Thie Thomsen
Forum Replies Created
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These cad-like programs are very likely to accept anything pre illustrator 7, so 3 should work.
All of the CS’es can save down to v.3, cs2 an cs3 both can from their “Save As..” option, in CS1 you have to Export to get to the older versions.
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I can see your spot colours… -
To help you with the additional question (the moving of stuff to a layer named “Z”), I hacked together a little javascript you can run using your illustrator’s script menu item.
It will create a new layer named “Z”, or, if it allready exists, use the existing layer. It will move all of the currently selected items to this layer.
You can put this script in an action by placing it in your Illustrator/Presets/scripts folder (so it shows up in your scripts menu), and add it to your action using the “add menu item” (or something, i’m using a dutch illustrator and do not know the english name) to select the script.
Enjoy
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I can see your spot colours… -
Did it work??
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I can see your spot colours… -
The funny thing is, there are fonts that do this. They are usually used in CAD applications.
i’ve found a couple of different ones over here, but sadly, they won’t work correctly in Illustrator. Something to do with postscript fonts needing closed paths.
https://www.featurecam.com/general/support/engrave_fonts.aspYou could however use these fonts in a cad app (qcad is a decent free one) and import the lines into illustrator (where you can manipulate and stroke them to your hearts delight).
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I can see your spot colours… -
Kinda sounds like something is wrong with your copy of illustrator…
However, did you try to put the necessary spot colours in your document’s swatches (instead of picking them directly from the colour book window) before recording the action?
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I can see your spot colours… -
I don’t see you selecting a spot colour from your swatches anywhere. Is that what is not being recorded?
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I can see your spot colours… -
How are you defining the dimensions of the object?
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I can see your spot colours… -
There is a less destructive way of getting seamless patterns:
When defining a pattern, make sure that a bounding box (where you want the pattern to end) is placed below the artwork with no colour for stroke and fill. If this is selected together with the stuff you want to use in the pattern, and “define pattern”, it will ‘clip’ the pattern to this box, creating seamless patterns.
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I can see your spot colours… -
Both if possible 🙂
That way we can see what is and what is not happening.
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I can see your spot colours… -
Here’s a solution I’ve seen applied a couple of times (once because of a big printing booboo thanks to not flattening the tranparency correctly).
Flatten and check your files well before applying this technique if you are going to send this to a printer.
Here we go:
– group the object you need to recolour
– create a white background object to lay behind it (by selecting->copy->paste behind->expand->union(pathfinder))
– draw a rectangle below the object you need to recolour (but above the white bottom object), and fill it with the colour you want.
– select the rectangle and the object (remember, the object needs to be on top)
– in your transparency window, click the pull down menu, and select “create opacity mask”Images :
Done… Please note that the object is transparent and inverted (tonewise) now, so to complete it, check the “invert” box in the tranparency window (this will fix the inversion).
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I can see your spot colours…