Design your first button

Related Videos

• Create your first meeting board in FigJam

  Project overview

  • Product: FigJam
  • Topics: Sections, widgets, stickies, images, and stamps
  • Length: 10 minutes

  FigJam is a great place to host all kinds of meetings and collaborative exercises with your team. In this project, we’ll show you how to put together a board to make your weekly syncs productive, engaging, and fun.

  

  With these steps, you’ll create a board that includes sections for a team roll call, a show and tell exercise to recap everyone’s weekend, and a space for sharing and discussing project updates.

  Create a new file

  First, let’s create a new FigJam file.

  You can do this by clicking the New FigJam file tile in the file browser or by typing figjam.new or figma.com/jam in your browser’s address bar.

  Add sections

  Next, let’s add a few sections. Sections let you easily organize objects on board.

  1. Click in the bottom toolbar or press ⇧ShiftS.
  2. Click and drag on the board to create a section. Make it nice and big so it can fit all your stickies, shapes, and images.

  

  Duplicate the sections

  Duplicate the section a few times to create five total sections by pressing ⌘Command / ControlD and dragging the new sections to their location on the board.

  

  Give them each their own color using the color picker in the section’s properties menu.

  Rename the sections

  

  We’re breaking up this weekly sync into a few exercises and give the sections a name so we know what goes in each. Let’s name the first section Roll call.

  1. Select the section.
  2. Click or double-click the title field.
  3. Type “Roll call” and press Return/Enter.
  4. Name the remaining four sections Show & tell, General reminders, Project updates, and Question of the week.

  

  Learn more about sections in FigJam →

  Add widgets

  What is a widget?

  Widgets are custom objects you can add to yourFigJam board. They allow you to level up your sessions with different tools, data from external applications, or new ways to play.

  Learn more about widgets →

  In the Roll call section, add the Photo booth widget so your team can add their selfie to the board.

  1. Click More in the stack of recent widgets and stickers in the bottom toolbar.
  2. In the Widgets tab, search "photo booth”.
  3. Select the widget to add it to your board, then drag it into the Roll call section.
  4. Click the red button and strike a pose!

  While you’re at it, add the Timeline widget to the Project updates section so you can visualize the team’s workload, provide updates, and discuss any blockers. Finally, use the Asana or Jira widgets to embed open tasks.

  Add stickies

  Next, we’ll use the General reminders section for updates from the company or for the team. Add a few placeholder stickies or mention something the team should know.

  1. Click in the toolbar of press S.
  2. Click an area of the board to place the sticky note.
  3. Start typing.

  By default, stickies you add to the board will have your name on them, but you can click to turn this off from the properties menu when you select the sticky.

  Add images

  Use the Show and tell section to share personal highlights, like what you did over the weekend. Get the conversation started before the meeting by adding your own images and stickies to this section. This shows everyone joining the call how to use this section.

  To add an image, drag and drop a file form your computer or:

  1. Hover over the pile of recently used icons in your toolbar.
  2. Click the More button to open the modal.
  3. Select the More tab.
  4. Select Images.
  5. Choose an image from your computer.

  Figma will place the image in the center of your viewport. Once the image is placed, you can edit and move it around the board.

  Tip

  You can also paste an image form your clipboard and use the keyboard shortcut ⌘ Command⇧ShiftK/ControlShiftK to add images.

  Learn more about placing images in FigJam →

  Add stamps

  Let everyone know you placed that image on the board by placing your stamp on it.

  To add a stamp:

  1. Select the Stamp tool. There are a few ways to do this:

     • Click in the toolbar.
     • Press the keyboard shortcut E.
     • Right-click the board and select Stamp.

  2. Click on your stamp from the stamp wheel.

  3. Click on the board or on an object to place the stamp.

  

  If you haven’t added an avatar to your account, your stamp will be your initials.

  Have fun

  Finally, we love to have a section for a Question of the week. This prompt helps us connect on a human level once we are done talking business. It always results in a flurry of emotes, stamps, high-fives, and sharing of some hot takes. For example, the Product Education team at Figma can’t seem to agree on the best ripeness level of a banana.

