How to add Borders for Characters in Adobe Illustrator

How to add Borders for Characters in Adobe Illustrator
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Before I start making the overall border for my game characters,
I make sure that if they are bunch of groups, I select all the artwork that I want to have a thick border then I just group it like so.Then I will duplicate the group, and this will be my base for the the border thickness that I will create.

With this base, I can either use the pathfinder tool or the shape builder tool and make this group one solid shape.

If you are using the shapebuilder tool make sure that you dont drag over holes inside the group, because this is not what we want and we dont want them getting filled with color.
After that I will select the new base shape and offset it by ~10 pixels or set any thickness I want it to be. You can offset a shape by going to the object menu, click path, then offset path.

What dis does is, it makes an exact copy of it but it can be thicker or even smaller depending on the offset thickness that you set.

And as you see, we now have a border for our character. And what's great about it is that we can reuse our base shape and offset it in different thickness.

So there goes our quick tip on how to create borders for your characters in illlustrator, now' this is not just limited to characters, you can also use this technique on logos, illustrations or even game art.

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Tools Used: Adobe Illustrator CS6

Offset Path : Object - Path -Offset Path
Window - Pathfinder
Paste in Front :Command/Control F
Send to Back :Command/Control + Shift + [
Lock Selection :Command/Control 2
Copy Drag -Option + Shift while dragging a shape
Select All -Command/Control A
Group -Command/Control G and Ungroup Command/Control + Shift G

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