There was a time when Illustrator was for drawing and InDesign was for page layout. In fact, I used to tell my students that if they understood Illustrator, they would understand InDesign, and it's true. InDesign is essentially Illustrator expanded. And it is expanded quite a bit! But Illustrator has grown a lot since its invention, and has added a lot of page layout features, like style sheets, linking images, and multiple pages. So, as much as I hate to say it, InDesign just isn't worth the trouble for most of my clients. Sure, if you are doing large documents, or catalogs, it makes sense. But for brochures, ads, and most page layout functions, Adobe Illustrator can do it, and is much, much, easier.
My background is in page layout and I've always said that you should learn the correct tool for the job. A decade ago, using Adobe Illustrator for page layout instead of InDesign would have been a serious mistake. Now it's the best way to go.
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
How to view the hidden layers in the Obama long form birth certificate
To see the hidden layers in the Obama long form birth certificate, you will need to open the pdf file with Adobe Illustrator. Adobe Photoshop won't work for this, it must be Illustrator. The trick to opening the pdf file with Illustrator is to open Illustrator first, and select open from there. If you just click on the pdf icon, it will just open in Reader.
Once you have the file open, go to Window>Layers
I've been teaching Adobe Illustrator for a long time, and all I can say about this file is that it puzzles me. I'm not sure why the artist chose to do most of the things on it. The background with the clipping mask is a nice artistic touch, but the rest, well, I just don't know. Go ahead and open up the file in Illustrator and tell me what you think!
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Once you have the file open, go to Window>Layers
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
Understanding layers in Adobe Illustrator
Many people are unaware of the layer palette in Adobe Illustrator. Window>Layers. It really isn't as important as in Photoshop, and when I do training I just mention it in passing. It can be wonderful tool for isolating and selecting areas in complex documents. And every time you draw anything in Adobe Illustrator, it creates a sublayer that you can go back to if you need to. If you don't create additional layers, Adobe Illustrator puts everything on Layer 1, as in the example below. But you really won't see anything until you twirl down the little triangle next to the icon.
In this particular instance, the artist has made use of the Group function, which is wise to do to keep objects held together. I'm not exactly sure why this particular document required all of these groups, but to see them all, you need to twirl down the triangle on the Group sublayer. One of the handiest things that you can do with layers is to turn off the visibility. The layer is still there, but you don't have to look at things that you aren't working on. To hide/show the layer, click on the icon of the eye.
A mistake many beginners make in Adobe Illustrator is to just make it too complex. If you are wondering why your file is taking so long to print, for example, you may have created too many objects. It's hard to see it on the screen, but if you take a look at the layers palette, you can usually find the unnecessary complexity there. When you save an Illustrator file as a pdf, you have the option of allowing Illustrator editing capabilities or not. I recommend that you do allow it, so that your printer can get into the file and do a little cleanup as necessary.
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
How to use the pen tool in Adobe Illustrator to draw a curved line
To draw a curved line, click and drag the mouse. That will establish the anchor point and the direction of the vector. The anchor point is indicated by a square. The vector is indicated by a line with two little dots on the end. Those are the handles that allow you to adjust the direction of the vector, and the angle of the curve. When you click elsewhere on the page, you will have a curved line.
Drawing and adjusting curved lines in Adobe Illustrator requires knowledge of anchor points, the selection tool, and the direct-select tool. If you don't understand those concepts, stop. Go back and become comfortable with them. This is because no one, not even someone like me who has been using this software since the 1980s, can draw a curved line without making some adjustments. The adjustments are done by changing the position of the anchor point and the direction and length of the handles.
My experience as a teacher and a trainer is that doing this is a "light bulb" moment for my students. After saying, "I'll never get this" several times, a light bulb goes off, and they get it. You will too. The more I explain it, the more complicated it seems. Let your fingers do it, when it clicks with you, it will be a pleasure. Learning it from a book or a video is almost impossible. Have someone show you. If it's in the budget, hire me. You will be pleasantly surprised.
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
How to use the pen tool in Adobe Illustrator to draw a straight line
The first mistake that people make when attempting to draw a straight line in Adobe Illustrator with the pen tool is to do a click-and-drag. If you've tried this, only to see a dot appear and another line with a smaller dot appear, and then disappear, don't feel bad. To be fair, in just about any other graphics program, that is how you draw a line, with a click and drag. That's not how you do it in Adobe Illustrator.
Select the pen tool, go on the page and click and let go. Then go somewhere else on the page and click and let go. I've taught classes where I've had people literally let go and hold their hands up in the air after they click the mouse. Do not drag the mouse.
Clicking-and-dragging with the pen tool establishes a vector direction, which is the subject of another post. This takes you into curved lines, which are really quite fun, again, once you get the hang of it. Start with a straight line. And make friends with the pen tool.
