This root means to shape matter into form: the potter at his wheel, the factory turning out goods, the artist making a work. The same three letters give the verb "to create", the noun for creation itself, the product on the shelf, the creature that was shaped, and, surprisingly, the יֵצֶר, the inner drive or impulse that shapes us from within. Forming and being formed, the maker and the made, all hang on י-צ-ר. Every word here is verified against pealim, niqqud included.
The same root runs through the verb system. Each binyan is a voice: it bends the one idea into active, passive, causative or reciprocal. Tap to hear.
Notice the split of labour: pa'al לִיצֹר is the high register "to create" (the artist, the divine), while pi'el לְיַצֵּר is the industrial "to manufacture". The intensive pi'el often pushes a root toward repeated, large-scale action, here, factory output. The causative hif'il is not lexicalized for this root.
Same root letters, different noun moulds (mishkalim). The mould tells you the function: who does it, the act of doing it, or the thing produced.
Strip the prefixes, suffixes and vowels. Three consonants remain, and the meaning lives there.