- [Instructor] In this movie, I'll show you
how to create the text effects
that we're seeing at the top and bottom of this document
using text expressed as an art brush.
And we'll also see
how you can distort that text using the Width tool.
Alright, so, I'll go and switch over to our problem so far,
and we don't need this text converted
to path outlines anymore,
because after all, we've now saved it to the Brush panel.
So I'll just click one, shift click the other
and press the Backspace key or the Delete key on the Mac.
Now we need to retrieve the path outlines,
to which we've assigned this text,
and that is anything but obvious in Illustrator.
There is no option where you just select the text
and right click and then choose some sort
of release command.
So what we have to do instead is press the A key
to switch to the White Arrow tool,
and then click off that text,
press Control + Y or Command + Y on the Mac
to switch to the Outline Mode
and go ahead and alt- or option-click on the path outline
independently of the text,
and if you've done it correctly,
you will have selected the entire path outline like so.
Then press Control + C or Command + C on the Mac
in order to copy that path outline.
And now, if you like, you can just press Control + 0
or Command + 0 on the Mac in order to zoom out.
Then just grab the Black Selection tool,
which you can get by pressing the V key.
Shift click on this text down here,
and just press the Backspace key
or the Delete key on the Mac.
Now, if you've done things correctly,
Illustrator will get mad at you
because you're trying to delete this path outline,
which means the text won't have anything
to hang onto anymore.
And so if that happens to you,
what you need to do, is just shift click
on that text a couple of more times
with the Black Arrow tool
until you definitely get it selected,
and then press the Backspace key
or the Delete key on the Mac to get rid of it.
And the reason I'm being so cavalier
about getting rid of this editable text is
because I still have it,
it's just associated with those smooth path outlines.
Alright, so, I'll go ahead and turn those guys off.
Then I'll press Control + F or Command + F on the Mac
in order to paste this object in front
as we're seeing right here.
Alright, now press Control + Y or Command + Y on the Mac
to switch back to the Preview Mode,
and with this path selected I bring up my Brushes panel,
and I'll scroll down the list
until I see that first text brush, different strokes,
and I'll click on it,
and then I'll hide the Brushes panel,
and I want you to notice
that things are already working better.
Illustrator has not only auto fit the text,
but we've got a kind of smooth transition at the word FOR.
Alright now, I want to modify this path outline a little bit,
and this is a kind of thing that is made really hard
when you're working with text on a path.
Let's see, for example,
that the path outline isn't really the shape
I'm looking for,
and I still want it to be symmetrical,
in which case, what I'd like to do,
is get rid of half the path,
modify the other half,
and then flip it and join those pieces together,
which you really can't do
when you're working with text on a path.
So here's what I'm thinking.
I'm going to press the A key to switch to White Arrow tool,
and I'll click on this right hand anchor point,
and I'll press the Backspace key
or the Delete key on the Mac to get rid of it,
and just like that, Illustrator already goes ahead
and path-fits that text.
Alright, now I'm going to select this anchor point right here.
And just so you can follow along
with me as easily as possible,
I'll press the Enter key or the Return key on the Mac
to bring up the Move dialogue box,
and I'll change the Horizontal value to negative 12,
and then I'll change the Vertical value to seven,
and that's going to move this point 12 points to the left
and seven points down, at which point I'll just click Okay.
Alright, now, this point needs to come down,
so I'll select it and press the Enter key
or the Return key on the Mac again.
I'll change the Horizontal value to zero this time,
and I'll change the Vertical value to 15 points,
and that'll move that point down as we're seeing here,
at which time I'll click Okay to accept that change.
Alright, now, I want this control handle to be horizontal.
So I'll drag it and then press
and hold the Shift key like so
in order to constrain the control handle
as we're seeing here.
Alright, now, I'm going to select this entire path outline
by alt-clicking on it,
that's an option-click on the Mac,
and I need to flip it around the center of the document.
Fortunately, I set up some guides in advance.
They're down here on this guides Layer,
so I'll just go ahead and turn it on.
And then, what you want to do is select the Reflect tool
from the Rotate Tool fly out menu
or you have that keyboard shortcut of O,
and then I'll alt- or option-click
on that vertical guideline
to bring up the Reflect dialogue box.
I need the axis to be vertical,
after which point I'll click the Copy button
in order to create a copy of that path outline.
Alright, now, here's the part that you could not do,
if you were working with text on a path.