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
How to underline type in Adobe Illustrator
Putting an underline on type in Adobe Illustrator is an option of the Character palette. To get this palette, go to Window>Type>Character. Then select Show options as shown below.
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
Power tools in Adobe Photoshop, InDesign, Dreamweaver and Illustrator
If you are a Graphic Designer, or a Graphic Design student, who "brags" about how many hours a project took, or how late you stayed working on something, you are probably just telling everyone that you don't know how to use Adobe's power tools. There are a lot of them and I would like to talk about a few here. It's all about learning these tricks and understanding that computers love to do what humans hate to do - repetitious tasks. In fact, if you are doing anything at all that is repetitious, you should ask yourself, is there any easier way? There probably is!
Here are a few power tools that you should know -
Photoshop - Actions. Actions allows you to record a complex series of tasks and then apply them with a single click. Even better - Batch. You will find Actions under "Window". Batch is under File>Automate. While you are there until midnight, a pro has created an action and a batch and was home before rush hour.
InDesign - Master Pages. Master pages let you not only place items on hundreds of pages with just a click, they allow you to change hundreds of pages with the same amount of clicks. New logo on every page of the 2,500-page manual? Click! Done.
Dreamweaver - Cascading Style Sheets file. When you go to use CSS for your typography in Dreamweaver, make sure that you create a separate file that links to all your web pages. Don't like those purple Helvetica 18 point headings? Change them on all of the pages in the whole site using the CSS page.
Illustrator - Symbols. Instead of drawing something and copying and pasting it, turn it into a symbol. If it repeats all over the drawing, and you can change it once and it changes in every instance. Need to change 275 six-pointed stars to eight-pointed stars? Do it once and it's done.
And this is just the beginning. Once you start learning these power tools, your productivity goes up like a rocket. And it's kind of fun. Zoom-zoom!
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
The advantages of creating vector art
There are two ways to create an image to be viewed on a computer - vector and raster. Raster is what most people are familiar with - a more common term is "pixels", that is, the tiny colored squares that, when put together, create an image. The smaller the squares, the sharper the image. That is what is known as "resolution". If you've worked with Adobe Photoshop, you are aware that resolution is an important calculation to make before you create any artwork.
An image created with vectors is independent of resolution. If you create a drawing in Adobe Illustrator, or an animation for Dreamworks, it can be output to any resolution you want. The best way to describe vectors is that they can be enlarged indefinitely without any loss of sharpness. That is because a vector image is not created with pixels at all. It is created with a series of points that are tied together like wires. When those wire forms are completed, they can be colored, textured, and reshaped easily. When you draw something in Adobe Illustrator, you never have to think of resolution. And I like that!
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Yes, I will also do a training session on setting up your blog on Google Blogger. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
Graphic Illustration using vectors
My most recent assignment was for a championship-style belt like the kind you would see wrestlers wear. It's a fairly simple shape in Adobe Illustrator, which is most easily done with the pen tool. The laurel wreath is free clip art that I converted into vectors using Illustrator's function "Live Trace". The buttons are just circles and the "stitching" is a stroke using the "dashed line" function. Once you have mastered Adobe Illustrator this is fairly straight-forward. Working with vectors is what Adobe Illustrator is all about. Vectors create that sharp graphic look, and although they take some time and skill to put together, they are easily recolored and repositioned.
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Yes, I will also do a training session on setting up your blog on Google Blogger. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
How to learn any software program
If you would like to learn a software program, such as Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, or Dreamweaver, I have some suggestions to make it easier and faster for you. It will soud simple enough, but you would be surprised at how many times people get this wrong and end up being frustrated.• Find out what the software program is for. Think of a software program as a tool in your toolbox. If you really don't know what the software program was designed to do, chances are you will be flying blind. Look it up on the web. Ask people.
• Use the correct software program for a particular need. Once you know what different software programs were designed for, choose the correct tool. If you need to create web pages, the correct tool is Dreamweaver. If you know Photoshop, you possibly could try to create a web page using it, but it will be a world of frustration for you. I call this "hammering in a nail with a screwdriver".
• Keep it simple. There are always about a dozen ways to do any given task in a software program. In Photoshop there are usually much, much more. Find the way that makes sense to you and do it. Don't let someone talk you into some convoluted, complicated, way of doing a task. Stick with what works for you. If there is another way that you discover later that makes more sense to you, you can change at that time.
• Learn best practices. This is all I teach. If you have guessed your way through creating something in a software program, and you don't dare open the file up again, you have made a mess. Throw it away and create it correctly.
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Yes, I will also do a training session on setting up your blog on Google Blogger. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
Adobe Illustrator for page layout
If you are doing complex page layout work that involves many chapters, or lots of photos, by all means use InDesign or QuarkXPress. They are power tools for that type of application! But if you just need an ad, or a simple one or two page brochure, go with Adobe Illustrator.
