[Vincent Rosati]

You probably want to use the Links palette – Window > Links. Then select the image and click the Relink button.

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

https://helpx.adobe.com/illustrator/kb/troubleshoot-damaged-illustrator-files.html

Some people have solved this by ensuring that the file and all parent folders have read/write permissions.

If you can open the file, copy the art into a new project file.

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

Vince 😉

Yeah, TIF is generally a good format for printers. I’m a huge proponent of the format. Virtually all of my raster project files are TIF.
I haven’t worked with InDesign for a long time. I’m not sure how you’d currently use a masked image. Maybe you need to create an alpha channel from your mask.?
Printing from Word is also a bit out of my area, but you should be able to generate a PNG at the desired resolution, but no CMYK, which may or may not be an issue depending on the printing process. If its digital printing it might not matter if the images are RGB.
So many IF/THANs.
I’d check the InDesign forum.

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

For Word, I think you should be using transparent PNG images.

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

I don’t know of any scripts that would do this. There could be, but not that I’m aware of.
I’d bet this was done by hand. The artist had a structure, in this case an illustration of a brain. Then off to the side, they created a type object or expanded type of each letter, then copy/dragged each letter into place.
I’d estimate this would take 2-3 hours, but potentially as little as an hour.
If this request came across my desk I’d do it by hand.

I’m not sure how a script might achieve this. I’m sure it could. Maybe each letter is a symbol, and you make a script that somehow fills an object with random letters, set to random rotation and random size within a defined range, with no overlapping.
Or maybe populate the letters based on a greyscale raster.. Not sure if that’s even possible.

That leads to why I think this was done by hand – the letters around the edges are flush with the edge.

Regarding the color, that can just be a single gradient applied to the art, after the structure is finished and you make everything a single compound path.

Maybe someone else will chime in with another idea.

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

Korben my man, you can duplicate the path in the Appearance palette and select a different brush.
We green?

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

After looking at the tutorials, I’d say yes – The broken glass technique isn’t working because it presumes you’re working with basic shapes.
That Colorful Glass tutorial is a monster 🙂

You could potentially do the shatter first, then apply the glass effect, but I’m not sure the edges would look like you want them to, and you’d have to manually set the gradient for each portion, which would be tedious.

You could potentially create a complex clipping mask of the negative shape of the shatter and apply it to the finished glass, but you wouldn’t be able to do any of the special positioning of the shattered elements, you’d just be creating cracks in the text.

You could also potentially reduce that number of cracked parts. Duplicate the finished glass, like 6 times or whatever, then create a clipping mask on each one, in various cracked shapes, then put the 6 pieces together to finish the final art.
The artwork will be heavy (not a bad thing), but something to consider with this approach.

I don’t have any other strong ideas, with the techniques that you want to use.

You might need to simplify or rethink the approach. There are a number of ways to achieve a glass look.

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

You can achieve that with Object > Envelope Distort > Make with Mesh. