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- [Instructor] In this movie we'll create



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this translucent windshield.



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And we'll do so by converting

a standard linear gradient



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into a gradient mesh.



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And so I want you to notice something.



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If I select the windshield which,



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if you're working along with me,



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you'll need to do by

clicking on the top edge.



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If you click down here on the bottom edge



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you'll select the hood instead



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because the hood is in front.



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In any event, I'll select the windshield



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and I'll move it out of the way.



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And you can see that reveals

the interior of the car,



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which is all found on this

layer called interior.



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And so I suppose one option

would be to press Control Z,



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or Command + Z on the

Mac, to undo that move.



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And now I'll zoom in here.



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One option would be to click

on the word opacity here



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and change the blend mode to screen



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which is just going to

produce the same effect



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as shining light on that windshield.



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And that will let us see through

to the interior of the car.



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The problem is we still very obviously



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have a linear gradient.



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Now albeit, this gradient

happens to contain



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quite a few colors.



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And if you want to see what those are,



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you can select the gradient tool,



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which you can also get

by pressing the G key.



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And then go ahead and hover

over the gradient annotator



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and you can see that we've

got this sort of dull orange



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that transitions into

green, back to orange,



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then to a kind of sky blue

and, ultimately, to white.



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So I want you to see that we have a total



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of five colors in all,

which is going to translate



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to three row lines, incidentally.



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One at the green location,

one at the orange location,



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and one at blue.



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Alright, so let's see

what that looks like.



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I'll go ahead and press the V key



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to switch back to my black arrow tool.



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And I'll undo the change to the blend mode



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so that we, once again,

have an opaque windshield.



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Next, what you want to do

is go to the object menu



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and not choose create gradient mesh.



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If you do that, you'll just replace



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all those colors with

black, which is obviously



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not what we want.



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So I'll cancel out.



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Instead, you want to

return to the object menu



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and choose the Expand command.



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And notice that you

can expand the gradient



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either to objects.



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So for example, if I

were to select Specify



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and it said to 255 by

default, then I will end up



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with 255 very narrow rotated rectangles



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inside of a clipping mask,



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which is not what I'm looking for,



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instead, I want a gradient mesh.



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Now, we only need to expand

the fill, not the stroke,



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so go ahead and turn

off the stroke checkbox



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and then click OK.



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And you'll see the colors

shift ever so slightly.



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So, notice, this is before,



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this is the original linear gradient,



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which has some very obvious

bands of color in it,



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and this is the smoother

effect we get by converting



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the linear gradient to a gradient mesh.



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Now, if you were to go

over to the layers panel



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and twirl open the meshes layer,



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you would see that we have

this object called windshield.



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And notice over here on the far left side



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of the control panel that it's a group.



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We do not need that group.



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In fact, it's going to get in our way,



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so go to the object menu and

choose the Ungroup command



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or press control shift G or

command shift G on a Mac.



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Now notice that we have a

clipping group right here



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and we have this path outline

and this path right there



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is just the stroke.



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Notice that if I drag it

to a different location,



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we have a stroke with

no fill, in other words,



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this is a useless object to us,



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so I'll press the backspace

key or the delete key on a Mac



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to get rid of it and then I'll twirl open



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the clipping group and if

you look very closely up here



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at the top of the windshield, you'll see



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that we're only getting

half a stroke and, in fact,



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we really don't have any stroke at all,



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we're just revealing half of the stroke



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from the larger body

object in the background.



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So, I'll undo that move



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and I will target this path

which is the clipping mask



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here inside the expanded clipping group



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and then I'll click on

the second color swatch



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up here in the control panel



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and I'll select black and

that will automatically



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give me a line weight of one point



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which is exactly what I'm looking for.



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Alright, now I'll deselect

the object for a moment



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and I'll zoom out and then I'll

target this item right here,



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the second item inside the clipping group,



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and that is the gradient

mesh object itself,



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you can see that by

the word Mesh over here



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on the far left side of the control panel



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and it's actually a rectangle

masked inside the shape



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of the windshield.



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Alright, now I'll go ahead

and zoom in on this object



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and we're going to be

modifying a few colors



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from the color panel and so if

you're not seeing the panel,



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you can go to the Window menu

and choose the color command.



