How I Make Seamless Repeating Patterns on Clip Studio iPad

Published: November 21st, 2024
Last modified: November 21st, 2024

I’ve been asked a few times how I make seamless repeating patterns, so here’s a little walkthrough on how I create patterns using Clip Studio Paint for iPad.

Create a new canvas that is PERFECTLY square – I tend to default to 4×4 inches at 300 dpi for printing on fabric goods, but feel free to start with a smaller/lower dpi canvas to practice. Use the paint bucket to fill a new layer with your desired background color for your pattern.

Tape File > Save or Save as… and call this file Pattern base.clip

Tap on this new background-color layer and tap Edit > Copy

Tap on File > Create New from Clipboard

Tap on Edit > Change Canvas Size… and double the size of the canvas – so if your pattern base is 4×4 inches, change the size of this new canvas to 8×8 inches – leave the Reference point at its default of the center and tap OK

Now you have a colored square in the center of your canvas.

Tap on File > Save or Save as… and call this file Pattern helper.clip

On this Pattern helper canvas, doodle your ideas for the pattern elements – I like to create both large elements and small elements for filler, and even if you don’t like some of your ideas, save them. I like to draw each shape in its own layer so I can easily move them around.

Once you have 3-4 pattern element ideas, we’re going to start arranging them into the pattern. Use the Move tool to drag one of your shapes so that is is partially off one of the colored square’s edges. I always avoid making any shape touch two edges, so don’t overlap any corners of your colored square.

Now, zoom way in so you can clearly see the edge of your colored square. Use the square Selection tool to select JUST the part of the art that is outside of the colored square. Then, use the Cut tool (it’s the icon with scissors that appears when you have something selected) to slice the art into two pieces.

Swipe inward on the left side of your iPad screen. This opens the panel of modifier keys. Press and hold the Shift button on this left panel and, at the same time, drag the art to the opposite inside edge of the colored square. Holding the Shift button ensures that when you drag/move your art, it stays locked to a grid, ensuring it is ONLY moving in the direction you want, not wobbling around and becoming misaligned.

You want all of your art to be inside the colored square!

Now you’re going to do this same basic thing for each of your pattern pieces! If you’re overlapping the right edge of the art, cut off everything right of the colored square, and drag it to the left inside edge of the colored square. Remember to hold Shift whenever you drag the sliced art pieces, so that they’re not misaligned.

Once you’re out of space on the edges, fill the middle. Try to space your assets out evenly, we don’t want anything too close, or it’ll be really eye-catching (in a bad way) on the final pattern.

Okay, now we’re ready to test it out as a repeating pattern!

Go to your Layers menu and select all the layers with your pattern assets by tapping the empty checkbox space to the right of the layer visibility eyeball symbol.. Don’t select the layer with the background color square, you don’t need it. Tap Edit > Copy and then open/switch to your Pattern base file. Tape Edit > Paste to paste in the layers with the art.

They should fit perfectly within the canvas, but if they don’t for some reason, make sure you keep all of the layers selected, or re-select them all, before using the Move tool to adjust the positioning. You don’t want to lose the relative position of the objects to each other.

Now go to File > Export to photo library and then Import > From photo library… and pick the exported image of your Pattern base. It will import as a new Object layer on your Layers panel.

Now go to Window > Material > Color pattern. Move the window so that you can also see the Layers panel. Click and drag the imported Object layer (it’ll have a little icon of a landscape) next to it on the Layers window) into the Color Pattern window.

Tap the new Material with your pattern image, and then tap the Settings gear icon. This will open the Material property window. Check off Tiling and leave the Tiling direction at the default of Vertical and horizontal and then tap OK

Tap-and-drag the material from the Color pattern window into the main canvas. This will create a new Object layer, and most likely fill your canvas with your new pattern.

You can resize the pattern by clicking any of the diagonal corners of the blue square. You can even rotate your pattern to see how it looks at different angles.

I like to draw a random blob shape and make the Object layer with the pattern a clipping layer by tapping on the icon to the left of the lighthouse icon on the Layer panel. I don’t know why, but I find it more fun to fiddle with the pattern on an irregular shape than just filling the whole canvas.

As rewarding as it is to see the pattern patterning, now you should check to see if anything is misaligned, or, if there are gaps that look awkward that need to be filled with something.

I like doodling a blob shape vaguely representing what I think would look best in one of these spaces. I do this in a new layer that I place on top of the art. Sometimes I deliberately leave an outline while I’m working, like below, so that I can more easily understand where these new pieces need to go (I can get “lost” in my own patterns otherwise).

Now it’s a process of revising and repeating! Go back to your Pattern helper file and adjust, add, and rearrange your elements to your heart’s content and then you can repeat the steps to create the pattern: copy and paste the assets from Pattern helper into your Pattern base file, export to photo library, import from photo library, drag the imported layer into your Color Pattern materials window, check off Tiling, and drag the pattern into your canvas to test/preview.

Remember to clean up the old work-in-progress versions of your pattern from the Color Pattern menu so you’re not spamming yourself with a bunch of nearly-identical outdated versions of your pattern.

Once you’re happy with your pattern, you can use it however you like – since I usually get my patterns printed on textiles, I will drag the pattern from my Color Pattern materials window into the template file for the textile product, then resize/rotate until I think it looks good.

If you’re going to use it on the web, you should be able to just export the square original version of the image from Pattern base as a png and tell your webpage to repeat-x and repeat-y within your web element.