-
Illustrator Text Path
I’m trying to recreate example no. 45 from ayatoweb. Have problem with step 3. I’ve made my own text in Illustrator and created outlines. When I copy and past this outline into the mask in AE I get a lot of masks (one for every letter of the text). What am I doing wrong ? According to ayatoweb the text must be a singe path, but how do you do this ?
-
6 Replies
-
I’ve not looked at the tutorial, but many of the letters in any given font are made up of more than 1 path – like O, B, P, i, – essentially anything that needs more then 1 continuous mask to make a shape. There’s no way around that if you want the letters to have all of their parts (like the hole in the o or e, or the dot over the i.
But what Ayoto has done is create 1 closed mask that holds everything – either through draeing it by hand or by merging all the paths in some way (I can think of a few).
What I did was, create my tape in Illustrator, and convert it to outline. Then I drew a thin Box (not a line)that went accross the bottom like Ayato’s, intersecting every letter at it’s base. Select everything and a do a Path Add (with pathfinder, which combines all of the letters and line into one object). Then choose Expand (Again, in the pathfinder palette) – which makes all extra path data disappear.
Then Copy and paste that into AE as you have done. You’ll still see several masks. Delete all except the first mask which should leave all the letters except the holse in letters like O, A, B…etc.
2 things:
– It may not be the 1st mask, but usually it is. figure out which mask is the main body, and then delete every other mask.
– You could also delete the extra path data directly in AI, but it’s much easier to remove extra masks in AE then it is to slect each point and delete it in Illustrator.
Much of his tutorials are great, but because of what (I think) may be a language barrier, and his preference for brevity, they’re not always clear.
—————————————-
Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
Thanx for your quick respons. I’ll try your solution as soon as I’m behind my computer again.
His examples are great but unfortunately his English isn’t. But it’s better than my Japanese…..
-
In a way, it’s good that his tutorials aren’t completly thorough and by the numbers. It kinda makes you think and figure out stuff on your own.
-
I’ve used your tips and created a text (with the text tool) that is connected at the bottem by a small rectangular. After adding the add shape option and clicking the expand button I copied the shape to AE. After deleting the redundant masks I’m left with one complete mask. So for so good. Now I would like to use this mask as a path for the Trapcode 3D Stroke. But this doesn’t work. I’ve tried to paste the mask into the shape and the position property of the layer. Before I copied the shape I’v put a keyframe at positition 0 to both properties. Am I doing something wrong or am I trying to achieve the impossible ??
-
Glad I could get you this far.
On this, though, I’m going to recomend you try the trapcode forum here at the cow, or wait for someone else with some experience using Shine. I don’t own or use it since no jobs I’ve had required me to do so, so I’m not really able to help you with it.
Sorry.
—————————————-
Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
I think I’ve found the solution. On the Trapcode forum I find a post about creating an outline from a text layer. You can apply the 3D Stroke effect. At first nothing happens but by keyframing the start en end position you get the desired effect.
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up