Class 9

Note to Self

Turn on the video record in Zoom

Assignment 2 Review: Tattoo

Files For These Demos:

Working With The Shaper/Pencil/Smooth Tools/Path Erase/Join Tools

Shaper Tool

Leftover tool from Adobe Flash/Animate (circa 1993) originally developed for the Apple Newton. Turns objects roughlty drawn as ellipses and rects into acutal ellipses and rects. Really utterly useless...

Pencil Tool

Like a cheaper version of the Brush tool. Has no adjustability for Accurate vs Smooth and won't use brush shapes, only stroke widths.

Smooth Tool

Takes the currently selected path and sort of massages areas into being smoother. Really hard to predict how it will work. It's usually better to use Object > Path > Simplify (although it affects the entire path and not just a portion of it). There are also extensions to Illustrator that do this much better (like Astute Graphics VectorScribe).

Path Eraser Tool

Erases part of a selected path. You have to drag along the actual path for it to work. Similar to the Eraser tool, but the Eraser tool will erase part of a closed-path object and keep the path closed, while the path eraser will turn the path into an open path or paths. The Eraser tool also has an adjustable size, while the Path Eraser tool is just a small point.

Circle with Path Eraser tool used on two sections.

Circle with Eraser tool drawn across it. Creates two closed paths with a gap between the size of the Eraser.

Circle with Scissor tool touched on right and left parts of the path, then moved down. Note that the path does not need to be selected.

Circle cut with Knife tool, then moved down. It creates two closed paths with no gap between the two parts.

Join Tool

Takes two paths and connects them together. Works best with overlapping paths. If you have two open paths that don't overlap, it's better to select the two points with the Direct Selection tool and use Menu > Objects > Path > Join.

Painting With Illustrator Continued

Modifying Strokes

With the Width tool

Expanding The Paint Brush Stroke

Since the Paint Brush tool makes only strokes/paths without fills, it's often useful to turn it into an object whose outer visual boundary is a stroke and interior is a fill.

Use Menu>Object>Expand Appearance

Why? Useful for creating Live Paint objects

Hand-drawn thing from paintbrush tool

Thing expanded into filled objects with no stroke

Thing filled with Live Paint after being converted to Live Paint object with Menu > Object > Live Paint > Make

Fun With Brushes

The Scatter Brush

For interesting effects!

13 point star, radius 1 .8 in, radius 2 .25 in. 2pt stroke. Rotate each about 18.85 degrees (360 divided by 13 divided by 2) and scale down

First, create an object, or group of objects (without gradients, brushes or other fancy stuff)

Choose New Brush from the bottom of the Brush Panel

Size: Fixed, 23%
Spacing: Random, 2% - 5%
Scatter: Random, -10% - 10%
Rotation: Random, 0° - 180°
Colorization: None

Set some settings, we can tweak latter...

The Scatter Star brush applied to a star

Scatter Star Brush applied to Paintbrush path

Scatter Star applied to a paintbrush path with pressure controlling size

Creating Gradients

Using the Gradient Panel

Gradient Types

Linear

Radial

Linear Gradient Angle

Radial Gradient Angle and Aspect Ratio

Changing Gradient Colors

Double-click on a tab to edit a color

Click below gradient band to add a new tab, click on an existing tab and drag it off the panel to delete it.

You can adjust the position of the tabs

Adjust the center point of the point-to-point spread of the gradient

Adjust the Opacity of a color tab

And Strokes can have gradients too!

The gradient tool doesn't work with gradients in strokes, but you can use the Angle to set the stroke, or use Menu > Object > Expand with only strokes, then select the fill in the appearance panel

Using the Gradient Tool

Important Trick: Gradients with Transparency

It's easy to mess up transparency in a gradient by making the transparent color different than the solid color. They should be the same.

The right way: black to black to black gradient, with the center black at 0% opacity

The wrong way: black to white to black gradient

"Freeform" Gradients

Only 2 years old, Freeform Gradients use points and/or lines to allow customization of a gradient within a shape.

