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Adobe
Illustrator Tutorials |
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| The Selection
Tool is used to select objects that have
been created. Using this tool you can also click,
hold and move objects. Shortcut: V. |
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| The Pen
Tool is covered in Illustrator Tutorial
#2: The Pen Tool In Depth. |
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| The Ellipse
Tool is used to create ellipses. As with
any other "shape creator", click and
drag to draw the shape, click once to draw to
a specific size. The centered ellipse tool is
self-explanatory. The polygon tool can be used
in different ways. For instance, click and drag;
then press Ctrl And Up or Down (Ctrl-Up/Ctrl-Down)
to change the number of sides of the polygon.
Click once to control the radius and number
of sides produced by the tool. The star tool
is similiar to the polygon tool except it can
control two radius'; the outer and inner. The
spiral tool is used to create snail-looking
objects. Amount of segments can be adjusted
by clicking, dragging and pressing Ctrl-Up/Ctrl-Down.
Click once to bring up a dialog box with: Radius,
Decay, Segments and Style. Shortcut: N. |
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| The Pencil
Tool is used to draw object with stroke
and fill. The paintbrush tool is used similiarly,
however it does not fill from origin to end
point; rather, it fills within the painted portion
itself. Shortcut: Y |
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| The Rotate
Tool is used to rotate selected object(s).
Select an object, select the rotate tool and
then click, hold and drag to rotate. Use the
twirl tool to twirl and object. This creates
a sleek and effective result. Shortcut: R. |
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| The Reflect
Tool is used to reflect a shape across
a user-defined axis. Select an object, then
click somewhere on the page. Next, click, hold
and drag and the object and it will reflect
across the axis you defined. Shortcut: O. |
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| In order to use Blend
Tool you have to select 2 objects, then
select the blend tool, then select two points
on the outer edge of each object, as shown below.
A dialog box will pop up which says Steps (Number
of shapes to be drawn between the two chosen
shapes), First And Last (Press Tab key; this
will make an even spacial arrangement between
each shape). |
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| The autotrace
tool traces any image shape automatically.
With this tool, you can click the edge of a
shape you want to trace, and Illustrator draws
the entire outline of the shape. Shortcut: B. |
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| The Measure
Tool is used to measure lengths and angles.
Click and drag and you will obtain values. Shortcut:
U. |
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| The Paint
Bucket simply fills in an object using
the fill (X) color. Shortcut: K. |
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| The Hand
Tool is used to manuever around the drawing
board in Illustrator. Click, hold and drag to
move around the drawing board. Shortcut: H. |
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| The Fill
Color is the color that is used as the
fill of the object. The Stroke Color is the
color that borders an object. You can change
the Color (,), Gradient (.) and Transperancy
(/) of the fill or stroke colors using the three
buttons located directly under fill and stroke
boxes. To get the Default Fill And Stroke, press
D or click on the icon located to the left of
the stroke box. Shortcut: X (toggles between
Fill And Stroke). |
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| The Zoom
Tool itself is self-explanatory. However,
in order to escape the wrath of Zoom, go View
>> Zoom Out (Ctrl -), Fit On Screen (Ctrl
0) or Actual Size (Ctrl 1) in order to get back
to the original size. Shortcut: Z. |
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| The Eye
Dropper Tool is used to select a color
from an object. To get good accuracy, try zooming
in as close as possible. This will allow you
to better see the color that you are selecting.
This tool can be especially useful when designing
color coordinated sites. Shortcut: I. |
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| The Gradient
Tool is used to fill in an object with
a gradient. Select an object, then select the
fill icon, and then select the gradient icon
(under the fill and stroke icons). Now go Window
>> Show Gradient in order to adjust the
gradient. There will be an entire tutorial devoted
to colors and gradients in upcoming weeks, so
stay tuned! Shortcut: G. |
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| The Graph
Tool will be covered in an upcoming tutorial
on how to use Illustrator for projects, so stay
tuned! Shortcut: J. |
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| The Shear
Tool is used to skew objects around a
user-defined point. Select an object, click
on the Shear Tool icon, then click once to define
a "point of skew", and then click,
hold and drag. Play around with this tool in
order to achieve your desired results. Shortcut:
W. |
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| The Scale
Tool is used to adjust the size of an
object/set of objects. Select an object, select
the scale tool, click on the screen to determine
where you want the object(s) to be scaled, click,
hold and drag to scale. The reshape tool lets
you select one or more anchor points and sections
of paths and then lets you adjust the selected
points and paths globally. Points selected by
the reshape tool are highlighted with small
boxes. When you drag the highlighted points,
any paths containing regularly selected anchor
points are smoothly distorted as if they were
being pulled by the highlighted anchor points.
Shortcut: S. |
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| The Scissors
Tool is used to cut out section of an
object. Select an object, click on the scissors
icon and then click on anchor points or the
path; after clicking three times or more, a
section will be cut out, meaning that the tool
has worked. The knife tool is basically a pencil
tool that splits an object, depending upon where
you drag the knife. Shortcut: C. |
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| The Rectangle
Tool is simply used to create rectangles.
Click and drag to draw the rectangle; click
once to enter in precise values. The Rounded
Rectangle tool is used the same way, except
the corners of the rectangle are rounded. The
other 2 tools in this set are Centered Rectangle
And Centered Rounded Rectangle, which are the
same as the first 2 tools except that they are
drawn from the center. Shortcut: M. |
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| The Type
Tool is covered on Illustrator Tutorial
#3: Text And Text Manipulation. Shortcut: T. |
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| The Direct
Selection Tool is used to select control
points along a path or an objects path. The
object must be deselected in order to select
a control point. Click, hold and drag to move
that control point around. The group selection
tool is used when you want to select an object
but can not select all the control points. This
tool is especially useful when you are working
with numerous objects, as most often is the
case. Shortcut: A. |
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