In this article, we’ll review several ways to cut out a shape in Illustrator. This tutorial was written using Adobe Illustrator CC 2020, but these instructions should work no matter which version of Illustrator you have, as long as you’re using vector elements and not a raster image.
How to Use a Shape as a Cookie Cutter
Imagine you have two shapes on the artboard in Illustrator–a rectangle and a circle. If you use the Divide Object Below command, you can use one shape like a cookie-cutter, creating a cutout through the other shape and deleting the shape you used as the cookie cutter. This is a great method for beginners because it’s so simple.
How to Cut Out a Shape Using the Knife Tool
You can use the Knife tool to slice multiple shapes. The Knife tool will cut it as long as a layer or shape isn’t locked.
How to Cut Out a Shape With the Scissors Tool
We’ve already taught you how to find the Scissors tool (it’s hidden in the submenu beneath the Eraser tool in the Tools panel). You can also use the keyboard shortcut C to activate the Scissors tool.
How to Cut Out a Shape With the Crop Tool
In Illustrator, the Crop tool isn’t on the regular toolbar. Instead, you can find it on the Pathfinder panel. Display the Pathfinder panel by selecting Windows > Pathfinder or using the keyboard shortcut Shift + Ctrl + F9 or Shift + Command + F9 on a Mac. Using the Pathfinder tool, you can put a shape on top of another object and tell Illustrator what part of the object you want to keep or eliminate. Let’s put the circle on top of the rectangle and use the Crop tool to create a new shape. You may find that instead of cutting out a shape, it might be easier to build a shape using the Shape Builder tool. We’ll cover that in a future tutorial.
How to Use a Clipping Mask to Cut Out a Shape
If you already know how to add a mask in Photoshop, this will be very familiar. In this example, let’s imagine we have a shape colored with a gradient. We can use another shape as a clipping mask so that only areas inside the second shape are visible. In other words, you can use clipping masks to hide parts of shapes.
Many Options With Adobe
All the Adobe Creative Cloud apps offer multiple ways of achieving the same effect. So, check our Illustrator tutorials and articles about Adobe Photoshop and InDesign. With practice, your graphic designs will be pixel-perfect!
