I have seen this tip around on a couple of blogs, but it is so helpful I had to repeat it. You can quickly change you document’s measurement units by Control-Cliking (mac) or Right-Clicking (pc) on the Ruler. I use this constantly when designing websites or working with a file from overseas (the United States is a little behind on the whole Metric system thing).
Selecting multiple objects in Illustrator is essential to productivity. Illustrator has some great selection features: Select Same, Select Object, Magic Wand, and so on. One selection feature that I always use is Save Selection. I usually save selections early on in a illustration to easily come back to them even though the stroke, fill, and other attributes have be modified.
I love working in Illustrator, but ever once and a while, I need to export a file to Photoshop. Illustrator gives you the ability to export to Photoshop while preserving important information. You can export Layers, Color Profiles, Resolution Specification, and Text Preservation. This is great for exporting website wireframes or sprucing up illustrations.
I am a Keyboard Shortcut junkie because Keyboard Shortcuts save a tremendous amount of time! The great thing about Illustrator CS3 is you can customize your shortcuts. Some of you probably know this already, but it’s worth mentioning for you that don’t. Now you can create shortcuts for Illustrator’s Tools and Menu Commands and set multiple profiles!
Creating type on a path is a great feature of Illustrator and is quite handy when sprucing up your typography or experimenting. Annoyingly, the Path Type object always seem to have inconsistent spacing and just doesn’t look right. Luckily, Illustrator has some Text On A Path Options! With these options, you can change the Effect, Alignment, Spacing, and Flip.
This trick is similar to the Compliment Color trick, but I use it so much, I had to share it. I use specific color modes for different projects, and found myself more comfortable mixing certain colors in certain color profiles. A quick way to switch between profiles in the Color Panel is to press Shift and Click on the Color Ramp. You can easily swap between CMYK, RGB, HSB, Grayscale and Web Safe RGB.
I love the results you can get when working with meshes, but sometimes I don’t love trying to edit them. When a path is converted to a Mesh Object, it is no longer a Path. This can get frustrating if you want the original path for other purposes. To extract the original Path, select the Mesh Object, go Object > Path > Offset Path and enter 0. Now you have a copy!