To apply a freeform gradient to a shape:

Select the shape, then choose Menu > Window > Gradient to open the Gradient panel.
Click icon for Freeform Gradient next to "Type:"

Gradient panel with Freeform set as Type

The Gradient tool will be selected and points will appear on the shape icon for Freeform Gradient Color Steps (the number of default points varies by shape). Each point represents a color stop in the gradient. The colors will automatically blend from point to point, point to line, and or line to line within the shape.

To move a point within the shape, drag it.
To set a point's color, double click it.
To add additional points, click anywhere on the shape where there isn't currently a point.
To remove a point, click it then press Delete on a Mac or Backspace in Windows.
To expand or reduce the spread of the color from a point, click the point, then drag icon for Freeform Gradient Color Spread at the bottom of the dashed ring that appears around the point. The bigger the ring, the more the color spreads and vice versa.
To make the color from a point more or less transparent, click the point then set the number by OPACITY in the Gradient panel.

Freeform gradients can also be set using lines.

Click LINES in the Gradient panel.
Click in the shape to set the starting point for the line.
Click again to create another point and a line will automatically connect it to the previous point. Repeat until the line is complete. The line will automatically curve through the points.

The points in a line can be moved, added, deleted, and have their color and opacity set using the same steps as above.

Freeform gradients can be made using a combination of points and lines. Just click POINT or LINE in the gradient panel to switch between them. When finished, switch to another tool to set the gradient. To edit the gradient later, select the shape then either switch to the Gradient tool or click EDIT GRADIENT in the Gradient panel.

Pattern Brush

Really complicated, possibly too much for this course.
Here's a nice set of brushes from different vendors.
But remember, you can't use stuff made by other people for this class...
Demo on making a pattern brush (Ace) ivy_pattern2.ai.zip

#1 takeaway: Work from source!

Playing Around With Gradients

Demo... example file (gradientjk.ai.zip)

A cool trick for precise control (reviewed)

Go to the preferences panel and change General > Keyboard Increment to 0.0005 (you can go as low as .0001)

Another Cool Trick for Measuring

Make a rectangle, square, or circle and use it as a measuring device to provide consistent spacing and alignment.

Saving appearance settings as a Graphic style

Type example (graphic_style2.ai.zip)

Any set of attributes you apply to an object, as seen in the Appearance Panel, can be saved as a style and applied to other objects

Select the object you want to create a style from

Click on the Create New Style button in the Graphic Styles panel

Then select the objects you want to apply the style to and click on the style in the Graphic Styles panel

Styles applied. In the lates version of Illustrator, sometimes trying to style text doesn't work.

A practical Scatter-Brush application

Download: practical_scatterbrush3.ai.zip

Set Size: 52%, Spacing 52%, then use Menu > Modify > Scale: 99.9% until the overlap is perfect

Practical Artbrush

Download: practical_artbrush2.ai.zip

Practical Pattern Brush

More here and on the web, but only build your own for this class.

Blending Objects

THIS IS HUGE!

Blends the stroke, fill and shape two or more objects together

Demo two stars
Demo three shapes
Demo path editing
Demo Isolation Mode editing

Blend sample blends.ai.zip file

The Blend Tool

Look out for strokes with blending filled objects...

Blending objects generates a path that can be edited

Blends the stroke, fill and shape two or more objects together

Three shapes blended. Note unpredictable transition between anchors

It can make a difference where you click with the blend tool

Blended Gradients

Blended Spiral Paths

Blended Paths

Blended stars on straight path with Menu > Object > Blend > Replaced Spline

Clipping Masks

Very important feature!

Select two or more objects
The top object must be a closed path
Menu > Object > Clipping Mask > Make

Placed bitmaps can be inside clipping masks
You can create clipping masks for objects within clipping masks
While the shape of the mask loses its fill and stroke, you can always copy it first, make it a mask, then paste it in front to make it align perfectly

Using The Distribution & Align Panel

Aligning Objects

Six Align Options:

Align Left Sides

Align Vertical Centers

Align Right Sides

Align Tops

Align Horizontal Centers

Align Bottoms

Three Align To Methods:

Align To Selection

Default, demoed above

Align To Key Object

Shift-click to select multiple objects, then click again (without shift) on the object you want the other objects to align to. The Key object will get a heavy selection line on its path.