If you are ever needed an object with a stroke to have exact dimensions, you probably got frustrated very quick. By default, Illustrator doesn’t take into account the dimensions of a stroke. You can easily change this by going Illustrator > Preferences > General and check the Use Preview Bound box. Now, Illustrator will take into account the dimensions of strokes, brushes, effects, and so on.
I love using the Brush Tool (b), but hate trying to change the direction of them. Finally I found a quick way to change the direction of a single brush stroke without affecting other strokes associated with the same brush. First, select the path and then click on a endpoint with the Pen Tool (p), creating a new direction toward that point. Sadly, this trick only works on open paths.
Here is another quick, but usefully tip. To isolate a layer in a complicated file, Option-click (Alt-click) the Visibility Icon on a certain layer to hide all other layers. Option-click (Alt-click) the Visibility Icon again to reveal all the layers. You can also Option-click (Alt-click) and drag across multiple layers to isolate more than one layer at a time.
In Illustrator, it’s easy to pick a complement color of the current Fill or Stroke in the Color Panel. From the Pop-Up Menu of the Color Panel select Complement. If you are keyboard shortcut freak, like me, you can change to the complement color by Command Shift-clicking (Mac) or Ctrl-Shift-clicking (Win) on the Color Ramp at the bottom of the Color panel.
I believe a great way to learn a program is to just play around with it. Illustrator is no exception, but sometimes you don’t know things exist or don’t know what certain tools can do. Vectips helps with some tips and tricks but sometimes you need answers quick or want to explore on your own. That is were the Illustrator Knowhow panel in Illustrator CS3 comes in handy!
Sometimes you need to convert an Illustrator file to grayscale. This could be for a print ad, logo option, or even just to try something different. In Illustrator CS3 you have several options to easily change and edit any artwork to grayscale. There are a couple of simple options and a couple of options that give you more control of how the artwork will look.
The other week, I had a file that kept getting corrupted when I would send it to a printer. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong and spent forever sending emails, zipping files, examining outlines and so on. I came to realize, it was an obscure brush I was experimenting with early along in the project. I didn’t even use it in the final version! After that fiasco, I will always clean up my files!