I'll press the A key to switch back to my White Arrow tool,
and I'll marquee these two anchor points right here,
and I'll join 'em together
by going up to the Object menu,
choosing Path and choosing Join,
or you have that keyboard shortcut of Control + J
or Command + J on the Mac, and just like that,
it joins the two paths together
and strokes it with a single art brush.
Now of course, the art brush is a little bit messed up here.
It's upside down and everything,
but we can fix that just by pressing the V key
to switch back to the Black Arrow tool.
I'll click on that path outline to select it.
I'll go up here to this Brush menu,
up here in the Control panel,
click on it and then click on that little dialogue box icon,
just 'cause it's convenient.
And then with the Preview checkbox turned on,
I'll click Flip Along and then Flip Across,
and that's going to fix my text,
at which point I'll click Okay to accept that change.
And now I press the Escape key to hide that menu.
Alright, now, let's say that you want to distort that text
in the middle, so it's taller.
In that case, I'd grab the Width tool,
and that's because you can use the Width tool
to distort any art brush along a path outline.
And so what I'm going to do,
you have to be careful on this one,
you click on this point right here,
and then you shift double-click on this one.
And that will bring up the Width Point Edit dialogue box
for both of those points.
And then I'll change that Total Width value to 1.6 points,
and if I've done everything correctly, which I have,
then I will see this effect here.
Now, let's see if I have enough room to pull this off,
I'll click on this endpoint,
and I'll shift double-click on this one,
and I'll change the Total Width value to 0.9 points like so,
and I'll click Okay.
Alright, now I want to enhance the distortion,
and I can do that by returning to that menu right there,
up here in the Control panel,
and I once again click on the dialogue box icon
to bring up this dialogue box here.
And notice that the Size option
now reads Width Points/Profile,
which means I can now give it a little extra hight,
if I want to, by changing this first value.
And so I'm going to increase it to 120%,
I'll leave the second value,
which represents the minimum, set to 100%,
and I'll click Okay,
and because that thing's in my way
I press the Escape key to hide it,
and I'll just go ahead and show you before and after.
This is before and this is after,
how cool is that?
Alright, now, what we want to do is copy this guy
to the bottom of the artwork.
I'm going to zoom out a little bit here and scroll back up,
and then I'll switch back to my Reflect Tool,
and I'll alt- or option-click on that horizontal guideline
like so to bring up the Reflect dialogue box.
This time I'll set Axis to Horizontal,
and I'll click Copy.
And things look great right now,
but bear in mind that I need to apply a different art brush.
And so, I'll just go ahead and bring up the Brushes panel,
and I'll select curiously handcrafted,
and notice, it's now upside down,
and bad news, the width points are messed up.
But that's a problem that's easily solved.
I'll just go ahead and switch back to the Width tool.
I'll click on this point right here,
and I'll shift double-click on this one
to bring up the Width Point Edit dialogue box,
and I'll make sure
that the Total Width value is set to 1.6 points,
and I'll click Okay.
And then I'll click on this guy
and shift double-click on it,
and I'll take its value down to 0.9, that's our problem,
and then I'll click Okay,
and we end up getting this effect here.
Now, I just need to modify the brush settings.
So I once again bring back my Brushes panel,
make it a little shorter
so that I can better see the preview,
and I'll go ahead and click on the dialogue box icon.
And this time I will once again change that first value
to 120%, and I've got the Preview checkbox turned on,
so I can see that this is working.
Then I'll turn on Flip Along, followed by Flip Across,
at which point we get exactly the effect we're looking for.
And now, I'll just go ahead and hide the panel,
and I'll tidy up the Layers panel
in addition to turning off the guides Layer.
I press Control + Shift + A
or Command + Shift + A on the Mac
in order to deselect the artwork,
and I'll press Control + 0 or Command + 0 on the Mac
to center my zoom.
And at this point,
if you decide things aren't exactly the way
you want them to be, for example, I'm thinking the center
of this text is a little high,
then I'll just go ahead and marquee these two anchor points
with the White Arrow tool,
and then I'll press the down arrow key,
one, two, three, four, five, six times in a row
in order to nudge those points down,
and I'll do the same thing here,
I press the up arrow key,
one, two, three, four, five, six times,
and notice that the art brushes move right along with.
So as long as you like like the font,
and you don't have any typos,
this is perhaps the most flexible way
to create type on a path outline
using a combination of type expressed as an art brush
along with the ever useful Width tool
here inside Illustrator.