How to Create a Cartoon Giraffe in Gravit Designer
In this tutorial, we’ll create a cute giraffe with geometric shapes in Gravit Designer. It is not necessary to have drawing skills — we’ll be starting simple and design our way to the final result with basic geometric shapes, boolean operations, and stroke settings.
By the end of this tutorial, you not only have created a cute giraffe with geometric shapes but will also be able to apply this technique to your future illustrations.
Creating a new document
Open Gravit Designer and create a document with 1000 x 1000 px.
Create a Layer Group by clicking on the icon near the trash can symbol in the Layers panel and name it “Giraffe.” Select it to start creating your design.
Drawing the head of the giraffe
Step 1 —The head
To draw the head, create a rectangle with the Rectangle tool (R) with a size of 169 x 221 px and fill it with yellow (#F1C40F). Select the Subselect tool (D) to corner the edges by dragging the orange dots.
Step 2 — The nostrils and mouth
Use the Ellipse tool (E) and hold Shift to make a 177 x 177 px brown (#865946) circle.
Now create a small circle with 20 x 20 px for the the first nostril and fill it with a dark brown color (#462E26). Hold Shift + Alt and drag the circle to the side to create to copy for the other nostril.
This is probably a good time to create a so called swatch, so that you can easily reuse colors later. Click on fill color box in the Inspector, go to Swatches and click on the plus icon to add a swatch. From now on, when you introduce a new color, also add it here. Or the other way around, if you want to reuse a color, pick it from here.
Now we’ll add the mouth. Create a 100 x 100 px circle and hide the Fill color. Then click on the Borders panel and set the Width to 6 and the color to the one from the head. If you haven’t done so yet, add it as a swatch.
After that enter the Advanced Stock Settings to set the Ends and Joins to Round. Align the new circle below the nostrils.
Take the Knife Tool (K) and drag a horizontal line to split the circle in two. After that, delete the top half. Now you have a giraffe with a smiling mouth.
Tip: I made some adjustments to the head. I increased the corners in the Appearance panel to give it a rounder form. Feel free to make changes as necessary.
Step 3 — The eyes
Now, let’s add the eyes. Make a 20 x 20 px black circle. Again, hold Shift + Alt and drag the circle to the side to create a copy.
If you like, you can create eyelashes to make your giraffe more lovely. Select the Path tool (P) to create them with two clicks. Then set the Width to 2 in the Borders Panel. In the Advanced Stroke Settings, set the Ends and Join to Round again. Repeat the process for the other eyelashes.
Step 4 — Hairy horns and ears
Let’s create the short hairy horns. Enter the rectangle tool again and create a 7 x 88 px rectangle. Like before, duplicate it while holding Shift + Alt. After that, create two circles with a size of 20 x 20 px each. Use the same brown fill color like for the snout. Select both the rectangle and the circle and align them to the horizontal center using the alignment icons in the top right of the Inspector (the right panel of Gravit Designer).
Select both horns, group them (Ctrl/Cmd + G) and Send to back (right-click with the mouse > Arrange). You can also select the object and press Shift+Ctrl/Cmd+Down.
Now for drawing the ears — create a rectangle with a size of 30 x 106 px and change the Corner in the Appearance Panel to 35. You can also click on the Subselect tool to create the rounded edges. Fill with the same color as the head (#F1C40F).
Duplicate the object pressing Shift + Ctrl/Cmd + D, hold Alt + Shift and shrink it with the mouse. Fill the ellipse with a dark yellow color (#FFCF51).
Group the ellipses (Ctrl/Cmd +G) and rotate the group using the handles at the corners on the canvas. To do so, enter the Selection tool (V), move the cursor outside so that the pointer changes, and then start to rotate your object.
Create a copy of the small ear holding Shift + Alt and rotate the object mirror-inverted. Feel free to adjust the ears, for example to make them a little shorter.
Creating the body of the giraffe
Step 1: The body
Take the Rectangle tool (R) and make a 50 x 200 px shape for the long neck. Pick the Subselect tool to create the corners. You can also go to the Appearance panel and set the Corner to 12. Send the long neck to back (Shift + Ctrl/Cmd + Down).
For creating the body, we’ll use the Rectangle tool (R) again. After that, in the Appearance panel, set the Corner to 45.
Select the body and the long neck and click on Union in the toolbar (Merge).
Step 2: Legs, patterned coat and tail
Create another rectangle with a size 40 x 222 px and duplicate it three times. Arrange them below the body to form the legs. Fill the first and third leg with the dark yellow from the ears (you should already have a swatch) and the second and fourth with the light yellow from the body.
For the long tail use the Rectangle tool (R) one more time and make a 6 x 186 px. Fill it with the dark brown color from the nostrils and use the Appearance panel to set the Corner to 2.
Use the ellipse tool again to create the patterned coat. You don’t need to worry about creating perfect circles, that’s not necessary. Create four or more ellipses and fill with the brown you just used for the tail.
Now we need to mask the patterned coat. Select the body and the circles, then click on Clip in the toolbar to make a masked group.
Step 3: The feet
Start with a circle of 54 x 54 px, that you fill with a brown from the tail.
Use the Knife tool (K) and press Shift to horizontal cut at the center of the circle. Then enter the Subselect tool (D) and press Delete to make the other half of the circle disappear.
Click on the half circle and make three more copies holding Shift + Alt. Color the first and the third with the dark yellow from the legs and the second and fourth with the dark brown from before you saved as a swatch.
Hooray! We finished our cartoon giraffe. A few rectangles in the back serve as the sky and the meadow.
Thank you, and don’t forget to share your illustration on Gravit’s social platforms or in the comments.
