- [Voiceover] In this movie, I'll demonstrate one
of the most common things people do with object blends
and that's create custom gratings.
So, for example, notice these two rectangles.
I have a dark blue one up here at the top of my document,
and a light blue one down at the bottom.
If I click on one with the black arrow tool
and Shift + Click on the other,
so they're both selected,
and then, go up to the object menu,
choose blend and choose make,
or again, you can press Control + Alt + B,
or Command + Option + B on a Mac,
then, I'm going to create
a straight-forward linear gradient.
So a linear gradient is nothing more
than an object blend between two rectangles.
Now, the same can be said of radial gradients as well,
except that you're working with circles.
And so for example, let's say I were to click
in this yellow circle with the black arrow tool,
and then Shift + Click in the orange one,
in order to select them both,
and then, again, go to the object menu,
choose blend, and choose make,
I will create the equivalent of a radial gradient,
and to make that a little more clear,
I'll go ahead and press Control + Shift + A,
or Command + Shift + A on a Mac,
to deselect my artwork and I'll also zoom on in.
So that's pretty much all you can do
with linear and radial gradients inside of Illustrator,
but if you're skilled in the art of object blending,
then suddenly, sky's the limit.
So for example, I'll go ahead
and move over to this piece of artwork here,
and notice these green path outlines down here
at the bottom of the document.
I could click and this forward one
and Shift + Click on the one in the background
in order to select those two shapes,
and notice, they are quite obviously
neither rectangles nor ellipses,
and then, if I went to the object menu,
chose blend, and chose make again,
or press Control + Alt + B,
or Command + Option + B on a Mac,
then I can create this nicely sculpted gradient
that actually bends along with the objects themselves.
Better still, I'm not limited to just two path outlines.
If I press Control + Z, or Command + Z on a Mac,
to undo that blend and then, I Shift + Click on
these two intermediate path outlines,
I can blend between them as well.
Either by choosing that command,
or, by just pressing the keyboard shortcut,
Control + Alt + B, or Command + Option + B on a Mac,
and the objects by the way,
are going to blend in the order that they're stacked.
So in other words, I'll undo the blend just for a second,
the object at the very back is going to blend
into the object in front of it,
then into the object in front of it,
and then into the front-most object as we're seeing here,
and so, if I go ahead and redo that blend
by pressing Control + Alt + B,
or Command + Option + B on a Mac,
you can see that that is indeed the case,
and now, I can change the color or placement
of any of these items just by pressing the Akey,
to switch to my white arrow tool,
then, I would click off the paths to deselect them,
and I'll go ahead and click inside
this path outline right there
to select it independently of the other ones.
Then, I'll go up to this first color swatch
on the left side of the control panel, click on it,
and change it to the shade of yellow right here,
which begins with R equals 252
in order to transform the colors inside that gradient,
and, I can add objects as well.
Especially if I want to add an object
to the front of the stack, and to do that,
I'll go ahead and press the escape key to hide that panel,
and then, I'll select my rectangle tool,
and I'll zoom out a little bit here,
by pressing Control + Zero, or Command + Zero on a Mac,
and then, I'll make sure that my Smart Guides are turned on
here under the view menu, which in my case they weren't,
so I'll go ahead and choose the command,
and I'll drag right here along the bottom of the document,
making sure to take in those bleeds right there,
until I create a rectangle that's 690 points wide
and approximately 22 points tall,
and now, I'll once again press the V key
to switch back to the black arrow tool,
and I'll Shift + Click on my blend to select it.
Now, if I go up to the object menu,
choose blend, and once again, choose make,
I will roll that top object into the existing blend.
So it's not like a group where you're grouping
something inside of another group,
instead, I'm just remaking the blend
so it now contains five objects
with this new rectangle at the top.
Now, I don't want the rectangle to be this color,
so I'll press the A key,
in order to switch back to the white arrow tool,
and I'll go ahead and click off
the objects to deselect them,
and then, I'll click inside the rectangle
to select it by itself, and I'll click on
the first color swatch up here in the control panel,
and I'll change it to this darker shade of green,
which begins R equals zero, G equals 146, and so forth,
in order to produce this effect right here.
Actually, I chose the wrong color so let's try that again.
Click to select it independently,
and then I'll go up to the first color swatch
up here in the control panel,
and I'll select this darkish shade of green,
R equals zero, G equals 104, B equals 55,
in order to produce this effect here.
Alright, now I'll just go ahead
and click off the shape to select it,
and I'll press Control + Zero, or Command + Zero on a Mac,
in order to center my zoom,
and that's how you create an all-together custom gradient
between any colors and shapes that you like
using object blending here inside Illustrator.