  This week, we have to decide what we want to do for our upcoming team offsite, so I’ll add the top three suggestions to a section and run a voting session during the meeting to pick a winner. I want to keep this a secret until the end of the meeting, so I’ll select the section and click to hide the contents until it’s time.

  Save board as a template

  Keep all your syncs for a given period of time in the same file for reference. Let’s select the core sections of our meeting, duplicate them, and place them in a new section called template so we can use it in this file in the coming weeks.

  We can also save this file as a team template and use it to create new files going forward.

  To publish a FigJam file as a template:

  1. Click the Share button in the top toolbar.
  2. Select the Publish tab, then click Publish as a template. If the file is in your drafts, FigJam will prompt you to move the file to a project.
  3. Enter in a name, description, and thumbnail image for the template.
  4. Select if you want to Publish to either your organization or current team. If set to your organization, anyone in the organization can use it. If set to current team, only members of the team the file is in can use the template.
  5. Click Publish.

  You can find more templates in FigJam and the Figma Community for exercises like brainstorms, design crits, mind maps, and more.

  Feel like adding to what you’ve built?

  Here are some ideas for next steps:

  • Try a template
  • Invite visitors to an open session
• Create pixel art in Figma design
  Project overview

  • Product: Figma design
  • Topics: Frames, layout grids, pixel grid, shapes, color
  • Length: 20 minutes

  In this project, we’re going to create some pixel art using Figma design.

  Pixel art is a fun form of digital art created using pixels as building blocks. Pixel art is a beginner-friendly medium that is accessible to almost everyone, even if you don’t have any drawing experience.

  Pixel art can be used to create things like fun illustrations, cross-stitch patterns, or retro-looking animations. This project is a great way to become familiar with using layout and pixel grids— important tools for creating precise designs.

  This project will walk you through illustrating a pixel heart. To create this design, we’ll do the following:

  1. Add a frame
  2. Configure the layout and pixel grids
  3. Create a color palette
  4. Outline the heart
  5. Fill in the heart

  If you follow along step-by-step, your final illustration will look like this:

  

  Add a frame

  Let’s start by creating a frame.

  What is a frame?

  Frames are the main building blocks of Figma. A frame is a container that holds design elements such as shapes, text, and images. You can use them to organize and structure design elements on the canvas.

  A frame can be any size and can contain any number of design elements. Frames can also be nested within other frames to create complex designs with multiple levels of hierarchy.

  1. Click the Frame tool in the toolbar or press F.
  2. Click on the canvas. Figma adds a 100 W x 100 H frame by default. Notice that when you add a frame, it gets added to the Layers panel in the left sidebar.
  3. From the Design panel in the right sidebar, change the width to 120 and the height to 110.

  

  This will be where we build the pixel heart. To make sure our heart is pixel perfect, let’s enable a layout grid for the frame.

  Configure the layout and pixel grids

  Layout grids help align objects within a frame. They also provide visual structure to help keep designs logical and consistent across different platforms and devices.

  To enable a layout grid, select the frame you just created and click the Plus next to Layout grid in the right sidebar to enable the grid. You’ll see a red grid appear on the frame. Click Layout grid settings to open the layout grid settings and make sure your grid size is 10 points. You can also change the grid color and opacity from here if desired.

  If you zoom in, you’ll see that each space in the grid is 10 pixels x 10 pixels which is perfect because we’re going to be using 10x10 squares as our building blocks.

  The layout grid will help us visually check to see that everything is in line but we can go one level deeper and use the pixel grid to really keep things organized.

  What’s the difference between pixel and layout grids? The pixel grid is a static grid in digital imaging that cannot be modified. Each square in the pixel grid represents a single pixel, when exported at 1x resolution. Layout grids aren’t reliant on the pixel grid; meaning that they aren’t dependent on specific resolutions or dimensions. You can modify layout grids to fit the needs of your designs, such as an 8 point grid or a 10 point grid.

  Use the following shortcut to toggle the pixel grid on or off:

  • Mac: ⌘ Command ‘
  • Windows: Control ‘

  See the difference?

  

  While we’re here, let’s make sure the Snap to pixel grid setting is enabled to make it even easier to place things where we need them. Click the Main menu, hover over Preferences, and make sure there’s a check next to Snap to pixel grid.

