How to Make a Spiral Page Layout in Adobe Illustrator

An unconventional layout such as I'm working with for page 09 of Infinite Spiral might seem intimidating to some artists.  However, by using a few of Illustrator's tools, creating a spiral layout like the thumbnail below is a much simpler task than you'd think.

Let's walk through the process.


Step One: (After opening Illustrator and creating a new Document [I use 11x17 for a 50% reduction]) Select your Spiral Tool.

Step Two:  Create a Spiral by Clicking and Dragging.  You should be able to rotate and size as desired while creating your spiral.

Step Three:  Using the arrow tool, you can center and rotate the spiral until it looks like your thumbnail or vision for the page.

Step Four:  Adjust the line width so that the lines are as wide as you want the panel gutter or space between panels to be.  This is important, or you will eventually have no space between your panels.

Step Five: Select the Arc Tool, which is under the same Menu as the Spiral Tool in your Toolbar.

Step Six:  Click and pull out arcs as desired.  They should be the same line width as the spiral.  If not, adjust as necessary by selecting them.

Step Seven:  Create enough arcs to outline the panels in your thumbnail.  Make sure the lines overlap each other so we can use our friendly Pathfinder tool in a few steps.

Step Eight:  Select ALL then go to Object>Path>Outline Stroke.  This will turn your lines into a shape.

Step Nine:  At this point you should be able to add black outlines if you so desire.  (You don't have to do this, but I do to make sure the Outline Strokes worked and that the shapes still overlap).

Select ALL again and then open the Pathfinder Tool (it is also under Window), and use the UNITE tool (the two boxes merging).

You should now have an awesome shape that looks a bit like a chambered nautilus.

 

Step Ten:  Create a rectangle the size of your page using the rectangle tool.

Step Eleven:  Send that rectangle to the BACK!  You can do this by going to Object>Arrange>Send to Back.

Step Twelve:  Once again, Select ALL.

Step Thirteen:  Use the Pathfinder but this time select the Minus Front Tool (to the right of the Unite Tool) in order cut the spiral from your rectangle, creating neat panels with consistent space between.

Step Fourteen:  Now you just have to clean up your end points and adjust linewidths to your desired panel border weight.

Final Product: After that you should have a panel layout similar to what I've created for page 09!  Happy Comicking!