Illustrator Illustrator Help

[Rantin Al]

Under Prefs > Smart Guides & Slices => Tick Object Highlighting.

In the pic are two paths. The rectangle has no fill and needs to either be clicked on the path, or dragged over to select.

The circle has a white fill and can be selected by clicking on any part.

With Object Highlighting turned on, as you mouse over, the object will 'highlight'. Click to select when lit.

Check View > Show/Hide Bounding box.

In the Layers palette, the small button (Blue arrow) can also be used to select a path. Just click it to select. Try this to make sure the object is not locked.

You don't have any locks on any layer?
Also check Main Menu Object > Unlock?

Al

 

[lindaw]

Thanks!! One more question for the night....why can't you pick the colors with the dropper? When I put the dropper over a color and click all I get is the red line through the color box. I tell ya, this proggie is gonna be the death of me yet!! [confused] [doh]

 

[MindBender]

Okay, first... that's right on about the 800dpi setting... it's only for vectors. I was being stupid again I guess.

Saving swatches - they are document dependant as was noted. You can make your own libraries that will show up in the library picker by making a blank document, saving some swatches and saving it as an AI file in the libraries folder in your Illustrator program folder. "global" color refers to how a process color is linked within a document, not whether it's carried over into other documents. There really isn't any way to permanently have a swatch library active like you do in Photoshop.

Eyedropper - make sure you aren't trying to eyedropper a raster graphic, it doesn't work. The eyedropper tool in Illustrator isn't for sampling screen colors like it is in photoshop. It samples attributes of objects. Double click the eyedropper tool in your tool box to see all of the things that it will sample (or "copy" if you like).

Layers don't work exactly like they do in photoshop. Don't think like you're in photoshop, it will just confuse you. You really have to attack Illustrator on it's own terms. They really work more like photoshop's layer sets if you must make a comparison.

The "freehand pen tool" in photoshop is similar to the "pencil" tool in Illustrator.

The only things I can think of is that you are turning off the layer's editability when you leave for some reason, or you are using the wrong tools to access the shape. You need to switch to one of your selection tools to regain control of a path that's been built already. So if you create a shape and then start working on a new shape or layer or whatever and the shape deselects... to start working on the previous shape, change to something like the direct selection tool or the path selection tool (the white or black arrow in the upper left of the tool box where the "move" tool would be in photoshop") and grab or marquee select the shape to make the anchor points and paths show up again.

Lastly, the best way to deal with Illustrator is to think of everything you make as it's own little object. Each object has it's own attributes that you can edit. There are some confusing ways to address this unfortunatley that hopefully Adobe will address in 11 . If you are trying to edit the color of a stroke or fill and it just won't change, try checking the "appearance" palatte to see if there are multiple strokes or fills applied to the object. It's confusing that these settings can override eachother, but it's easily overcome if you are aware of it. IMHO this is programmed poorly. One of the few things in Illustrator that's just bad. They should just move entirely over to the appearance menu and they'd be okay. But for now, it's confusing.

Hope that helps.

 

[lindaw]

Viola! The pencil tool works fine if I leave the layer and work on another layer then go back it activates the path. How strange is that? The pen tool does not do this. Well a problem for another day. I have been through heck already today with this proggie. It will not get the best of me! (she says as she ducks and runs from the computer!)

Thanks everyone for the wonderful help!!!!!

 

[lindaw]

Ok pen tool is now working! Duh I wasn't clicking on the little circle [confused] So all my problems for the day have been solved! Now I get to stay up all night and work on this darn thing! [upset]

Thanks for all the wonderful help gang!! 8} :B

 

[Rantin Al]

Good advice, MindBender.

Linda, are you trying to select an existing path with the pen / pencil tool?

Noooooo !

Use the black arrow (first tool top left) selection tool to select, move or scale a path object.

Use the white arrow to select individual anchor points or path sections.

There are other 'pen tools' in the flyout for adding, subtracting and converting paths.

Turn on the tool tips until you get a bit more familiar with how this all works.

As MindBender said, the sample tool picks up attributes from an object and puts them onto the selected object. If you click on the page and not an object you pick up the page, which is blank. Hence the red line through the box. IE: no attributes.

You'll get there but switch off from Photoshop.
You'll go nuts if you don't!

