How to Make Mandala Art with Inkscape: Mirror Symmetry + Rotate Copies Easy Mandala Maker Tutorial 

Thanks so much!! I'm having fun making these and I'll keep doing them!

@@IronEchoDesign I would love to see a tutorial for making the mandalas in the 3D layers style. And/or your take on the shadow/light boxes. I've been trying to figure out the best or easiest method for going about those and I seem to only find the complicated ways. 🤣

Thanks so much!! That's exactly the pace I'm going for.

Thank you so much!! So happy to help, and I'll keep making these videos

Nick is the best! His videos got me in to Inkscape.

Ha, thank you so much!! I know there's much better than mine, but I'm trying!

Haha, thanks!!! There's a lot bigger names out there than me, but I try to help where I can.

Haha! I wish. Thank you!!

Thanks!! I'm going to try this dual Path Effects method in version 1.2 now that it's out and see if there are any new tricks.

Thank you!! That is wonderful to hear!

Thank you so much!! You made my day, and I love making these videos. I'll keep going.

@@IronEchoDesign Yvw! I do have a question though. I was following along on the mandala and I got ahead of myself and made a mess on my screen. My issue was after I wiped the slate clean I couldn't figure out how to reset the settings. I would make the slanted line and it would automatically do the mirrored and the next step. How would I fix that without closing the app?

Great question, and I've experienced the same effect. I think Path Effects has a tendency to get stuck sometimes. When I've done the same thing and deleted parts of my work or Control-Z'd too much, sometimes the settings get messed up. The best option I've found is to start in a completely clean Inkscape project, or go back to a saved version that had it right. Hope this helps!

Haha! I love it. Thank you!!

Thanks so much! Blender is super powerful. I’d love to learn it. Inkscape has so much it can do I spend most of my design time with it.

Thanks so much! I really appreciate it.

Thanks!!

Thank you!! I'll keep at it.

Thank you!! Glad you found it too!

Thanks!! Glad the timing was good!

Thanks so much!!

Exactly! Thanks, and this is one of my favorite things about Inkscape. Simple settings, can make complex designs.

Thanks so much, and I hope I can expand into some of those other platforms. I really want to get into Blender, but my computer is not high performance enough.

@@IronEchoDesign you’re growing. You’ll get there. Keep pushing and you can get whatever you want down the line. You got this. Luminar neo is also really cool but makes everything really easy. You can do a lot in very little time with it because of the A.I.

Thank you! I’m going to keep trying to upload consistently.

Thanks so much! 🙏

Thanks so much!!

Thanks so much! And thank you again for your kindness. I’ll keep making these. 😊

Thank you very much!!

Thanks so much!! I get lost in time, playing with these.

Thanks!!

Thank you!!

Thanks!

Thanks so much! Inkscape is great.

Thanks so much!

Thanks so much!! I haven't set up an IG account for IronEcho yet. I have a personal account that is open, but it's mostly just me and the kids.

Thanks! Vector portrait is something I've been working on for a bit. I'm not there yet in terms of making a viable video that has clear steps, but I won't give up!

@@IronEchoDesign That’s okay. Feel free to go for it whenever you are confident that you’ve discovered the right techniques to do it. It’s a very interesting topic but also seems more complicated than regular design. A painterly effect is really cool but I’m not sure if it’s possible to apply that to a portrait in Inkscape. I don’t know if Inkscape has any settings to make a photograph look like it was painted. The background will also probably need to be removed so the portrait doesn’t look too busy. Two-tone portraits look amazing but I’m not sure if that option is built into the ‘Trace Bitmap’ feature, and if the shadows & shading will look right when turned into vector. Movie poster style portraits tend to be complicated and come in many varieties. The ones that come to mind are portraits from action/thriller movies that I’ve seen at subway stations, which have dramatic shadows and a limited color palette. I wonder what parts of the portrait should be done with the ‘Trace Bitmap’ tool and what parts need to be done manually. I’m sure there’s many different ways to do this, but also limitations that come with the software. It’s a very interesting topic, so I hope it will be explored in the future.

