Dimensional Raindrops Tutorial

[justwilliam]

I stumbled across this tutorial and thought I could give it a shot as it looked fairly straightforward. (I apologise that it is for Illustrator.)

 

Right away, it was telling me to do things that I could not figure out how to do (as I am using AD, and not very well at that), so I got quite frustrated. I tried all of the Boolean doodads, I rearranged my layers and tried the doodads again, I scratched my head, I used strong language, and then I made myself a nice sandwich eating it as far away from the computer as I could - all before I finally decided to forget about the silly tutorial and just look at the final image and try to figure it out for myself.

 

Well, I think I did it to that beginner's level of satisfaction which I like to call, "close enough". I then proceeded to goof it all up by adding a lot of crazy and uncalled for cr*p - oh well.

 

Anyway, I was wondering if any of the more guru-like folk here could look at this tutorial and explain how to do the 'step 2' part where the drops are 'cut out' with the background colour remaining. That is the part where I abandoned the tutorial completely - didn't get very far, did I.

 

Here is the tutorial:  http://design.tutsplus.com/tutorials/create-a-dimensional-raindrop-desktop-wallpaper-illustration-in-adobe-illustrator--cms-22904in the event that any others may wish to follow it.

 

Below is my attempt (with the additional falderal, but it is while doing just such falderal that I am learning the tools - such that I am).

 

EDIT: I added the original tutorial copycat version below as well.

[Jakerlund]

Very nice indeed, thanks for sharing :)