Al

 

[lindaw]

Thanks for the info everyone. Things seem to be going ok right now. It is soooo hard to stay out of pshop! Like you said once I quit thinking pshop things started working much better.

The file I am reworking is a jpg clipart yuck file. I just pull the color code from pshop and key that into ai and save it and that is working. I love a challenge.....thank goodness!!!! I must say the logo is looking quite nice, my first one!!! 8} 8} [:I

 

[lindaw]

Ok I know forget pshop but why can't you make layer sets? I see in the help files that you can group layers but I selected 4 layers and the group option is still not available. It is going to be such a long day! | |

 

[lindaw]

Ok here is what I have so far....yikes! A ton of geometric shapes to add but hey it is progress thanks to the gang!! :}

any suggestions please throw them at me! My raster effect settings are at 72 is that ok?

Also I took the ai file into pshop, resized it and saved for web. Maybe I should do this in AI? Looks a bit jagged [upset]

 

[Rantin Al]

Yay! I knew we would get you up and running.

Ok1 This is a muck-about page. As you see there is a lot in it.
The arrowed box is a full sized magazine cover, to give you an idea of scale.

The outlined box in the layers palette is one single object. By grouping the parts as I make them, they form a sub-set or sub-group. Surprisingly similar to Layer Sets in another program.

To make a Group: In the layers palette just click on the small circle for each of the items you want to put into the group. This will select each path and highlight it. Then it's just Object > Group. (Command/ Control+G)

You can combine other groups to make bigger groups.

Try Exporting from Illustrator. Scale the graphic to required size and hit Export. Choose the format and settings you want.
Quicker than re-opening in Photoshop and doing the same thing.


Al

 

[lindaw]

Yeah baby! We be cooking now! (doing the snoopy dance all over the server room!)

Thanks for all of your help!! :} [:I

 

[lindaw]

My update....This proggie is not so bad. Have a ton of work to do on it but hey I am a million steps ahead of yesterday..

 

[MindBender]

Layer sets don't really work the same in Illustrator. You can't really define a group and just make set... what you do is drag the layer items inside each-other in in the layers palate if you want them in a set. This doesn't do anything but organize them in Illustrator though. They won't be linked for moving or act any differently, they will simply be organized differently. If you want to link objects together so that they share attributes in some way, you need to use grouping or pathfinding.

I'm glad you're finally making some progress.

 

[Guest]

Good to hear that things are going better now Linda

I do understand your frustrations; Illustrator can be annoying in the beginning, especially when you're used to Photoshop, I know all about it!

 

[Rantin Al]

Great stuff Linda, keep us updated with your progress.

Al

 

[lindaw]

Ok things are going great except for one small problem....how do I change the size? I presized this file in pshop before I brought it in but if I save this for the web in AI I need to change the size and for the life of me I cannot find where to do that. You know I looked for the edit>image size...sorry ;\ and I even checked the help files for image size, change size and I can't find anything. | |

 

[wbiss]

Select all elements, Lindaw (take the black arrow selection tool and draw a box around all the elements in your design). Alternatively Select->All. You will see the 'bounding box' where you can 'scale' the image to desired size by dragging on the corner anchor points! Holding down the 'shift' key will constrain the proportions.

 

[Rantin Al]

Linda You need to create a Custom paper size, the same size as your final graphic. You do this in the Page setup. Settings > New >set dimensions with no border.

In the document set up, choose "Use Page Set Up". Select the custom page size and fit the graphic to this new custom artboard.

Save this as an eps or whatever.

This sounds complicated | I'll make up some screenshots which makes it clearer. Honest

It's fiddly more than anything. In the meantime, if you are stuck, select the graphic, Copy it to the clipboard.
Jump to Photoshop, create New, accept the dimensions (they should be the size of the graphic, choose the resolution you want.

Photoshop will render it to actual size at the resolution you specified.

Back soon, Al.

 

[Rantin Al]

Wendy the problem is that if the page setup is at the usual A4, then the graphic will come out as an A4 image on an ocean of white.

Using the custom page size and using this as the document setup means that the graphic comes out at size as it needed, with no border. (Unless one is specified).

I'll get the thing written up after, with screengrabs and samples.

Al

 

[wbiss]

[innocent] Ahhhh... now I see said the blind man! Tx Al, for clarifying the problem for me!