Thank you!!!

Thanks!! I'm working on another one of these, but for version 1.2.

@@IronEchoDesign cool. I'll keep an eye out for it

Just uploaded, but it's going through processing. Should be live tonight!

Thanks so much!!

Thanks!!

Just replied to your question on the Trace Bitmap video. Happy to help answer the question.

Thank you!! I hope I can make helpful tutorials.

Thanks so much! Vielen dank!

Thanks!!

Thank you very much!

Thanks!!

Vielen Dank! 🙏 Thank you so much!! I very much appreciate the support! 🙏

Thank you!! Hello Switzerland!

Thanks!! They're fun to do!

Thank you!! These are fun.

Anytime! Thank you!!

Thanks so much!! That's a great idea. Would be really cool to make one for each of my kids. I'll play around with some variations and see if I can get it right.

@@IronEchoDesign Thank you so much, will be waiting for that to make a design for my friend's birthday

Thanks Martin! I sincerely appreciate all the work you do to make Inkscape wonderful, and I watch every update on your channel. I did a bit of experimenting when the mandala requests started coming in, and came to this method to emulate the hand-drawn style. I'm more inclined to the geometric patterns Tiled Clones makes myself, but this way is fun too.

Thank you so much!!

Thank you!!

Thanks!!

Thank you very much!!

Thanks!! I'm working on a new mandala video to see if there's a difference with new Inkscape 1.2

Thanks so much!!

Thanks so much! I was having problems getting mirroring to behave. If you click out of the group with the Path Effects on it, it should stop the action. I made a 2nd version of this mandala video (blue thumbnail) that explains things a little better.

Thanks!!

Thanks so much!

Great suggestion. I think I figured out a solution for this that works pretty well. I'll try to record after work this week. Can I screen capture your request here and share in the video?

@@IronEchoDesign thanks. Yeah Sure

Okay, sounds good. Thanks, and I'll try to record this week.

Thanks!! The warp sound effect in the start of the intro? It's from the RU-vid sound library under the song Pretty Boy- DJ Freedom.

Thanks! I've since redone this tutorial because I think others have had the same question. In the new version I think the steps are more clear and avoid the doubling issue. Hope this helps if you want to check it out: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Zm45Hwdedno.html

Totally agree. We can go so much deeper. I like to experiment to see how far I can push the tools and I know I have barely moved off the basics yet. The dragon scales would be cool. I play around with it. Thanks.

Thank you!! Yes, I think your solution should work. If it doesn’t, let me know and we can troubleshoot.

Thanks! Part of it is the recent updates, but it was also a bit inconsistent in how the Path Effects were applied. I made another video that addresses some of it here if you want to check it out: Inkscape Mandala Design Tutorial: How to Create Mandala Art with Live Mirroring ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Zm45Hwdedno.html

@@IronEchoDesign awesome, thank you!!!

For sure. You can download it at Inkscape dot org. It’s free!

If you click out of the path effects group, it should stop the mirroring, however I noticed sometimes it gets stuck no matter what. I made an updated version of this video to go into further detail and better show how to control things using the layers and objects menu. It's the mandala video on my channel with the blue thumbnail. Hope this helps!

Great question. The Page will stay but you can set the "Desk" to white to match it and get the clean look. Or if you're looking for all gray, you can set the Page to match the gray colored Desk. All with the Document Properties settings. Why is the Page itself not completely removable, I'm not sure.

Thanks! It's funny because I originally was hoping Mirror Symmetry would stay on for all lines, but the functionality was inconsistent. To make sure it doesn't stick on, click off of everything, change tools and then change back if needed and the new line should be independent. Let me know if it's still not working. Happy to help!

@@IronEchoDesign Thanks... And glitchy is an understatement. Through trial and error I have discovered that if I don't group things together that keeps it turned off. Still working out the nuts and bolts, but having a good time. Thanks again for the tutorial.

Totally. I have another mandala tutorial in the works but layering path effects sometimes is no problem and other times when I do a practice run it fails. I like that we're pushing the boundaries of what Inkscape can do, and hopefully they'll work out the bugs with each new release.

