Sams Teach Yourself Creative Suite 2 All in One

Adobe Illustrator CS2 would have been Illustrator version 12 if Adobe had not renamed it for the Creative Suite.

Where Illustrator Came From

After inventing PostScript, a computer language specifically tailored for printing graphics on laser printers, John Warnock devised a program that would enable people to draw in PostScript. This became Adobe Illustrator. The first software program that Adobe sold, Illustrator was released in 1987 and has since come a long way from being a simple vector drawing program. It now does great 3D effects, transparency, web graphics, vector tracing, and more.

What Illustrator Does

Described as a vector-based drawing program, Illustrator uses mathematical outlines (called Bézier curves) to define paths and shapes. Unlike Photoshop, which works with individual pixels, Illustrator is object based, meaning that you work with things such as shapes, lines, and text objects instead of a bunch of little dots. Don't get the idea that Illustrator is a kids' drawing program, thoughnothing could be further from the truth. Illustrator has the capability to create art that is so photo-realistic, you'd think it was created in Photoshop (see Figure 2.6).

Let's take a deeper look at what vector graphics are and how they work. In the early 1960s, a fellow by the name of Pierre Bézier developed a computer drawing system that consisted of points and paths to help design aircraft and cars (those paths would come to be known as Bézier paths). Think of the points and paths like those connect-the-dots exercises you did as a kid (although, if you're anything like me, you still enjoy doing them). There are dots, which we call anchor points, and the lines that connect them, which we call paths. In the world of vectors, there are two kinds of paths, closed and open (see Figure 2.7). A closed path is one in which the path starts at one anchor point and then finishes at that same anchor point, whereas an open path doesn't.

At a basic level, every vector object has two attributes, a fill and a stroke (see Figure 2.8). The fill is the part that fills up the area inside the path, and the stroke is the actual path itself. You can apply colors and settings to the fill of an object, the stroke, or both.

You're probably asking yourself how Illustrator can create complex artwork if all it does is connect straight paths among all these anchor points. Good question. Well, it turns out that not all anchor points are created equal. In fact, Illustrator employs three kinds of anchor points (see Figure 2.9): corner points, smooth points, and combination points. Each kind controls how the paths that connect to it are drawn.

By the Way

A good way to quickly grasp the concept of drawing with Bézier paths is to understand that you don't draw the paths. What you are really drawing are the anchor points, the dots. Illustrator does the rest, automatically connecting the dots with paths, based on how you place those anchor points.

A vector shape can be made up of any combination of anchor points, so you can already get an idea of how precise vector graphics can be (see Figure 2.10). Illustrator's Pen tool enables you to draw these vector shapes, as well as edit existing vector paths.

You'll find a lot more than just the Pen tool in Illustrator, however. Here's a small sample of the kinds of tools and features you'll find in Illustrator CS:

• Illustrator has spectacular 3D and artwork-mapping capabilities, making it easy to create not only the coolest art, but also realistic packaging mockups.

• Many designs utilize parts of artwork repeatedly (logos, design elements, and so on), and Illustrator manages these artfully with the Symbols palette. Special tools let you spray symbols on your page, taking creativity to a new level.

• A tracing feature enables you to convert pixel-based images into vector artwork.

• A Save for Web feature enables you to export web graphics in just about any web format you might need, such as GIF, JPEG, SWF, or SVG.

• A seemingly endless supply of vector drawing tools makes it as easy as possible to help you draw art, including Pen, Pencil, and Brush tools. There are also a Polygon tool, a Line tool, an Arc tool, and a Grid tooleven a vector Flare tool.

• You'll find a wide range of what Illustrator calls Live Effects, such as Drop Shadow for adding those nice soft shadows, Feather for giving vector shapes a soft edge, and many other effectseven Photoshop ones such as Gaussian Blur.

• Illustrator's Pathfinder palette makes editing vector shapes a breeze by giving you a plethora of options that let you combine shapes, cut holes in them, and more, all at the click of a button.

• Illustrator contains a wealth of text options that enable you to set the perfect line or paragraph of type, as well as have text run along a free-form path.

• Powerful Enveloping, Warp, and Liquefy tools enable you to twist, squeeze, bend, and distort art to your heart's desire.

• A Mesh tool and a Blend tool enable you to achieve painterly effects and smooth blends and gradations between colorsall vector, all the time.

• Illustrator has an innovative Variables palette for helping to generate artwork automatically using scripting and a database.

Now that you have a better understanding of what Illustrator can do, let's discuss when you should use it.

By the Way

You'll also find the vector Pen tool in Photoshop and InDesign. In fact, many of the applications in Adobe Creative Suite share similar tools, which we discuss in detail in Chapter 4, "The Key That Makes It All Work: Integration."

When to Use Illustrator

Illustrator is perfect for various tasks, including the following:

• Most people use Illustrator for logo design and corporate identity. Because logos are continually scaled to different sizes (anywhere from a button on a website to a highway billboard or the side of a blimp), creating them as vector artwork is a must.

• As if the name of the program wasn't enough of a hint, Illustrator is the tool of choice for fine art and illustration. Illustrator's diverse and flexible toolset allows for a wide variety of stylized artwork. Many of Illustrator's tools also have support for pressure-sensitive tablets, to allow artists to put their ideas on screen easier, with more control.

• With a full selection of text tools and the capability to place raster images into a file, Illustrator is a great single-page layout tool for creating flyers, advertisements, or sales sheets.

• Walk down the aisle of your favorite supermarket and take a look at all the packages on the shelves. Chances are, just about every package you see was created with Illustrator. Package design demands unlimited creative options, custom color support, and reliable printingall attributes of Illustrator.

• Because most graphics on the Web are rasters, most people don't think of Illustrator when they think of web design. The truth is, Illustrator is a great tool for designing web graphics. Illustrator's Save for Web feature lets you export optimized web graphics directly, or you can bring art directly into Photoshop or ImageReady. An added benefit is that if you ever need to use those graphics for print, you don't need to re-create the art at a higher resolutionyou can use it right from Illustrator for just about any task.

• In Illustrator, you can open and edit Illustrator files, EPS files (PostScript), PDF files, SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) files, DXF/DWG files (AutoCAD)even native FreeHand and CorelDRAW files. Illustrator can also export files in all kinds of formats, making it a valuable production and utility tool. Between Photoshop and Illustrator, you'll be able to open and work with just about any kind of file you might get your hands on.

• Graphs and charts are used to graphically represent numbers or other data that might be hard to grasp just by looking at a bunch of numbers. Illustrator's Graph tool enables designers to quickly create eye-catching and appealing infographics that can be incorporated into annual reports, newsletters, and business presentations.

• Going beyond the static image, Illustrator can convert layered and blended art into art that animates or moves when exported as a Flash (SWF) file. Illustrator is also used for creating art that is used in traditional animation such as television cartoons and animated motion pictures.

• Maps, environmental graphics (such as signs), and architectural drawings require Illustrator's precise vector tools and unique capability to structure art using layers, sublayers, groups, and subgroups.

It quickly becomes obvious that Illustrator is a powerful application that can perform a wide range of tasks. Keep in mind, however, that Illustrator can contain only one page per document, so it isn't ideal for layouts such as newsletters, books, magazines, and other documents that require several pages. Although you can place raster images into an Illustrator document, you can't edit the individual pixels, such as taking red eye out of a photo.