- [Voiceover] In this movie, I'll show you
how to add more path outlines to
an existing compound shape,
in order to finish off the word, Colleen.
So obviously we could express the end
of this word with independent compound shape,
that would be fine.
But let's just say for whatever reason
I want to keep the entire name together.
Well one way to work would be to marquee
all the letters like so.
And then go over here to the path finder panel
and once again Alt or Option click the Exclude icon.
Which would mess up the fill and strobe,
but otherwise we end up with a
single compound shape and the interaction
of the first four letters goes unharmed.
But here's the problem.
If I now double click on any one of these
path outlines to enter the isolation mode,
I can access the new sub paths just fine.
But if I click on one of the old ones,
I select them all together, because they're
part of a nested compound shape.
So in other words, they are another
compound shape, as you can see on the far
left side of the control panel,
that is inside the newest compound shape.
And what's really damning about that
is that I can't enter in isolation mode
for these letters.
If I double click on them, nothing happens.
So here's the better way to work.
I'm just going to escape out.
And then I'll press Control Z or
Command Z on a Mac, to undo
that new compound shape.
And now this marquee, these guys right here,
make sure I've selected all of them.
And then go up to the Edit menu and
choose the Cut command, or you can press
that very common keyboard shortcut of
Control X or Command X on a Mac.
Now double click on any one of
these path outlines to once again enter the isolation mode.
And then go up to the Edit menu and choose
Paste in Front, or you can press Control F
or Command F on a Mac.
And that adds these letters to the
existing compound shape.
Which means I can select every
sub path independently.
Alright, now I want to be able
to see what I'm doing.
So i'll go ahead and marquee these
new guys here and I will Alt click
or Option click on the exclude icon
in order to override their previous
shape mode.
Alright now I obviously have quite
a bit of work to do here.
So I'll go ahead and click this path outline,
this rectangle here, and Shift click this circle.
Now Alt click or Option click on Minus front,
in order to subtract them.
Then I'll select this guy right here
as well as this one if I can get to it.
I can't that way, I'll have to Shift click
on it over here.
And maybe I should zoom in
so you can better see what I'm doing.
With these two path outlines selected,
I'll Alt click or Option click on the unite icon
in order to finish off that N.
And as you can see this N is behind
some other stuff.
In order to remedy that situation,
just go ahead and marquee like so
in order to avoid this big rectangle.
And then right click anywhere in the document
window, choose Arrange, and then choose Bring to Front.
And that will take care of all the
problems affecting the N.
But we still have some other problems
going on in the background obviously.
So i'm going to go ahead and marquee
these top rectangles here.
And I'll Alt or Option click Minus Front
in order to subtract them, and that
actually makes a huge difference.
The N is now in good shape as you can see.
And next, I'll go ahead and select
this modified ellipse and Shift click on this
one in order to select both of them.
And I will Alt or Option click on the Unite icon
in order to fix just about everything
that's wrong with the E's.
Except this rectangle here is obviously
in the wrong stacking order.
It's in the wrong front to back location.
So I'm going to select it and press Control X or
Command X on the Mac to cut it,
and then I'll try to find this rectangle right there,
and I'll press Control F, or Command F on a Mac
to paste it in front.
And I have to do that exact same thing
to this rectangle.
Go ahead and select it, press Control X or
Command X on the Mac to cut it,
and then click on this big rectangle and
press Control F or Command F on the Mac
to paste it in front.
Alright now we still have a problem.
Notice these tiny little notches
that are showing up here.
I figured out that's a function of
the edges of the big rectangles,
they're not far enough over.
So to make them visible, because otherwise
I probably won't have a chance of selecting
them correctly, I'll press Control Y or
Command Y on a Mac to switch to the
preview mode.
Now I'll press the A key in order to select
the white arrow tool,
And then I'll go ahead and click on this edge
right there in order to select it independently.
And I know I've done it right because I have
hollow anchor points, which indicates that
the rest of the path was not selected.
And then I'll Shift click on this edge
as well, right there, and now I'll press
Control Y or Command Y on the Mac in order
to re-enter the preview mode, and I'll press
Shift left arrow, in order to scoot those edges
ten points over which totally takes care of the problem.
Alright now, I'll zoom out for a last look
and it looks pretty darn good to me.
So I'll just go ahead and press the Esc key
to escape out of the isolation mode.
And that folks, is how you take a bunch of
additional path outlines, and paste them into
an existing compound shape.
And then edit those paths to absolute perfection
in order to create a custom type effect
here inside Illustrator.