Thank you!! This video was made with an old Inkscape version. The new Snapping menu is found in the upper right hand corner with the magnet icon. Click the triangle to expand the whole menu. Thanks again!

Lets try to fix this! First guess is the Fill and Stroke settings may have been adjusted. Can you check to see if there is a Fill color selected on the Fill tab?

@@IronEchoDesign Yes, that was the problem! Thank you so so much! It works now 😊

Nice!

Thanks so much! I have experienced this exact same glitch with 1.2. It happens with other Path Effects too. If I move on to something else in the Inkscape session, the Path Effect remain. I don't know why it does that, and it causes headaches in the design process.

@@IronEchoDesign Okay, no problem! I did think that it could be an Inkscape bug, when you said "hopefully" :) Anyway, restarting it solved the issue. Thanks again for a wonderful tutorial.

Thanks for the input. I originally planned to mirror everything together like yours appears to be doing, but couldn't get the functionality to work consistently. There is a way to ensure it all mirrors together by using the layers and objects tab, but when i got far along into the design, i had crashes. As far as Bezier pen tool changing, you could double click on the tool icon to see what the preferences are set to. Again, thanks for sharing.

@@IronEchoDesign Thank you for the tips. I double clicked on the Bezier tool to look at its settings. I changed the settings from “This tool’s own style” to “Last used style”. Initially, I thought this fixed the problem because the line width was now the same as I had used to draw the rest of the mandala. However, this actually created another problem. Now when I use the “Edit paths by node” tool to modify the position of the line, it treats that line as if it’s a shape instead of a line. It widens the line & changes its shape to become bulbous instead of changing its position.

@@IronEchoDesign Another weird thing I noticed as I was going through this tutorial is that it wouldn’t let me delete lines & shapes that I had drawn. I tried selecting them & pressing delete on my keyboard, and I even tried pressing delete through the “Edit” menu. But none of it worked. Oddly enough, it wouldn’t let me delete lines that I had created with the ‘Bezier pen’ or circles I created with the ‘circle tool’, but it did let me delete the ‘spirals’ I had created with the Spiral tool. I’m not sure if this is a bug or if I’m doing something wrong.

@@IronEchoDesign Other than these frustrating problems that I encountered, I did manage to get through this whole tutorial, and I learned a couple of new things. Thank you for sharing 😊

I also had this problem. I hate when this happens. And no solution.

This video was made in the previous version of Inkscape. 1.2 made a few changes to the UI if you're on the new version. But, if you're using 1.1 or earlier, click on View from the top menu and towards the bottom of the drop down you'll see a choice for "custom". Choose that and it should look like mine does in the video. Hope this helps!

Also- i redid this video with 1.2 if you're already on the new version. It's a similar thumbnail, but with blue background if you want to check it out!

@@IronEchoDesign thank you for that :) can you plz share the link? i do have version 1.2 ;) great videso by the way :)

Thanks!! Here is the link. Hopefully it doesn't get blocked: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Zm45Hwdedno.html

Let's fix this. Is Edit Paths by Nodes selected? When you click on the line itself (not a node) it won't bend?

@@IronEchoDesign yes, exactly. Edit path by node is selected (just as it shows in the video). I can click the line and see the red dots. When I click and drag, the line moves, not curve like it does in the video.

Okay, we need to get the node handles to appear (circles with line attached to end node). Grab the middle of the line and initiate a bend in any direction. Once it bends, click on the line, and they will appear. Can you let me know if that fixes it?

@@IronEchoDesign I figured it out, works now.

Nice!!

It was moved in Inkscape 1.3. Now found under Extensions>>Document>>Guides Creator. Hope this helps!

@@IronEchoDesign yes thatnk you. found it. works great.

Nice. Glad it worked.

It might be in a different place now. If you're using Inkscape 1.2 its located under Extensions- Render- Guides creator.

Just switched to 1.3. Guides Creator is now under Extensions > Document > Guides Creator

Haha. This may be true.