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- In this movie I'll
show you how to create

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what's known as a compound path,

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which is when you combine
multiple path outlines into one.

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And most simply this is used
in order to carve holes,

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so for example, if you
take a look at the rim

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of the magnifying glass,
we have the inner circle

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cutting a hole in the outer circle.

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And the same thing is occurring with

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this black shadow right here.

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And let me show you what that looks like.

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Go ahead and switch over to this document

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and it appears I've made a mistake,

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I went ahead and created these two circles

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on this Guides layer,

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but that's great because
it gives me the chance

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to show you a very fundamental technique.

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I'm going to go ahead
and partially Marquee

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those two circles with
my black arrow tool.

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And notice I now see a little blue square

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over here in the Layers Panel.

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That square represents this selection.

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And so if I drag it and drop
it onto the Drawing layer,

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it now becomes Red to
indicate that the selection

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has moved to that layer.

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And you can also see
that the anchor points

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and the segments are turning Red, as well.

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All right, so the most common example

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of a compound path is the letter O.

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So let's say I decide to draw an O myself.

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I'll go ahead and switch
to the Ellipse Tool

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and then I'll go ahead and drag

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from the intersection
of these two guidelines,

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and I'll press the Alt key,

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or the Option key, as I drag

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to create this path from the center out.

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And then I'll press the Alt key,

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or Option key on the Mac,

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while creating a smaller ellipse.

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All right, now I'm
going to press the V key

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to switch back to the black arrow tool,

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and I'll go ahead and
Marquee both these paths.

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And let's say I want to change the Fill

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to something like Red,
just so that we have

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a different color going on screen.

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Notice that I am filling
both path outlines.

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If I want the inner path to
cut a hole in the outer path,

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then I need to combine the two paths

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into a compound path.

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And you do that by going
up to the Object menu,

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choosing Compound Path, way
down here at the bottom,

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and then choosing the Make command.

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And that goes ahead and
combines those two path outlines

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into one.

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And notice if I go ahead and drag this O

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out here so that it's
partially over the paste board,

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we can see that its interior
is indeed transparent.

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And the only reason we're
seeing a vertical line through

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the character, by the way,
is because Illustrator

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is showing us the edge of the artboard.

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But otherwise this shape
is entirely intact.

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All right, I'm going to get rid of that O

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because I don't want it,

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and what I want to do instead

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is create that little
bit of a shadow ledge

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that I was showing you
in the final graphic.

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And I want to make sure this time

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that I can exactly align
this new circle that

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I'm about to draw with the old one.

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And so I'm going to add a custom guide

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by clicking on the Guides
layer to make it active,

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and then I'll go ahead and select

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the Line Segment Tool, from
the Line Tool flyout menu.

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And I'll drag from the
intersection of these

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two guidelines right
there, down into the right

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while pressing the Shift key

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until I reach the bleed,
as I've done right here.

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And I'm pressing the
Shift key, by the way,

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so I can constrain the angle of this line

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to exactly 45 degrees.

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And if you're not clear on
where I'm going with this,

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I'll reveal the method behind my madness

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in just a moment.

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All right, now I want to
convert that line to a guide

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by going up to the View
menu, choosing Guides,

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and then choosing Make Guides.

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And I now have a custom
guide at 45 degrees.

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All right, now I'm going to click

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on the Drawing layer to
make it active once again,

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and I'll select the Ellipse Tool

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and I'm going to drag
from the intersection

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of this inner circle,

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and this diagonal guideline.

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So this point right there,

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and I'm going to drag up and out,

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and because the standard behavior

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is to create the ellipse inside of a

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rectangular bounding box,

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I am not getting any
sort of alignment at all.

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But if I press and hold the Control key,

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or the Command key on the Mac,

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during my drag, not before,

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because that would give
you the black arrow tool,

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then I'll go ahead and create the ellipse

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from that exact point.

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The problem is I can't
see the size of my ellipse

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as I'm drawing it,

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I don't have that heads up display,

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and that's because I
turned off Smart Guides.

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So I'll go ahead and undo the

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creation of that ellipse
and go up to the View menu

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and turn Smart Guides back on.

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And now I'll reattempt that maneuver

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by dragging from the
intersection of that inner circle

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and the diagonal guideline,

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and then pressing and
holding the Control key,

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or the Command key on the Mac,

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in order to align that edge
right there to that circle.

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And then also press
the Shift key as I drag

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so that I'm drawing a
perfect circle, like so.

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And I want it to be as close
to 402 points as possible.

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Looks like 401.58 points

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is about the best I'm going to do,

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at which point I'll go ahead and release

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in order to create that circle, like so.

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And be sure if you're
following along with me

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to release the mouse button

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before you release the Control and Shift,

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or Command and Shift keys.

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All right, now what you want to do

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is switch back to the black arrow tool,

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which of course you can
get by pressing the V key,

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and I want you to click on
this circle right there,

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the inner circle, because we're
going to be using it twice.

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And so anytime you want
to use the shape twice

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you need to copy it
before you put it in play.

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And so with that shape selected,

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I'll go up to the Edit menu

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and choose the Copy command.

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Or you can press Control C,

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or Command C on the Mac.

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All right, now I'm going to
Shift click on the circle I just

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created, and I'm going to fill
both these circles with Black

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by clicking on this first swatch

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on the left hand side
of the Control Panel,

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and choosing Black.

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And now of course I want the inner circle

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to cut a hole in the
relatively outer circle.

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And so I'll go up to the Object menu,

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choose Compound Path, and choose Make,

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and the deed is done.

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The thing is I also
want this outer circle,

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this guy right here,

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to have its inner circle cut out of it.

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So I'm going to go ahead
and press Control Z,

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or Command Z to undo that absurd move,

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and i'll paste that
shape that I just copied

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by going to the Edit menu
and choosing Paste in Front,

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it's very important you
choose Paste in Front,

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by the way, as opposed to Paste,

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because Paste is just going to paste

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the shape any old place.

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Whereas Paste in Front is going to put it

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right back where Illustrator found it.

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And of course you can also
execute that command by

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pressing Control F, or
Command F on the Mac.

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All right, now go ahead and Shift click

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on that outermost circle,
go up to the Fill swatch,

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on the far left side of the Control Panel,

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change the Fill to White this time,

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which isn't going to cover
up anything, by the way,

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because we pasted the shape in front

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of the outermost one, so
this Black ring right here

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is still at the front of the stack.

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And so now I'll go up to the Object menu,

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choose Compound Path, and choose Make,

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in order to combine those
two shapes together.

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And just to confirm that we have

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what I said we would have,

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I'll go ahead and drag these
paths out into the paste board,

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and you can see that we
now have a White ring

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with the innermost circle

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cutting a hole in the outermost one.

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And having proven that I'll just go ahead

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and press Control Z,
or Command Z on the Mac

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in order to put those shapes
back where they belong.

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And that's how you create compound paths

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which allow one path to
cut a hole through another

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here inside Illustrator.