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- In this movie, I'll
show you how to erase

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and smooth lumps in your artwork.

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And specifically I'm talking
about this extra bit of line

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up here in the hair.

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We've got a lump down here
at the bottom of the chin.

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We have some imperfections
around this eye,

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so if you're working along with me,

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obviously your imperfections
are going to be different.

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But I do want to show you how
you can make things better

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using a combination of the
eraser, the blob brush,

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and the smooth tool.

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So I'm going to start up here
at the top of the artwork.

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And then I'll click on this black outline

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with a black arrow tool to select it.

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And then I'll get the eraser tool,

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which I can now get by pressing the E key,

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and with this small brush,
I'll just go ahead and paint

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over the top right here, like so,

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and then I'll paint away
all that extra lump.

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And notice, that doesn't necessarily

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give me the smoothest results.

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And the thing is, the eraser
tool isn't quite as skilled

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at creating smooth transitions
as the blob brush is,

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and part of the reason is
if you press the enter key,

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or the return key on the Mac,

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in order to bring up
the eraser tool options,

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you can see that we don't
have a fidelity slider.

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Which is a shame, quite frankly,

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but it's just the way it is.

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So I'm going to cancel out of here.

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So you may find yourself
needing to smooth things

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over using the smooth
tool, which you can get

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by clicking and holding the pencil tool,

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and then selecting the smooth
tool from the fly out menu,

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and then just drag over
that same area once again

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in order to smooth it out,
then you may want to zoom

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out a little bit just to make sure

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that you haven't messed up
any other parts of the path,

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because what can happen,
when you're smoothing

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one section, another
section gets unsmooth.

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So you may have to just sort of check out

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what's going on in other
sections of that path outline.

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Now this area may respond to
the smooth tool by itself,

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but in my case it didn't, so
I'll just go ahead and press

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control Z, or command Z on the Mac,

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and I'll switch again to my eraser tool,

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and I'll paint over this
little region right there.

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Hope for the best, ends up looking okay,

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but we do have a couple of neighboring

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anchor points right there,
in fact we have two sets

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of anchor points on either
side of this segment,

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which is generally not something you want.

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So I'll go ahead and select
the smooth tool once again,

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which has no keyboard shortcut,

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not my default, anyway, you
can give it one if you'd like,

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but I'm just going to
drag over this section

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in order to smooth things out.

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Alright, now let's check
out any other problems.

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We've got a problem right
there, as you can see.

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So I'll go ahead and, once again,

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select the path outline,
and I'm doing that

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by pressing the control key,
or the command key on the Mac,

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to get my black arrow
tool, and then clicking

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on that path, like so.

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So every time you use the smooth tool,

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you deselect the path outline.

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Alright, now grab my eraser tool,

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and I'll drag over this little section,

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and that gives me another divet,

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so I'll grab my smooth tool,

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and I'll just drag over
this region once again,

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to smooth it out.

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Now this eye has a different
problem, as you can see.

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I'm missing some path outline,

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so I'll control click, or command click

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on that path to select it,

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and I'm going to make these anchor points

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a little more visible by double clicking

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on an empty section of my drawing layer

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to bring up the layer
options dialogue box,

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and then I'll change the color to violet,

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which shows up pretty
well, and I'll click okay.

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Now, I need to add some
stuff to these path outlines,

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so I'll go ahead and switch
back to my blob brush,

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and I've got a little brush,
as you can see right here,

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so I'll just paint over this area with it,

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and then I'll paint over
this region as well.

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And, if I get unsmooth results,

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or too many anchor points,

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then I'll just go ahead and
switch back to the smooth tool,

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and drag over each one of
these sections, like so.

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And that looks like I need
to drag a couple of times,

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in order to make that work.

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Alright, we have a little bump up here

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at the top of the hair, so I'll
go ahead and control click,

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or command click on
that path to select it.

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I'll get my eraser tool,
and then I'll paint

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over this region, like so.

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Of course i'm only erasing the selected

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path outline, nothing more.

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And then I'll switch
back to my smooth tool,

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and I'll drag over that
portion of the path

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to smooth it out.

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And now I'll go ahead and
zoom out a little bit,

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and I'm just searching for
other problems right there.

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It looks like we have a
little bit of a problem edge,

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and so this time I need to add to it,

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so I'll grab my blob brush tool again,

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and I'll just paint upward, like so.

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And I'm trying to be careful here,

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so I do as good as a job as I can,

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and, let's see, where
else do we have problems,

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I think there's, oh, right
there, on the bottom of the chin.

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I'll go ahead and get rid of it

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by painting with the eraser tool.

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And I'm just going to paint
straight with the tool,

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and see if I get a nice
sharp corner, which I do.

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And that seems pretty good to me.

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And then we've got some other problems

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down here on this part of the path,

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so I'll just go and paint over this

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with the blob brush tool this time.

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That gives me a very unsmooth result.

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So, I'll drag over it with a smooth tool,

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but you don't want to drag
all the way to the corner,

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because that will smooth out the corner,

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which is not what you want.

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In here I can smooth that out

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using the blob brush tool, once again.

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So I'll just go ahead
and paint down, like so.

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And that's a little unsmooth,

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but I'm not going to
worry too much about it.

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And then we've got a lump on the shoulder,

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as I recall, there it is, and so I'll now

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grab my eraser tool,
and I'll paint over it,

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and then I will revisit
it with the smooth tool

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just by dragging.

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And just so you know, by the way,

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I've got my smooth tool
set to smooth things

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up as much as possible, which you do

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by pressing the enter key,
or the return key on the Mac,

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to bring up the smooth
tool options dialogue box,

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as you can see here.

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I've cranked the slider setting
all the way over to smooth,

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which is just fine, so
I'll just cancel out.

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Alright, and then I will zoom out

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by pressing control zero,
or command zero on the Mac,

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and I'll deselect my artwork
by pressing control shift A,

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or command shift A on the Mac.

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And the result is the
artwork you see right here.

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I think things could be a little
better though on the slip,

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so I'm going to control click,
or command click right there,

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and this time I'm going to
grab my blob brush tool,

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and I'm going to increase the
size of my brush, like so.

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And instead of dragging with the tool,

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I'm just going to click in order to create

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a little bit of roundness right there.

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Alright, now I think I'm done,
so I'll zoom out once again,

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press control shift A, or
command shift A on the Mac.

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Ad that's how you both
erase and smooth away

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lumps in your artwork using a combination

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of the eraser tool, the blob
brush, and the smooth tool

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here inside Illustrator.