  

  Create a color palette

  We’re going to use 10 x 10 squares to build our heart. To add a square to the canvas, select the Rectangle tool in the toolbar or press R and click on the canvas.

  By default, Figma adds a 100 W x 100 H square. You can resize the square by either selecting a handle and dragging your cursor while holding Shift or by typing the desired dimensions in the Width and Height fields in the Design panel. Using either method, resize the square to 10 W x 10 H.

  

  We have our first building block! Because our heart is going to be four colors, let’s duplicate this block so we have our color palette at the ready. Select the square and use the Duplicate shortcut:

  • Mac: ⌘ Command D
  • Windows: Control D

  By default, Figma places the duplicated square directly on top of the original square. Drag it to the side and duplicate it twice more. Line up the four squares above the frame.

  We want our heart to be more colorful than the default gray. Select each square one at a time and use the Fill setting in the right sidebar to change the fill to the following:

  • Square 1 (outline color): #C771D3
  • Square 2 (fill color): #F5C0EF
  • Square 3 (shadow color): #E99BF4
  • Square 4 (highlight color): #FAE4F8

  To keep things orderly, let’s name the squares of our color palette to match what they will be used for. Double-click on the layer name in the left sidebar or use the following shortcut and enter a new name for each of the squares:

  • Mac: ⌘Command R
  • Windows: Ctrl R

  Our color palette is done and now we’re ready to outline the heart.

  

  Outline the heart

  Select the Outline color square in your color palette and use the duplicate shortcut to copy it. Drag the new square into the frame. Because we enabled Snap to pixel grid, you’ll notice the square snapping to the underlying pixel grid which also happens to line up with the layout grid. We’re going to place this block in the sixth column on the bottom row. We are then going to place five more blocks in a diagonal line going up and to the left. Instead of creating a new square every time, select the existing square and duplicate it using the same shortcut as before.

  Click and drag the square up one row and left one column. Make sure to align it with the layout grid. With the second square still selected, use the Duplicate shortcut again. After placing one duplicated shape, Figma assumes you want to continue placing shapes in the same pattern and automatically places the new square up one row and left one column. Duplicate the square four more times until you get to the edge of the frame. If you get stuck, watch following GIF:

  

  Once you hit the edge of the frame, continue duplicating and placing squares in the following pattern:

  1. Three squares up
  2. One square up and to the right
  3. One square up and to the right
  4. Two squares right
  5. One square down and to the right

  When you’re done, your file should look similar to the following:

  We could continue duplicating squares to finish the outline but let’s save some time and duplicate this half instead.

  Before duplicating, let’s group what we have in the frame so far. Groups allow you to combine layers together so they can be treated like a single object.

  Click and drag your cursor to select all of the squares in the frame and use the shortcut:

  • Mac: ⌘ Command G
  • Windows: Control G

  You’ll notice that the Layers panel in the left sidebar now only displays one layer named “Group 1”. Click on the group and use the duplicate shortcut again to add a second group. With “Group 2” selected, right-click on the group and select Flip horizontal. Drag the second half of the outline in place, using the red guides to align it with the first half. Then select both groups and use the Group shortcut again to group the two halves together.

  If you get stuck, watch the following GIF:

  

  Double-click on the new “Group 3” layer and rename it to “Outline”. We’re done with this layer so let’s lock it. Locking layers helps prevent objects from incorrectly getting moved or modified. To lock this layer, select the outline layer and click the Lock icon in the left sidebar. To unlock a layer, click lock again.

  Our outline looks great! Now it’s time to fill it in.

  Fill in the heart

  Use the Duplicate shortcut to duplicate the Fill color square from your color palette. Drag the new square into the frame.

  All we need to do now is duplicate the square enough times to fill the inside of the heart.

  Tip: You can select and duplicate multiple blocks at once to fill in the heart more quickly.

  

  We could stop right here but let’s give our heart a little flair by adding shadows and highlights.

  To add the shadow, we’re going to select blocks along the left side of the heart’s inner fill. You can select multiple blocks at the same time by holding Shift while you click. Select the blocks show in the image below and change their fill to color code #E99BF4. You can do this by entering the color code in the Fill field or press I to enable the eye dropper and sample the Shadow color in your color palette.

