- In this movie, we'll join our independent line segments
to create filled path outlines.
Notice, if I go ahead and zoom in right here, for example,
that I've got a little clip
in the corner of my right-hand smoke stack.
That's because these two lines right here
represent what are known as independent paths
inside of Illustrator.
In other words, this line segment right here
does not continue into this one.
What we need to do in order to continue them
and end up with a nice, sharp corner
is join the paths.
So I'm going to press ctrl + 0
or cmd + 0 on the Mac
in order to center my zoom.
Then I'll press the "v" key to switch to my Black Arrow Tool
and I'll partially marquee all three of the line segments
that are associated with the right-hand smoke stack.
Now, I'll go up to the Object menu,
choose Path and choose Join.
Or, you have this keyboard shortcut of ctrl + j
or cmd + j on the Mac
which I will be using to join the other paths.
All right, so go ahead and choose the command
and notice, now, you end up with a nice, sharp corner
and that's because these three line segments
have now been fused into a single continuous path outline.
And to confirm that's the case,
I'll press the "a" key to switch to my White Arrow Tool
and I'll select this anchor point by clicking on it
and then I'll drag it.
Notice that that stretches both
of these neighboring segments.
That's because what was formerly two anchor points,
overlapping each other,
has been joined into one.
All right, I'll go ahead and press ctrl + z
or cmd + z on the Mac to undo that move
and I'll press the "v" key
to switch back to the Black Arrow Tool
and I'll click on that path to select the whole thing.
Now, what I want to do is close the path
so that I have one continuous path outline
that returns back on itself.
In other words, what I need to do
is connect these two so-called endpoints
so that we have one more segment down below.
And you do that in the same way we join the line segments,
by going up to the Object menu, choosing Path
and then choosing Join
or, again, you can press ctrl + j
or cmd + j on the Mac
and that will go ahead and join those endpoints
with a straight segment.
Now, we want to reverse the fill and the stroke.
In other words, we want to fill this path outline with black
and give it no stroke,
just get rid of the black outline
that surrounds that rectangle.
You can do that by going down to the bottom of the toolbox
which I can't see.
So I'm going to go ahead and click in this double arrow icon
to switch back to the double column toolbox
and I'm going to move this guy,
this floating toolbar out of the way.
Then notice down here, we can see the fill
which is set to none
and we can see the stroke which is black.
In order to swap those two attributes,
you click on this double arrow
which represents the swap icon.
It has a keyboard shortcut of shift + x.
I want you to remember that one as well.
Notice, as soon as I click on it,
I swap the stroke and fill
and I end up with this black smoke stack.
All right, now let's repeat those operations
but using keyboard shortcuts
for the other smoke stack and the factory.
So I'll go ahead and partially marquee
the three line segments associated with this smoke stack
and I'll press ctrl + j,
or cmd + j in the Mac,
in order to fuse those three independent line segments
into one continuous path outline.
Then I'll close that path outline
by pressing ctrl + j or cmd + j again.
Now, I'll swap the fill and stroke
by pressing shift + x.
In other words, it's ctrl + j twice,
that's cmd + j twice on the Mac
followed by shift + x
and that's all there is to it.
All right, now I want to partially marquee
these factory objects.
So notice that I am making sure to fly
underneath the smoke stack.
I'll show you that again
because if I were to come up into the smoke stack
even partially, like so,
including this guy over here on the right,
then I will select all of the objects
which is not what I'm interested in doing.
Instead, I'll go ahead and start dragging down here,
partially marquee all of the independent line segments,
do not go up into this left-hand smoke stack
or over into the right-hand one,
just stay inside the factory lines like so.
Then press ctrl + j or cmd + j on the Mac.
And I really want you to see this.
I'm going to zoom in here
and I'm going to press ctrl + z
or cmd + z on the Mac to undo.
Notice how we have no sharp corner here
or down here either.
But if I press ctrl + j or cmd + j on the Mac,
then we get these nice, sharp corners.
All right, now I'll go ahead and zoom out here
and I'll close this path by pressing ctrl + j
or cmd + j on the Mac once again.
Then I'll go ahead and swap the fill and stroke
by pressing shift + x, like so.
Then I'll go ahead and click off the path outlines
to deselect them.
If you want to see how things look without the guidelines,
then the easiest thing to do
is to go over here to the Layers Panel
and click on the eye in front of the guides layer
in order to hide it.
Clicking on that eye makes it disappear
and hides the layer as well.
Now, we have an unfettered view
of our finished path outlines.
That's how you fuse independent line segments
into continuous path outlines
using the Join command
here inside Illustrator.