In addition to being an excellent drawing program, Adobe Illustrator handles type with ease. I have found it to be increasing in popularity for this use in the last few years, and for good reason. It's much, much simpler than dealing with a full-on "page layout" program.
With Adobe Illustrator, you can compose a page of any size, use any font, any color, even bring in photos. Nothing is better and easier for working with graphics, such as logos, or even just blocks of color and line. It's pretty amazing what Illustrator can do!
Blog post on introduction to Adobe Illustrator training is here
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Yes, I will also do a training session on setting up your blog on Google Blogger. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
Training session - Introduction to Adobe Illustrator
Adobe Illustrator is a drawing program, as opposed to Photoshop, which is a painting program. I like to think of these two programs as sisters. They seem similar at first, but they are different, and different for a reason. In an introduction to Adobe Illustrator, we would cover
• The Adobe interface. If you've already worked with Adobe software before, you will be aware of this. It is an intuitive icon-based interface that was designed for creative people. If you use it correctly, it is a pleasure, if you use it wrong, it can be just terrible. This is where we start.
• Using simple, or primitive, shapes. This is at the heart of all vector programs, which is what Adobe Illustrator is. All computer animation is based on vectors, from "Toy Story" to "Avatar". No, Adobe Illustrator isn't used for computer animation, but it is the best introduction to vectors. A vector shape is a series of points that is "rendered" by a computer. You draw the shapes, the computer fills them in.
• Drawing vectors, using paths, strokes and fills. This is where it begins to be completely different from Photoshop. Vectors are independent of resolution. A vector image can be output to any resolution that you want it to be, from low (web) to high-definition. In fact, if you are confused about resolution and pixels, that's fine, Adobe Illustrator doesn't deal with them, so you don't have to.
When you start drawing with Adobe Illustrator, you will understand why it's such a great program. Trying to do the same thing in Photoshop is like trying to draw with a broom! Adobe Illustrator is for precision.
To prepare for your Illustrator session, be sure that Illustrator is installed and running on your computer. No, it doesn't matter what version you have or whether it is on a Mac or a PC. Just let me know. Give yourself three hours of focused time by turning off your phone and telling people to leave you alone for a while. Don't worry, we will take breaks!
If you would like to get personal on-site software training in Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator or Dreamweaver in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area, please contact me. Yes, I will also do a training session on setting up your blog on Google Blogger. Paypal accepted, morning appointments only.
Contact Brad directly
Thursday, September 23, 2010
The difference between an on-site training software session and a class
• A private college, such as The Art Institute of Phoenix, is the most appropriate for you if you are just starting out and want the very best foundation. Yes, it takes time and money, but it is well worth it - I've seen the graduates!
• A community college is the best place to go if you want to get a little without paying a lot. This is by far the least expensive way to go. And, if you don't like the class, you can drop it. The drawbacks, of course, are, well, dealing with the community college, which is, after all, a government organization not unlike the DMV. Filling out forms, standing in line, etc. is part of what you have to do.
• Taking a training session from a private company, such as Roundpeg, is a great way to go for a busy professional. There are no grades, no lines to stand in, no nonsense. You just show up and start learning. And you get free coffee and bagels! You can take a half-day session, or sign up for multiples. The only drawback to this approach is that you have to take time off from work and go there. If you're working for a company, this can be a very pleasant way to learn new software. If you own the company, you may not want your people to be away all day.
• A personal training session means that the trainer comes to you. I do this, and most training companies can arrange for this, too. This is the most appropriate for you if you want to learn something specific about a piece of software, have no interest in dealing with a school, and would prefer not to leave your office. If you know exactly what you would like to do, for example, using Adobe Illustrator to create a brochure, this is what you want. A personal training session is custom-made for you. The way I do it is you work on your own computer and I sit next to you.
If you would like to learn Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, or Dreamweaver, please contact me. I do personal on-site training sessions in the greater Phoenix, Arizona area.
Software for creative people
I am an artist, an illustrator and a graphic designer. Sometimes people are surprised that, since I teach software, I am not a "techy person". But for Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and Dreamweaver you don't have to be. In fact, that's the point.Ever since I first started teaching these software programs in the 90's, my philosophy has been to encourage creative people to take control of their projects by learning the software.
The Adobe Suite is designed to be used by artists. The interface is best used by people who think visually. If that's you, you are in luck. In fact, this is the best possible relationship of humans to computers. You add the creativity, the software does the work.
But keep in mind that these are not video games. Trying to figure them out all by yourself is a recipe for frustration. If you learn best from books, invest in a tutorial book, and do a little bit at a time. You will also find these programs taught at your local community college, both on campus and online. You can attend seminars offered by companies such as Roundpeg. Of course, the best thing to do is to contact me if you are in the Phoenix, Arizona area. My specialty is half-day sessions, which I have been doing for over ten years now, and I have seen clients go from hating software programs to loving them.
