Glassy Orb in Illustrator

I recently learned how to create a glassy effect in Illustrator, and I know this will be incredibly helpful to quite a few of my friends. Most of us, including myself until recently, were under the impression that you could only make a glassy effect in Photoshop. Well, now we can make our glassy effects in a vector format for easy resizing.

Step 1. Select the ellipse tool and create a circle with no stroke.

Step 2. Fill the circle in with the following color (#999933). You will be able to substitute this color for any of your choosing once you get the hang of the effect.

Step 3. Create a smaller circle and place it inside the larger circle like the image below illustrates. Select the smaller circle and fill it with the following color (#CCCC33)

*You will be able to substitute this color as well. You typically want to choose a color that is a lighter version of the larger circle’s color. It will be the highlight.

Step 4. Now, select both circles and go to Object>Blend>Make. You should now have a circle like the one below.

Step 5. Now, create an oval similar to the one below and fill it in with a black and grey gradient like so. Make sure that the grey is on top and the black is on the bottom.

Step 6. Select the gradient oval, go to the Transparency Tab, and choose the Screen setting.

There you are. You have your easy, flexible and resizable glassy effect in Illustrator. I hope this was helpful.