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- In this movie, we'll take a look

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at the next kind of anchor
point that's available to us,

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which is the smooth point.

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Now we saw a whole bunch of smooth points

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in the previous chapter, but
there's a lot more to them

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than I've shown you so far.

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And when you're working with the Pen Tool,

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you can't help see smooth
points in all their glory.

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So I want to give you a sense
for how they really work.

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So the first thing I'm going to do

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is rename this layer here, corner points,

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and then I'm going to
go ahead and turn it off

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so we can focus on the smooth points,

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which I will put on an independent layer

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by alt or option clicking
on the little page icon

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at the bottom of the Layers panel,

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and I'll go ahead and name
this guy smooth points,

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and then I'll change it's color to gold.

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After which point, I'll
go ahead and click OK

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to create that new layer.

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All right, now the best way to get a sense

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for how smooth points
work, is to take a look

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at the smoothest shape there
is, which is an ellipse.

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So I'm going to go
ahead and click and hold

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on the Rectangle Tool, and
then select the Ellipse Tool

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from the fly out menu.

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And if you swapped out
your keyboard shortcuts,

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as I suggested a couple of chapters ago,

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then you'll see a shortcut of shift + m.

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All right, now I'm going
to draw a big ellipse

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across this entire document like so,

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and it doesn't have to
be centered or anything.

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I just want it to be large,
so we can see what's going on.

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And now you can see that it has a total

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of four anchor points, all
of which are smooth points.

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And as you may recall, a smooth point

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ensurers that we have a smooth transition

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between two neighboring curved segments.

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Now to see what those
smooth points look like,

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go ahead and switch to
the White Arrow Tool,

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which you can get by pressing the a key.

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And then go ahead and click on
any one of the anchor points.

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At which time, you will see

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not only this square anchor point,

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but two circular control
handles on either side of it

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connected by straight levers.

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These control handles
attract the segments.

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They're responsible for the curvature.

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And so they're basically like magnets

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where the segments are concerned.

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And so notice, if I
drag this control handle

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a little bit farther away,
the segment bends toward it.

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And by the way, you want
to drag on the circle,

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not on the lever itself because
if you try to drag the lever

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you'll just marquee nothing, like so.

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All right, I'm going to go ahead and click

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on the point once again to select it.

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Also notice as I drag this control handle

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over on the right of the anchor point,

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I also move the one on the left,

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and that's because the two
are linked into alignment

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with each other.

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Now one control handle can
get shorter than the other,

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but it's going to remain
at the same angle,

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as we're seeing here.

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And that alignment is what
defines a smooth point

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in Illustrator.

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All right, now we saw that if
you drag the control handle

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farther away from the segment,

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the segment is going
to bend out toward it.

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But if you drag the control
handle toward the segment,

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it's going to start flattening
out, as we're seeing here,

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and that's because were
no longer requesting

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as much curvature.

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If you go ahead and
drag the control handle

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to the other side of the segment,

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it's going to bend in the other direction,

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and it's going to bend more and more

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the farther you drag that control handle.

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And now, you can see that we've got

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an awful lot of curvature

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because the other control
handle has moved across

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its segment and farther away as well.

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All right, let's say I like
this amount of curvature

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but I don't want my path outline
going outside the artboard.

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Then I would just go ahead and
drag the square smooth point

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inward like so.

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All right, now I'll just go ahead

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and center my zoom once again.

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Now just because you're
working with smooth points,

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doesn't mean you might
not get lumpy results.

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Notice in this case, for example,

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I'm getting an extremely lumpy curve,

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and that's because the control handle

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affects the way the segment
exits an anchor point

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and how it enters the next one.

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And so in this case, both
of the control handles

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on either side of the
segment are requesting

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a ton of curvature, and that's creating

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a kind of wavy segment, as
we're seeing right here.

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And so the solution is to just go ahead

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and bring the control handles in

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so that we get smoother results
as we're seeing right here.

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Now another way to see
your control handles

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is to click on a segment, in which case,

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you'll see the control
handle that's directing

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the way the segment exits an anchor point,

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as well as the one that
defines how it's entering

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the next anchor point.

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Now watch what happens if
I take a control handle

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and bend it totally in
the other direction.

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We're going to end up with a loop

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inside of our path outline.

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That's rarely desirable,
and so the solution

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is to just go ahead and put
things back the way they were.

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You also have the option,
when you're working

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with the white arrow, of
dragging directly on a segment

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like so, in which case,
you're going to modify

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the bending of that segment.

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And you have a lot of latitude these days.

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You can drag that segment
just about anywhere you want,

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and the control handles
will come along with it.

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You can also constrain the
drag by pressing and holding

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the shift key, in which case,

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those handles are going to
lock to the nearest 45 degrees.

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You can also lock your control handles

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by shift dragging
directly on them, like so,

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which is great if you're
looking for absolutely vertical

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or horizontal alignment.

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And so I'll go ahead and
make these guys up here

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exactly horizontal like so.

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Now you're going to be doing a ton of work

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with control handles inside Illustrator.

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And you're going to run into situations

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where you're not getting smooth results.

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And any time that happens,
I want you to take a look

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at an arc.

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So go to the Line Segment Tool,

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and then select the Arc Tool.

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And just go ahead and draw a big arc.

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And in my case, I want to flip it

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just for the sake of demonstration here.

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And after you draw the
arc, then press the a key

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to switch to the White Arrow Tool,

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and go ahead and click off
the line to deselect it.

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And then click on its
segment, and you'll see

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how the control handles are arranged.

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And I want you to notice that
we have two control handles

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for curving segment.

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That's very important.

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You don't want to have just
one control handle like this

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because you'll end up with
a kind of flat tire effect.

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So you definitely want two
handles for every curving segment

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and you want those handles together

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to occupy about 2/3 the
length of the segment.

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So in other words, about 1/3
of the length of the segment

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is not covered by handles;
and the other 2/3 are.

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That is not to say that they
have to be even in length

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by the way.

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One can be longer, and
the other can be shorter,

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and you can still end up
with very smooth results

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like this.

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And that friends is how
smooth points really work

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inside Illustrator.

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In the next movie, I'll show
you how to draw smooth points

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with the Pen Tool.