  

  Finally, we’ll highlight a couple blocks on the right side by changing the color code to #FAE4F8 using the same method you used to add the shadow.

  Want to quickly change colors in bulk? You can use the Selection colors feature to change colors applied to objects in a selection. Select the frame and navigate to the Selection colors setting in the right sidebar. You should see five colors listed there. Ignore #FFFFFF since that’s the frame’s fill color. Changing the code of the other colors to adjust the fill of all objects with that color applied. Try it out to change your heart to shades of blue, yellow, or purple!

  

  What’s next

  Congratulations! You just created pixel art in Figma design. If you’re looking for another challenge, try recreating the pixel cat below using the tools we learned today.If you design something you're extra proud of, we'd love to see it! Mention us on Twitter @Figma or publish it to the Figma Community.

• Create a basic wireframe and prototype

  Project overview

  • Product: Figma design
  • Topics: Frames, shapes, text, prototyping, groups, renaming layers
  • Length: 20 minutes

  In this project, we’ll learn how to create a basic wireframe and prototype of a mobile app.

  Let’s imagine you’ve come up with a new million dollar app idea…This or That. In the app, users will be presented with two options, and they need to pick only one. Genius! Before you finalize your logo and start picking out company swag, you’ll want to design some basic wireframes and prototypes to test out your app idea with users.

  Wireframes are low fidelity mockups of webpages or apps. You can use wireframes to quickly create multiple iterations of what your final product could looks like—without spending too much time focusing on things like color, images, or other elements of design.

  You can take your wireframes to the next level by using prototypes. Prototypes are designs with interactive elements. They help you design, test, and show how users will engage with and navigate through your product.

  Together, wireframes and prototypes help you plan out how users will engage with and navigate through your app.

  By the end of this project, you’ll have experience working with frames, shapes, text, and prototyping in Figma. Let’s get started.

  

  Design a wireframe with frames, shapes, and text

  To build our wireframe, we’ll use the following objects:

  • Two frames to contain the designs
  • Seven rectangles to represent the images and buttons on the app
  • Four text layers to identify key button labels

  Create a file

  To start, we need a new design file.

  1. Log in to your Figma account from figma.com.
  2. From the file browser, click Drafts.
  3. Click New design file.

  Tip: You can visit figma.new from your web browser to quickly create new design files.

  Add the first frame

  What is a frame?

  Frames are the main building blocks of Figma. A frame is a container that holds design elements such as shapes, text, and images. You can use them to organize and structure design elements on the canvas.

  A frame can be any size and can contain any number of design elements. Frames can also be nested within other frames to create complex designs with multiple levels of hierarchy.

  Each frame represents a different page of our app. We also want to design our app for mobile devices, so we’ll use preset frame sizes. For this project, let’s focus on the following two frames:

  • A “This or That” frame that shows two options
  • A “This” frame that shows what happens when the user pick “This”

  Let’s start with the “This or That” frame.

  1. Click the Frame icon from the toolbar, or press F.
  2. From the Design panel on the right sidebar, select the iPhone 14 Pro preset size.

  

  Now that we a frame, let’s rename it. Establishing a clear naming structure makes it easier to find and manage layers in your files.

  1. From the layers panel, double click on the name of the frame you just placed on the canvas.
  2. Rename the frame to "This or That" and and press return (Mac) or enter (Windows).

  

  Add shapes

  Since we don’t need to get into too much detail with colors, stylings, and design, we can use basic shapes to represent the layout of our app.

  Let’s add rectangles to the "This or That" frame to represent the two options.

  1. Select the Rectangle tool or press R and click inside the "This or That" frame.
  2. Use the Width and Height fields in the right sidebar to enter in pixel values for the shape. We’ve set the width of our rectangle to 319, and the height to 240.
  3. Click and drag the rectangle to place it towards the top of the frame. Figma will attempt to align the object with others around it by automatically snapping to them—in this case, we’ll snap the rectangle in the center of the frame.
  4. To customize the fill color, select the rectangle and then open the color picker from the Fill section on the right sidebar. We’ve used hex code #8ED3E2 as our fill color.

