: Designing repeating pattern for top section pyramid I have a requirement that I am failing to figure out. I am trying to design for a print item shaped as a pyramid, where each top (triangular)

@Sarah814

See the picture:



Your pyramid has 4 equal triangles. The top part is separated by a horizontal line. The top part can be considered as a part of the surface image, so I have not drawn it here.

Note: The bottom face is ignored in this answer.

Anything that is reflected equally to the left and to the right from the white center line of the triangle will continue seamlessly around the pyramid.

Altenatively you can position your 4 triangles side by side onto your artboard and draw over the seam. The leftmost and the rightmost edges must be fitted separately. The fitting is automatic if you have a symmetry line between the triangles 2 and 3. See an axample:



The green line is the symmetry axis. The red piece of art will continue seamlessly around the pyramid.

How to get the wanted height H and the wanted bottom side A:


calculate a temporary length S = squareroot(H^2 + (A/2)^2). Actually this is the length of the white centerline.
the angle X = 2*arctan(A/(2*S))
B = S/cos(0.5 * X)


The calculations are not a must, if you do not need exact height. Then draw one triangle (=the orange in my picture), sketch the white centerline and draw a symmetric pattern onto the triangle. Then make three copies and you're done.

Note: A tetrahedron needs only 2 copies.

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@Annie732

If it is a 4 sided pyramid then the green area will appear square when viewed from above.

You can make the 4 triangle faces by bisecting this square with the pyramid edge lines:

Each face of the pyramid is a right triangle with the right side at the top.

Draw your pyramid from above (square) with the top (green) section a smaller square centered in the larger one.

Bisect both with 45 degree lines (I drew a vertical line, copied it, pasted it, rotated new one 90 degrees, selected both, aligned horizontal and vertical, rotated 45 degrees and placed on my squares, then aligned Everything horizontal and vertical using Align to Artboard - with a square Artboard).

Apply a continuous pattern in the center square. When you are satisfied you can use the angled lines to divide the whole image with (Select All) Pathfinder-Divide or make a triangle that perfectly covers one of the faces and isolate just the one side for printing by using that triangle to make a clipping mask (Group All except new triangle, select group and new triangle, Left Click - Make Clipping Mask)

If it is a 3 sided pyramid the process is the same but with different shapes. Let me know if should illustrate that one.

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