Nathaniel Kelso created a couple of really handy scripts to fit text boxes to their content. This might seem like a really basic problem, but these problems are usually the most annoying. There is a script for a text box’s Depth and a script for the text box’s Width. If you work with a bunch of typography in Illustrator I’m sure they will come in handy. Thanks to John Wundes for pointing it out. Download the script here (you need to scroll down a little ).

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Illustrator CS6 is shipping! I’m sure most of you know and have already downloaded the the trial version, but if you haven’t, go and get it already! In the following post I breakdown some of the new features in CS6 and it’s not quite a review, just an overview at what is new. I want to use CS6 for a solid month in production work before I put up my review.

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I get some great email questions from Vectips readers and sometimes they even answer their own questions, making for great tips! Which leads me to… you can use the tilde (~) key to mannually move pattern tiles. For example, select an object with a pattern tile applied to it, hold down the tilde key, and move it with the arrow keys or one of the selection tools! Pretty handy.

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I love using Illustrator’s Width Profiles (CS5 and up) but I hate accidentally deleting the custom widths I’ve created. There’s no great way to save custom profiles like you do when saving other custom libraries like brushes, swatches, and graphic styles. The best way I’ve found to save them is by applying the custom profile to an object and saving a graphic style. From there you can save a custom graphic style library.

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Thanks to John Wundes, I learned Matthew Erickson created an awesome Artboard/Layers exporter script called MultiExporter. The script handles exporting of selected layers, artboards, or a combo of both into PNG, JPG, PDF, and EPS formats. This script is a little more extensive than other exporting scripts and worth checking out!

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When the Shape Builder tool came out in CS5, it wasn’t really on my radar. I have a set of actions and keyboard shortcuts setup for the different Shape Modes from the Pathfinders panel. I didn’t really need a new tool to replace my workflow. After using it more and more, I’m coming around to thinking it’s a pretty powerful tool and I really like to use it as a Paint Bucket.

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I like scanning a bunch of different brush strokes to create custom Illustrator Art Brushes. When I create these brushes from the outlined scanned artwork I sometimes get this weird overlapping effect that’s really annoying. I’ve been hunting around for a solution and finally found one. To be honest, I’m not really sure I understand why it works, but it does, so I guess that’s fine.

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