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You also want to make sure

that it's fully expanded,



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so that you can see the slider

bars and I've got the sliders



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set to HSB that is hue

saturation and brightness.



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Now, I don't want what

just happened to happen,



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I just got done filling

the entire mesh with white



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and so I'll press control

Z or command Z on a Mac



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to undo that change.



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Alright, now we're going

to modify a few points here



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by pressing the A key to

get the white arrow tool



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and then I'll go ahead and

select this bottom left point



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and you can see that the hue

is already set in advance



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to 50 degrees, the

saturation's approximately 30%,



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and the brightness value is

80% and the reason that we have



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these decimal values is

because this is the closest



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Illustrator can come

in the RGB color space.



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But just to make it a little

easier to follow along,



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I've gone ahead and listed

the HSB values for each one



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of the mesh points here

inside this Photoshop file.



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So, I just throw it up on screen



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so you have a chance to see it.



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I'll go ahead and switch

back to Illustrator



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and notice that the bottom

right point, if I click on it,



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is set to those very same HSB values



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and that's because this

was the first color stop



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in the linear gradient, so

it actually starts down here



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at the bottom and goes up to the top.



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And so, at least so far,

we're not really changing



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any colors here.



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I'll go ahead and click

on this mesh point.



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Notice that it's HSB values are

120, 20, and 50 respectively



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which is just fine, the same

goes for this mesh point



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down right and that's

because this entire row



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corresponds to the second color stop



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in that linear gradient.



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Now, the only change I want

to make to this mesh point



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is to reduce the opacity

value and so notice



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if I click on the word opacity up here,



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I can't change the blend mode,

not for a single mesh point,



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but I can dial in a different

opacity value if I like



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and so I'm going to take that

opacity value down to 80%.



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Alright, now I'll select

this guy and his HSB values



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are 50, 30, 80, which is just what I want.



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I do, however, want to

reduce the opacity to 60%



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and because I've a lot of D keys,



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I can do that just by tapping the six key.



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So, those D key shortcuts

are going to work



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even when you're adjusting mesh points.



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Now I'll select this guy

and I'm going to dial in



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some different values.



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I'm going to set the

hue value to 30 degrees



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which is going to create a

little bit of orange down here



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at this location and so

notice we now have something



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we couldn't pull off

with a linear gradient.



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We have not only colors

transitioning vertically



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but horizontally as well



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and I'll set the saturation value to 30%,



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that's pretty much where it is already,



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and I'll set the brightness value to 60%



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to produce this effect here.



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Alright, now I'll select this mesh point.



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Its colors are just fine

here in the color panel



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but I do want to reduce

the opacity value to 70%



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and so again because I loaded D keys,



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I'll just press the seven key



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and then I'll select this guy right here



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and this is going to

be a pretty modest edit



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but I'm going to take

the brightness value down



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from 100% to 80% like so



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and that will dim down

the colors in that corner.



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Alright, so I could stick

with what are essentially



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a bunch of horizontal rows

but as long as I'm working



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with the gradient mesh, I

might as well bend these



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segments a little bit and so I

decided to take these guys up



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like so and then I clicked on this segment



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and drag these control handles.



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Notice that you can't

drag a segment directly



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when you're working with mesh objects,



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you have to go ahead and

move the control handles.



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Alright, that takes care

of all of the modifications



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to the actual mesh itself

and so now I'll just go ahead



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and press the V key to

switch to my black arrow tool



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and I'll click on the windshield



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and that goes ahead and selects

the entire clipping group



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after which point I'll

click the word opacity



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up here in the control panel



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and I'll change the blend

mode for the entire object



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to screen in order to produce

this effect right here



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and now I'll deselect the windshield,



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I'll press control zero

or command zero on a Mac



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to zoom out, I'll go ahead and

twirl the meshes layer closed



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and I'll scroll down to the

bottom of the layers panel



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and I'll turn on this layer of white



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which is designed to cover

up the tracing template



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and that's just going to

give us a cleaner look



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where these background

windows are concerned.



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And that's how you turn a linear gradient



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which can look pretty darn fakey at times



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into a luminous translucent gradient mesh



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here inside Illustrator.