.
  
  
  You don’t have to make it square if your pattern would look better in a rectangle. Just as long as either the width or height is 8.4166. Click on your workspace and fill that box with your color.  Use a white fill if you are planning on having no color. This box is important it will be our guide when we start moving stuff around.
  

Getting your shapes

Some designers like to plan out their designs in advance and know what they want to achieve before they start. Others sit down and work the space until it looks right. Here in this tutorial we have the luxury of having all the shapes we need for our pattern colored and ready to go.  It looks all neat and tidy now but at one point there were different color ideas and shapes of all sizes that didn’t seem to fit. So you’ll have to imagine your shapes in the place of the ones we are using here.


Notice that the swatches palette has only the colors used in it. We will be indexing this pattern when we are done.

So let’s start building.

Choose two sides of the box to start building along.  Here we’ve chosen the left side and the top as our starting point. 


By building we mean spacing your shapes in a way that best fills the space keeping in mind all of your design knowledge about space and color and so on.  In this case we’re flipping cats and adding fish, yarn and paw print to fill in space.  As we go along adding shapes you’ll notice that pretty soon you’ll have to start thinking about what’s going to be on the right side and the bottom of that box.


Because we want this to be a seamless repeat we need to get the exact shapes from the left to appear on the right. The same shapes from the top will need to be on the bottom.  If either of these are off then we’ll have a problem.

 

Getting the exact shape. Left to right

Every shape that is on or near the left side needs to appear on the right side in the exact position in respects of the vertical lines of the box. To do this you’ll need the selection/move tool. Here is why it is important to have a transparent background and your selection tool set up properly. See getting started steps above.

• Position the selection tool just above and to the left of the upper and most left shape. Then drag in a right and down motion. Moving all the way down and enough right until you have selected all of the shapes near or on the left vertical line of the box. This will select the layers you need.  When you release you should have something that looks like this.
  
• Now position the selection tool over left edge of the selected box. Don’t click yet. You must hold down option/alt before you click on the selection or it won’t copy. It will just move everything selected.  While holding option/alt key, so that it makes a copy, you’ll drag your selection straight across to the right vertical line of the box. Holding down the shift key, along with the option key, after you start moving will cause your selected shapes to move in a straight line. Stop when the edges of the box touch or if you have snap to layers on it will make a little jump to let you know you are there. It is a good idea to zoom in and make sure the boxes are lined up perfectly.
  
  
  
  
  
  You won’t need the new box that carried over. Its only purpose was to give you a clean line to move to. Delete the new box. Do not delete the original one.

Getting the exact shape. Top to bottom

We now have all the information along the right side of the repeat. In a way this makes the top line complete, and ready to move down. Again you’ll need the selection tool.

• Position the selection tool just above and to the left of the upper and most left shape again. This time drag all the way to the right and down enough to select all of the shapes on or near the top horizontal line of the box. When you release it should look like this.
  
  
  You’ll notice here that only one star actually touches the line, but more are selected. This will later help us see what kind of space we have left.
• Position the selection tool over the top horizontal line of the box. Again hold down the option key before you click. Drag your selection straight down this time. Hold down shift as you go. Stop when it connects to the bottom horizontal line of the box. 
  
  
  Again you can delete the new box. Do not delete the old one. Notice the space we have left.

What to do with the blank space?

Now that all of the information is around the box you can see the space you’ve taken up. At this point you have some choices to make as a designer. “Do I want lots of space between the shapes and just nudge stuff around until I like how it looks, or am I thinking that the spacing is fine for now so I’ll add a few pieces to fill the space.”  It’s up to you to decide when you face this choice.  Every pattern will give you new challenges anyway.

• For this pattern we are going to act like we got them in the right spot first go and then add a few shapes to the space.
  
  
  The pattern looks done for the most part, but there are still a few things we need to do get it cleaned up and see if it repeats.

 

 

 

See if it repeats… a very important step.

There are a few ways to check your pattern to see if it repeats. We’ll try one way with the least amount of steps for an image still in layers.  This way also works for images that are not in layers. Be sure to save your image before you do this next stage. Please follow these steps carefully to check your repeat. Don’t get rejected because your pattern doesn’t repeat.

Flatten your image if it is in layers. Layer> flatten image. After doing this save your image as “test” or re-name it something that you can delete later.  That way you don’t have a tone of working files. This is just an extra precaution if you want to keep your original in layers. You’ll be submitting flattened files, so it’s up to you if you want to keep a layered version.

• Use your rectangle marquee tool and set the style to fixed size. Type in the width and height of the repeat size you used. In this case it will be 5.05 by 5.05 in. Then click on the image to get a selection marquee and line it up with the box.
  
• Next step will be to define your pattern. Go to, Edit> Define Pattern. You can name it whatever you want.
• Open a new document and make around 3 times the width and height of the repeat size you made. So 15 x 15 inches should do it.
  
• Fill your new document with your pattern. Edit> fill. Select the pattern option for the fill. Then choose your pattern from the drop down menu.
  
• Use you marquee tool (already set to the repeat size. See getting started) and find the edges of your repeat. Click on the image and look carefully around this edge to make sure it all lined up.
  
  
  At this size you’ll get a good look at how your spacing is looking. It’s a good idea to go back in and shift anything you need to.

There will be a seamless transition from the left side to the right, and from the top to the bottom if all worked well.

Common problems

Be very careful when you shift your shapes around or edit them. Here are some common problems that can occur if shapes are edited then not carried over properly.