Adobe Illustrator CS5 One-on-One

Endpoints and Closed Paths

Where to begin? Let’s start simply and build our way up. First, we’ll

look at lines, which Illustrator calls open paths because they have

endpoints—points at the end of the lines, points that stop. (The

upper half of Figure 2-2 shows one of an open path’s endpoints.)

They’re out there, on the market. They’re single points. Maybe

they fi nd another point, maybe they don’t. They’re not quite ready

to settle down.

Then we’ll move on to shapes. Illustrator calls these closed paths

because they don’t have endpoints. These shapes aren’t closed in

the sense of “shut down,” it’s just that they aren’t accepting new

points. The points are married, really. Except that they’re binoga-

mous—every point is joined to two other points, so the shape con-

tinues forever and ever, as shown in the lower half of Figure 2-2.

Drawing Lines, Arcs, and Spirals

In these fi rst two exercises, we’re going to be working with a fi le

you fi rst saw in the preceding lesson—the eye of Horus. This time,

however, you’ll get to actually illustrate in Illustrator, not simply set

up guides. The fi rst exercise will focus on draw-

ing paths using the various tools available from

the line segment tool ( ) fl yout menu. Time to

start drawing!

1.

Open an illustration. Choose File

Open. Navigate to the Lesson 02 folder

inside the Lesson Files-AIcs5 1on1

folder, which should be on your desktop. Open

the fi le named Horus is go.ai. You should see

the same familiar eye, but this time in a light

gray, as shown in Figure 2-3.

2.

Examine the document’s layers. Bring up the

Layers panel by pressing F7. This document is

split into three layers—one to house the trac-

ing template (Horus), one to hold the guides

(Guides), and fi nally the layer where you’ll be

drawing (Draw Here). The fi rst two layers are

locked and should stay locked. Click the fi rst

column to the left of the Draw Here layer to

turn on the and make the layer visible. (You’ll

Figure 2-2 .

Figure 2-3 .

Closed paths continue

endlessly.

Open paths

contain endpoints.

41

Drawing Lines, Arcs, and Spirals

see that I’ve already drawn the eyebrow and the

outline of the eye for you, as in Figure 2-4.)

3.

Detach the group of line tools from the tool-

box. You’re going to be using a number of these

tools, all grouped under the tool in the toolbox.

Rather than having to click and hold, waiting each

time you want to switch tools, you can detach the

group and make a standalone minitoolbox. Click

and hold the tool until the fl yout menu appears,

and then move over the tear-off bar shown in

Figure 2-5 before your release the mouse. Presto!

You now have a minitoolbox you can position

anywhere in your workspace.

You can repeat this tear-off as many times as you want.

If you have a large monitor, for instance, you might

want to create multiple copies of this minitoolbox and

position them around the screen so that you always

have one nearby.

Figure 2-4 .

Figure 2-5 .

4. Draw the center vertical line. The tool should already be

selected; if not, press the key to select it. (The tool itself

looks like a backslash, which is why the key is the keyboard

shortcut.) Starting at the top of the center vertical line, click and

hold the mouse, dragging down toward the bottom of the line.

Hold the Shift key while dragging to constrain the line to regu-

lar angles (45 degrees, 90 degrees, etc.—only multiples of 45

degrees). When you’ve reached the bottom of the line (a smart

guide should appear with the label anchor, as in Figure 2-6 on

the facing page), release the mouse.

5. Fix the line’s attributes. You have your fi rst line, but it might

be hard to see at the moment—its attributes don’t match the

other lines in the drawing. Fortunately, you can lift the proper-

ties of other objects and apply them to the selected object using

the eyedropper tool. Here’s how:

•

Switch to the tool by clicking it in the toolbox or by

pressing the I key.

•

Move your cursor over one of the existing heavy paths;

when the green smart guide path appears under your cur-

sor, click to lift that path’s attributes and apply them to

your newly drawn line, as in Figure 2-7.

42

Lesson 2: Lines, Shapes, and Color