  

  We want the second rectangle to be the exact same size, so let’s duplicate the first rectangle.

  1. Select the rectangle, and press Command + D (Mac) or Control + D (Windows) to duplicate.
  2. The new rectangle is placed directly on top of the first rectangle. Click and drag the second rectangle to the middle of the frame.
  3. Change the fill color of the second rectangle. We’ve used hex code #D48C8C as the fill color.

  Looks great! Take a moment to rename the two rectangle layers you’ve added. Name the top rectangle "This Image", and the bottom Rectangle "That Image".

  Now that you know how to add and modify shapes, add two more rectangles to represent the "This Button" and the "That Button". Each rectangle has a width of 130, and a height of 95. Make sure to rename the layers. When you’re done, your frame should look something like this:

  

  Add text

  Our first frame is almost done. Let’s add some text to identify the "This" and "That" buttons.

  1. Select the Text tool from the toolbar, or press T.
  2. Click on the bottom left rectangle and type “This”.
  3. With the text layer selected, use the Text settings to adjust the size to 24.
  4. Click and drag the text layer to move it towards the center of the bottom rectangle. Figma will try and align the text layer to the center of the rectangle by providing a red guide as a visual indicator.

  

  Right now, the text layer is just sitting above the rectangle layer. We want to combine those two layers into a group, so that they can be treated as a single object.

  To group these layers, select both objects by clicking and dragging your cursor across them on the canvas, capturing them in the blue selection box. Then, use the following keyboard shortcut to create a group:

  • macOS: Command + G
  • Windows: Control + G

  The layers panel in the left sidebar now only displays one layer named “Group 1”. Rename it to “This Button”.

  

  Now that you know how to add text layers and create groups, create a “That Button”. When you’re done, your design should look something like this:

  

  Create the second frame

  Now that our “This or That” frame is complete, we need to think about what the next frame is going to look like.

  If the user clicks "This Button", then “This Image” should get larger and “That Image” should disappear.

  We don’t need to start from scratch—let’s just duplicate our first frame by clicking Command + D (Mac) or Control + D (Windows). Rename the new frame “This”.

  Remove “That Image” by selecting the objects and pressing delete.

  

  Next, expand the size of “This Image” so that it takes up the majority of the frame.

  

  Add prototyping

  We’ve finished creating a wireframe for two pages of our wildly exciting new mobile app.

  Now, we want to provide some more clear guidance on how these two pages work together. How does a user get from the "This or That" frame to the "This" frame? What kinds of interactions and animations can we expect when navigating between the two pages?

  We can answer the above questions with prototyping.

  What is prototyping?

  Prototyping allows you to create interactive flows that explore how a user may interact with your designs. In Figma, prototypes are made by building connections between objects. Each connection consists of a trigger (i.e., what starts the interaction) and an action (i.e., what is the result).

  Learn more about prototyping →

  When users click "This Button" on the “This or That” frame, we want them to be directed to the “This” frame.

  Let’s create a prototype connection to build the interaction:

  1. Click the Prototype tab on the right sidebar.
  2. Hover over the "This Button" layer on the "This or That" frame.
  3. Click the blue plus sign on the edge of the button, then drag the connection to “This" frame. This opens up the Interaction details modal.
  4. From the dropdown menu, set the trigger to On tap.
  5. Set the action to Navigate to. From the dropdown menu, set the destination to “This” frame.
  6. From the Animations dropdown menu, select Smart Animate.

  Tip: Smart animate helps create advanced animations by looking for matching layer names between frames. Since we have layers on each frame labeled "This Image" and "This Button", we’re able to create an animation that automatically applies a transition between the two frames. Learn more about smart animate →

  

  Once you’ve created an interaction, exit out of the Interaction details modal. Press the Present button on the toolbar to test it out.

  

  Congratulations, you’re all done!

