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- [Voiceover] In this

movie, I'll show you how



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to distribute selected

objects so that there's



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a specific amount of room between



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each object and its neighbors.



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And so you can see here in the

final version of the artwork



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that we have an even

amount of space between



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each one of our squares as

opposed to having them all



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absolutely adjacent to

each other as they are now.



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And that spacing is absolutely even



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up here at the top of the first row,



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between each one of the rows,



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and down here at the bottom as well.



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So in other words, we have a total of



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one, two, three, four, five gaps



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that we need to bear in mind.



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Alright, so I'll go ahead and switch over



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to my document in progress.



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You may recall that I made

my artboard 100 points bigger



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than it was before and so,

if you take 100 and divide it



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by those five gaps,

then you can anticipate



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that each of the gaps

is gonna be 20 points.



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And so I'm gonna start things off by



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selecting all these squares which I can do



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by going up to the Select menu and choose,



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"All on Active Artboard" where you have



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that keyboard shortcut of Ctrl-Alt-A,



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or Command-Option-A on a Mac.



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And then, I'll just go ahead and drag



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this top left anchor point

until it snaps into alignment



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with the top right corner of the artboard.



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But, for whatever

reason, if I zoom in here



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you can see that that didn't quite work.



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If that happens to you, then

the most rock solid solution



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is to bring up the Transform

Panel by clicking on the word,



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"Transform" on the right

side of the Control Panel.



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Then, select this top point in the



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small reference point matrix

and notice your x and y values.



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In my case, the x value is zero points.



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That's with respect to

the artboard by the way,



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which is perfect, however,

my y value is 2.827,



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for whatever reason, so I'll

just change it to zero as well.



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And then just press the Tab

key, and that goes ahead



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and moves the square into

exactly the proper location.



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Now you may wonder, "Well,

why didn't I just go ahead



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"and use my Alignment functions

right here, in order to



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"for example, switch this align

icon to align to artboard,



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"and then I could click

on Vertical Align Top?"



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The problem is that's gonna move



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all those objects independently



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with the exception of the

group objects in the center.



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So I figured just dragging the objects



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was the better solution.



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Alright, I'll go ahead and press Ctrl-Z,



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or Command-Z on a Mac, to undo that move.



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And now what we need to

do is scoot the squares



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20 points down and 20 points to the right.



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And so, with my black arrow tool selected,



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I'll just go ahead and

press the Enter key,



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or the Return key on

a Mac, and I'll change



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both the horizontal and

vertical values to 20 points,



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and I'll turn on the Preview checkbox.



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At which point, we'll see these guys scoot



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into the proper locations.



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Alright, I'll go ahead and click OK



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in order to accept that change.



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Now if you're really on the ball,



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you could tell me that I

wasted a little time there.



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That wasn't the most efficient approach



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because after all, we were just looking



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at the Transform Panel and

I could've just changed



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the x and y values to 20 points.



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In which case, good for

you for noticing that.



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Alright, now what I wanna

do is distribute these guys



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by a specific increment and I can do that



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by bringing up the Full Align Panel.



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And to make that happen,

go to the Window menu,



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and choose the Align command,

which appears in my case,



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over here on the right

hand side of the screen.



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And notice that we're

seeing the six Align icons,



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along with the six Distribute icons.



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If you're not seeing anything more,



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then you need to click

on this double arrowhead



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right next to the word, "Align,"



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and that'll bring up the

Distribute Spacing option.



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Notice, however, that

it's currently dimmed.



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And that's because to make it available,



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you have to select a key object.



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And so I'll just go ahead and

click on this top left square



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in order to make it the key

object because after all,



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it's the only one that's

in the proper position.



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And now, as you can see,



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Distribute Spacing is available to me.



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I'll go ahead and change this value here



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to 20 points because

that's the size of the gap.



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And then, I'll click

Horizontal Distribute Space.



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And that's gonna make an

absolute disaster of things,



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as you can see.



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I'll go ahead and zoom out here.



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And the reason that this is happening



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is because Illustrator's distributing



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every single one of the squares



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20 points away from its neighbor



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except for those four in the center.



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And that's because

they're grouped together.



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What we need to do if first,

group our squares into columns.



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And I'm gonna do that by zooming back in



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and of course, undo this mess.



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And, in order to make things work,



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I'm gonna have to ungroup these

four squares in the center.



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That doesn't mean you have to select them



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independently of the

other ones, by the way.



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You can go up to the Object menu



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and choose the Ungroup command,



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or press Ctrl-Shift-G, or

Command-Shift-G on the Mac.



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And that will ungroup any

groups inside the selection.



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And so, I'll go ahead

and choose that command.



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At which point, I can now

see the word, "Rectangle,"



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over here on the far side

of the Control Panel,



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and that tells me that I

no longer have any groups.



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Because previously, it would have appeared



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as, "Mixed Objects."



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Alright, now I'm gonna

marquee these four objects



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in the first row and I'll press Ctrl-G,



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or Command-G on a Mac, to group them.



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And then I'll marquee this next column,



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press Ctrl-G, the third

column, press Ctrl-G,



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and the fourth one, and then press Ctrl-G,



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and of course, that's

Command-G on the Mac.



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Alright now, if I press Ctrl-A,

or Command-A on the Mac,



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to select everything and by the way,



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that is the wrong keyboard shortcut



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because I selected all these letters



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on the second artboard as well.



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Don't want that, so what

I need to do instead,



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is go the Select menu and choose,



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"All on Active Artboard,"

or press Ctrl-Alt-A,



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or Command-Option-A on the Mac.



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Alright, now notice once again,



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"Distribute Spacing" is dimmed.



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And so what I need to do

is establish a key object



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by clicking on that top left square



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which is gonna select

the entire first group.



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And then, if I click

Horizontal Distribute Space,



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I end up getting the exact

effect I'm looking for.



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Alright now, we're gonna wanna



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vertically distribute the space,



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but that means first grouping

the squares into rows.



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So, I'll start off by

going up to the Object menu



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and choosing, "Ungroup."



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And that's going to ungroup all



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four of the groups, by the way.



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Then, I'll marquee these top squares,



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press Ctrl-G or Command-G to group them,



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the next row, group them,



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the third row, group them,



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and finally the fourth

row, followed by Ctrl-G,



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or Command-G on the Mac, to group them.



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Alright, now I'll just go

ahead and marquee these guys



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instead of selecting

everything on the artboard.



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And now, notice again

this object is dimmed



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because we don't have a key object.



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And in case that doesn't make

sense, just think about it.



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You have to tell Illustrator

which of these rows



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is supposed to be fixed

in place so it knows



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that other rows are the

ones that are getting moved.



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Now, notice we have this

"Align to" option right there



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and you can switch it to

"Align to Key Object."



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In which case, Illustrator's

going to randomly



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select a key object for you.



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That's not the row I want, however.



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So I'll just click on the top row



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which will both deactivate the bottom row



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and set the top row as a key

object, as your're seeing now.



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After which point, go ahead and click on



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"Vertical Distribute Space"

in order to move those rows



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so that they're exactly 20 points apart.



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After which point, I'll just go ahead



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and click off the

objects to deselect them.



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And that's how you distribute

selected objects by a specific



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amount of space using the

Distribute Spacing options



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down here at the bottom

of the Align panel.