Learning Adobe Illustrator
There are many reasons why knowing Adobe Illustrator, and knowing it well, is your "badge of honor" as a Graphic Designer.
It shows that you understand vectors. If someone is not familiar with how vectors work to create shapes, they probably don't know how to use page layout programs, like InDesign or QuarkXPress very well.
Another reason why employers are impressed by you if you are good in Adobe Illustrator is that it is not a "figure it out by messing around with it" software program. I have been teaching Adobe Illustrator since the mid-nineties and have heard many, many times that people who have tried to figure it out by just opening the program and driving it around get nowhere. People who know Adobe Illustrator are valuable.
If you want to be a professional Graphic Designer, learn Adobe Illustrator. But learning it out of a book or from an online tutorial can be a frustration. Find a class at a local community college. If you are fortunate enough to live in California, take a training session from my good friends at roundpeg.com and of course, you can always contact me.
Using style sheets in Adobe Illustrator
I recently did a small project for a client which was just a series of colored boxes with quotations from their clients in them. I created two style sheets, one called "quote" and one called "names".
To do this, create the first colored box and style the text the way you want it. Then, with the text selected, go to Window>Type>Paragraph Styles and click on the create new icon (looks like a piece of paper folded on the corner) and give the style a name.
When your client wants to see a change - a different font, different alignment, different color, whatever, you change it once in the style sheet and it changes it throughout the document for you. A big time saver, and much more accurate than doing everything by hand - and by human memory!
The difference between Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator explained
Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator are the basics of the graphic artist's toolbox. Both are important, but they are different. Photoshop is a "painting" program, Illustrator is a "drawing" program. Photoshop is easy to get started on, Illustrator is difficult to get started. I like both programs, but I am especially fond of Adobe Illustrator. If you like to draw, you should be using Adobe Illustrator.
Please don't get me wrong - I love Photoshop - and use it every day, but many times it is not the right tool for what you need to do. If you are doing an image with solid masses of color, like the logo pictured, you could do it in either Photoshop or Illustrator. If you've never learned Illustrator, I can understand why you would use Photoshop. But Photoshop is the wrong tool for this. Using Photoshop here is like using a paintbrush to do a drawing. You need a pen.
The best place to start with Adobe Illustrator is basic shapes - squares, circles, etc. Once it "clicks" with you that you are drawing, not painting, Illustrator makes sense.
Learning new software programs
You know that you need to learn a new software program. Maybe you've heard someone rave about "Dreamweaver". Maybe you are still using a version of Adobe Illustrator from 1998 and would like to be able to use all the new stuff in CS4. Maybe your company is forcing you to "upgrade" to a new version and you can't find where all the buttons moved to! Or maybe you are interested in a new job and they want you to know certain software programs.
There are many ways to learn or upgrade your skill with a software program, and as a teacher, I have done them all. You could take classes at a private college, such as The Art Institute of Phoenix (which is where I taught from 1996 to 2001) and that would be the ultimate experience. If that is too much of an investment, both financially and time-wise, consider going to your local community college. I am an adjunct faculty at Glendale Community College and can recommend going there. You may consider going to a training session such as those offered by RoundPeg or LearniT. You could teach yourself. For that, I would recommend Lynda.com. You could learn from videos on YouTube, there are lots of them.
I have done all of these things, and the one thing I have always heard is, "I just want someone to show me!" Most software programs contain things that you will never need. And wading through hours, weeks, or even years of that to get what you want can be frustrating. That is why I do on-site training sessions. If your time is valuable, you may want to consider this. All training companies offer this. This is how I do it - you contact me, tell me what you would like to know, I sit with you (or with as many people can fit around your computer) at your office and we do it. Allow about four hours. I teach Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and Dreamweaver.
What a vector image is and how it's used in animation and gaming
If you've ever watched a "making of" documentary about computer animation, you already know what vectors are, even though you may not be familiar with the term.Every computer-animated movie you've ever seen and every video game you've ever played is created with vectors. Vectors are simple lines that are combined together into a "wireframe". That wireframe is then rendered with color and texture.
A vector image is easier for a computer to deal with than a raster image (a Photoshop file is a raster image). A vector image is made up of anchor points whereas a raster image is made up of pixels. Vectors, being a fairly simple mathematical problem for a computer to solve, takes up less processing power.
Software programs like Adobe Illustrator are vector programs for creating still images. Programs like Adobe Flash are for putting those vector elements in motion. More complex animation requires software programs like Maya and Softimage. The best place to start learning about vectors is Adobe Illustrator, which is a 2-D program.
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