  Feel like experimenting with what you’ve built? Here are some ideas:

  • Design a "That" frame, and add more interactions to show what happens if users click "That Button".
  • Add a "Next" button on the "This" frame, so that users can move on to their next choice.
  • Explore prototyping by changing your interaction animation types and seeing how the prototype changes
• Create an illustration in Figma design
  Project overview

  • Product: Figma design
  • Topics: Shapes, color, groups, layer organization, frames
  • Length: 20 minutes

  In this project, we’re going to illustrate a magic potion in Figma design. Creating illustrations is a fun way to become familiar with the Figma editor and tools. No worries if you’re new to illustrating; we’ll walk through using basic shapes, groups, colors, and frames. We’ll also learn about how layer organization can impact your designs.

  If you follow along step-by-step, your final illustration will look similar to the following:

  

  We’ll create our magic potion by doing the following:

  1. Create the bottle
  2. Fill the bottle with magic potion 
  3. Top it off with a cork 
  4. Add some final details
  5. (Optional) Frame your design and export it

  Create the bottle

  We’re going to create the bottle using the Ellipse tool, the Rectangle tool, and a group.

  Add the shapes

  The Shape tools are located in the toolbar. Click the arrow to reveal the other shape options.

  

  We’re going to add one ellipse and two rectangles to the canvas:

  • To add an ellipse: Select the Ellipse tool or press [O] and click on the canvas
  • To add a rectangle: Select the Rectangle tool or press [R] and click on the canvas

  Tip: You can also add shapes by clicking on the canvas and dragging your cursor. You’ll see the shape’s dimensions under the bottom edge as you resize the shape. Hold Shift while dragging the shape to create perfect squares and circles.

  Resize the shapes

  Now that we have our building blocks, it’s time to resize them. You can resize objects by either selecting a handle and dragging your cursor or by typing the desired dimensions in the Width and Height fields in the Design panel.

  

  Use either method to resize the shapes to the following dimensions:

  • Ellipse: 200 W x 200 H
  • Rectangle 1: 100 W x 100 H
  • Rectangle 2: 120 W x 40 H

  On the 120 x 40 rectangle, we also need to round the corners so the lip of our bottle doesn’t look so sharp. Select the rectangle and enter “10” in the Corner radius field in the Design tab.

  

  Align the shapes

  Now that we have our shapes, we should align them so they look more like a bottle. Click and drag a shape to move it around the canvas. As you move objects, you’ll notice red guides appear. These help you align the object to other objects on the canvas.

  Tip: After placing your shapes, select all of them and use the Align horizontal centers setting in the Display tab to make sure everything is nice and centered.

  Align the shapes so that they look similar to the following:

  

  Group the shapes

  Our bottle is looking great. Let’s organize things before continuing. If you look at the Layers panel in the left sidebar, you’ll notice that each shape is on its own layer.

  

  We can simplify things by grouping these layers together. Groups allow you to combine layers so they can be treated like a single object.

  To group multiple layers, select them and use the shortcut:

  • macOS: Command + G
  • Windows: Control + G

  You’ll notice that the Layers panel in the left sidebar now only displays one layer named “Group 1”. Naming layers is another great way of staying organized in Figma. Double-click on the layer and rename it to “Bottle”.

  

  Add some color

  Let’s give our bottle some color. Select the bottle and click on the Fill setting in the right sidebar to open the color picker. For this tutorial, we’re going to use the color code #DEDCF9. You can enter the code in the Fill field or use the color picker to select a different color.

  

  Once you’ve changed the fill color, it’s time to lock this layer. Locking layers helps prevent objects from incorrectly getting moved or modified. To lock this layer, select the bottle shape and click the Lock icon in the left sidebar. To unlock a layer, click the Unlock icon.

  Our bottle is complete. Now it’s time to fill it with the magic potion.

  Check in: Does your file look similar to the following?

  Create the magic potion

  Add an ellipse

  Use the Ellipse tool to add an ellipse to the canvas and resize it to 175 x 175.

  Stuck? Recall how we added and resized shapes when we created the bottle.

  Drag the ellipse on top of the bottle shape and use the red guides to help you align it. Change the ellipse’s fill color like you changed the bottle color in the last section. For this project, we’re going to use the color code #E99BF4. You can enter this code in the Fill field or use the color picker to select a different color.

  Modify the ellipse

  We’re going to use the Edit object setting to make it look like our potion is sloshing around in the bottle.

