Photoshop user needs help with Illustrator!!

[Hardev]

Hi,
I have been using photoshop for users and am extremely comfortable using it. I recently joined a new company and was forced to use Illustrator (for designing brochures!!). I am having difficulty getting used to Illustrator!! Does anyone know of any Illustrator tutorials for photoshop users??


BTW in photoshop, if you want to align a word (just an example) to the center of a box, all you have to do is right click on the box layer and click on the align button, does anyone know how to do it in illustrator??


Thank you

[novafishy]

go to the Align Pallete in Illustrator.

[Black_phoenix]

Hi heres a tutorial on aligning objects


http://www.illustrator-brushes.com/i...or-objects.htm


just select the text and the box then align them

bp

[JoelTHE]

Haha, I loved reading this post. I remember when I was first introduced to Illustrator after using PS for years...I felt so uncomfortable.

BUT...the key with Illustrator is not to try to mimic what you would have done in Photoshop. Illustrator is very powerful, and when used in combination with Photoshop you can produce some serious stuff. All the graphics on my website were done with PS and Illustrator and I get asked all the time what 3D software I use.

First comment...learn to align by eye and not by computer...computers align things mathematically and most graphics (letters especially) are not perfectly visually balanced and are not in the exact centre when they look balanced...so just do what looks right, because if it looks right, it is right.

Secondly...there are three main areas of Illustrator (in my opinion) that you should be familiar with and then everything else is gravy.

1) Pen Tool. Try it, play with it, love it. Experiment with making perfect curves by plotting anchor points and dragging, turning them, etc. You might suck at it at first, but after a couple days you'll start getting pretty comfortable and you'll realize how powerful it is to be able to make perfect curves that are re-sizable.

2) Pathfinder. This tool lets you combine shapes in a lot of different ways. Become intimately familiar with it, it will make your life easier. Forget tutorials on aligning, find a tutorial on this.

3) Shape tools. If you are comfortable with the circles and rectangles and adding fills and strokes and all those basic things then you can combine them with the above tools for the real deal.

An honourary #4 would be the text tools, but they aren't very different from Photoshop.

After getting a handle on those things, start using PS and Illustrator to draw. Draw the shapes in Illustrator and then import to PS. Seriously, even though I know all about the complex tools of Illustrator, I only occasionally need anything outside of the above areas.

Adobe Illustrator is my favourite software for layouts and brochures and things like that...and it's irreplaceable for logos, illustrations, custom lettering, etc.

I hope that helps.

[phil-ray]

i also have been useing illustrator for the first time nearly 2 or 3 weeks back now getting used to it now but it is such a bit step its mad.

my advice is play about a bit but also do the tutorials if there is any, and ask people if u dont know, also u could use photoshop for all your photo needs and then put it in illustrator to do the text and nice crisp boxes and stuff like that. (at least untill u know how to do the stuff in illustrator

[pea3698]

I totally aggree with Joel. I use photoshop and illustrator hand in hand. I actually had my yearly review today and a down point was that I don't know photoshop very well(which is an odd accusation, I pretty much know the program inside and out). It always seems to annoy my supervisor that I design in both photoshop and illustrator. My point is that one is made for some tasks the other for others. Anyone that knows the capabilities of both programs know this.

Point in being master both and the combination will take you in leaps and bounds to better places( at least that's what i'm hoping )

[Jujumon]

i pretty much draw a line between photoshop and illus.

photoshop: manipulating photos

illustrator: finishing layout and web vector graphics (I hate flash drawing tools)

[jerryCLEMENT]

Haha, I loved reading this post. I remember when I was first introduced to Illustrator after using PS for years...I felt so uncomfortable.

BUT...the key with Illustrator is not to try to mimic what you would have done in Photoshop. Illustrator is very powerful, and when used in combination with Photoshop you can produce some serious stuff. All the graphics on my website were done with PS and Illustrator and I get asked all the time what 3D software I use.

First comment...learn to align by eye and not by computer...computers align things mathematically and most graphics (letters especially) are not perfectly visually balanced and are not in the exact centre when they look balanced...so just do what looks right, because if it looks right, it is right.

Secondly...there are three main areas of Illustrator (in my opinion) that you should be familiar with and then everything else is gravy.

1) Pen Tool. Try it, play with it, love it. Experiment with making perfect curves by plotting anchor points and dragging, turning them, etc. You might suck at it at first, but after a couple days you'll start getting pretty comfortable and you'll realize how powerful it is to be able to make perfect curves that are re-sizable.

2) Pathfinder. This tool lets you combine shapes in a lot of different ways. Become intimately familiar with it, it will make your life easier. Forget tutorials on aligning, find a tutorial on this.

3) Shape tools. If you are comfortable with the circles and rectangles and adding fills and strokes and all those basic things then you can combine them with the above tools for the real deal.

An honourary #4 would be the text tools, but they aren't very different from Photoshop.

After getting a handle on those things, start using PS and Illustrator to draw. Draw the shapes in Illustrator and then import to PS. Seriously, even though I know all about the complex tools of Illustrator, I only occasionally need anything outside of the above areas.

Adobe Illustrator is my favourite software for layouts and brochures and things like that...and it's irreplaceable for logos, illustrations, custom lettering, etc.

I hope that helps.

Yea your Bee image is pretty clean. We just recently did that kinda stuff in my advanced image manipulation class, and i came back with some awesome results. 2 thumbs up for the bee, it does look very 3d.

[jerryCLEMENT]

Also, i agree, once you get used to illustrator for logo design and things like that, it's pretty hard to be without for certain things. And i have been using PS for almost 10 years now.

[JoelTHE]

Yea your Bee image is pretty clean. We just recently did that kinda stuff in my advanced image manipulation class, and i came back with some awesome results. 2 thumbs up for the bee, it does look very 3d.

It's a wasp. Thanks though I appreciate the compliments. What exactly are you covering in that class? I've never taken a PS class before and I've always been curious about what you learn...

[jerryCLEMENT]

Pretty useless stuff for me. I actually took the about 6 months ago, we did vector illustration, then texturing in photoshop, poster design, masking, color seperation, things like that. I had already known all that stuff when i went into the class, i just needed it for the credit. Tii bad i'm not at home, i would post my final for you to see. I didn't really learn anything in the class, i tested out of the first image manipulation class and they wouldn't let me test out of the second so i ended up taking it. Class was cake.

[JoelTHE]

Mmmm...cake...