  Select the ellipse and click Edit object in the toolbar to enter vector edit mode. Vector edit mode lets you manipulate the individual points of an object without changing the entire shape.

  While in vector edit mode, click on the top point of the ellipse and drag it down and to the side. If you get stuck, watch the following GIF:

  

  When you’re satisfied with how your potion looks, click Done in the toolbar to exit vector edit mode. Next, we’ll add some bubbles.

  Add bubbles using the ellipse tool

  The Ellipse tool is getting a workout in this project. We’re going to use it to add some bubbles to our potion bottle.

  Drag the Ellipse tool to create several small bubbles. They don’t all have to be the same size but make sure they are small enough to fit inside the bottle. We used a mix of 6 x 6 and 12 x 12 ellipses. Before moving on, be sure to change the fill of your ellipses to something a bit more colorful. We used the color code #985DF6.

  Once you’ve placed the bubbles in your bottle, drag your cursor over all of the bubble ellipses and the larger potion ellipse and them group them using the shortcut:

  • macOS: Command + G
  • Windows: Control + G

  You’ll notice that all of the ellipse layers in the left sidebar are condensed into one layer named “Group 2”. Rename the layer to “Potion” and click to lock it.

  Check in: Does your file look similar to the following?

  

  Create the cork

  We'll create a cork using the Rectangle tool.

  Add a rectangle to the canvas and resize it to 75 x 75. Use the Corner radius setting in the Design tab to round the rectangle’s corners to 25.

  Change the rectangle’s fill to #CE856C and rename the layer to “Cork”. Drag it over to the lip of the bottle.

  

  Organize your layers

  We don’t want the cork to be on top of the bottle so we’ll need to reorder the layers in the left sidebar. The order of layers determine how objects are displayed on the canvas.

  Let’s move the “Cork” layer under the “Bottle” layer so that only the top part of the cork displays. This will help it look like it’s inside the bottle. Select the “Cork” layer and drag it down below the “Bottle” layer. Once you’ve moved the layer, click the to lock it.

  

  Add glare lines

  Our potion is almost complete. We just need to add some glare lines to help it stand out.

  Add two rectangles to the canvas and resize one of them to 20 x 10 and the other 40 x 10. Use the Corner radius setting in the Design tab to round both rectangle’s corners to 20.

  Change both of the rectangles' fill to #F2F2FF. Move them to the lip of the bottle. Select both rectangles and group them using the shortcut:

  • macOS: Command + G
  • Windows: Control + G

  Rename the layer to “Glare” and lock it.

  Check in: Does your file look similar to the following?

  (Optional) Add your illustration to a frame and export it

  If you’d like to export your illustration from Figma, you can add your layers to a frame. Frames are one of the main building blocks of Figma. Like groups, you can use frames to organize all of your design elements in a single place.

  You can add a new frame using the Frame tool in the toolbar and drag content into it or you can directly select and convert existing objects into a frame. Let’s do the second option.

  Unlock your layers and drag your cursor over your illustration to select all of them. Once everything is selected, right-click and select Frame selection. Your four individual layers are nested under one layer named “Frame 1”. If you click the arrow next to the name, you’ll see that the named layers still exist and can still be selected and edited individually. Rename the new layer to “Magic Potion”.

  If you’d like to export your illustration, select the “Magic Potion” layer and use the Export settings in the right sidebar to export your design.
  

  What’s next?

  Congratulations! With only a few basic shapes, you illustrated a magic potion in Figma. If you’re looking for another challenge, try recreating the bear illustration below. It was created using the exact same tools we learned in this project. If you create something you’re extra proud of, share it to the Figma Community.

  We can’t wait to see what you design next!

  

• Make a custom profile card

  Project overview

  • Product: Figma design
  • Topics: Adding and styling frames, shapes, text, and images
  • Length: 20 minutes

  In this project, we’re going to build a custom profile card. You can make one just for yourself, or make a template so everyone on your team can introduce themselves.

  To create a Figma design file, click on Drafts in the file browser. Then click the New design file tile. You can also type figma.new in your web browser to jump straight into a brand new file.

  Build your layout with frames, shapes, and text

  Let’s start by adding all our objects to the canvas, including:

  • A frame to contain the design
  • A rectangle to use as a color or image background
  • An ellipse to use as an avatar
  • Two text layers, for your name and some information about yourself

  Don’t worry about how everything looks as we’re adding shapes to the canvas! We’ll get everything looking just-so when we start using the design panel to modify our objects.

  Add a frame

  What is a frame?

  Frames are the main building blocks of Figma. A frame is a container that holds design elements such as shapes, text, and images. You can use them to organize and structure design elements on the canvas.

  A frame can be any size and can contain any number of design elements. Frames can also be nested within other frames to create complex designs with multiple levels of hierarchy.

  Let’s start by creating a frame and adding objects to it.

  1. Click the Frame tool in the toolbar.
  2. Click the canvas to create a 100 x 100 frame. Notice that when you make a frame, it gets added to the Layers panel in the left sidebar.
  3. From the Design panel in the right sidebar, change the width to 390 and the height to 750.

  

  Tip: You can use the Hand tool to pan around a file without selecting or moving objects. You can also zoom in or out by pressing or on your keyboard.

  Add a rectangle and ellipse

  Now, lets add one rectangle and one ellipse inside the frame:

  • To add a rectangle: Select the Rectangle tool and click inside the frame
  • To add an ellipse: Select the Ellipse tool and click inside the frame

  Don't worry too much about the exact dimensions, we can tweak those later.

  Add text

  1. Click the Text tool in the toolbar.
  2. Click inside the frame to create a text layer.
  3. Write your name and click anywhere on the canvas once you’ve finished writing.
  4. Create a second text layer and write a description.

  Tip: Now is a good time to double check whether your objects are inside your frame. Take a look at the Layers panel in the following screenshot.

  Your rectangle, ellipse, and text should be nested under the frame. If nothing is nested, you’ll need to select each object on the canvas and drag it into the frame.

  Use the design panel to modify objects

  Every object on the canvas has properties that determine its position and what it looks like. When you click on an object to select it, the Design panel in the right sidebar updates to provide information about that object. In this section, we’re going to change the properties of our objects to make our design come together.

  Create a nice background for the card

  

  1. Drag the rectangle to the top left corner of the frame. When you see red lines, it means Figma is trying to align the rectangle with the frame.
  2. In the Design panel, set the width to 390 and the height to 200.

  Tip: You can manually resize an object by selecting it and grabbing the corners. As you resize or move objects, you’ll notice red guides appear on the canvas. These help you align the shape to other objects on the canvas.

  Now, lets add a color to the rectangle:

  1. With the rectangle selected, click the color value under Fill.
  2. Use the color picker to try out a color.

  Add your face to the circle avatar

  Adjust the size and position

  

  1. Set the height to 185 and the width to 185.
  2. Drag the circle so half of it is on top of the rectangle and it’s in the horizontal center of the frame.

  Add a stroke

  1. With the circle selected, click the plus icon next to Stroke.
  2. Change the stroke color to white, or #FFFFFF.
  3. Set the stroke position to outside.
  4. Change the stroke width to 8.

  Add an image fill

  1. With the circle selected, click the color value under Fill.
  2. Click Solid and change the fill type to Image
  3. Hover over the black and white checkerboard in the overlay and click Choose image.

  Tidy up the text

  Turn your name into a heading

  1. Select the text layer with your name.
  2. Click and drag one side of the text box to manually resize it and unlock the width and height properties. Set the width to 320.
  3. Click Align horizontal centers.
  4. Under Text, align the text to Center.
  5. Change the font size to 32.
  6. Change the font weight from Regular to Bold.
  7. Drage the text layer underneath your avatar.

  Adjust the width and alignment of the description

  1. Select the text layer with your description.
  2. Click and drag one side of the text box to manually resize it and unlock the width and height properties. Set the width to 320.
  3. Click Align horizontal centers.
  4. Change the font size to 16.
  5. Drag the text layer underneath your name.

  Round the card’s corners

  As a final touch, select the frame and set the Corner radius to 24.

  You’re done! Congratulations! 🎉

  Feel like experimenting with what you’ve built? Here are some ideas:

  • Add an image fill to the rectangle to give your avatar a nice background
  • Turn the card into a component other people can use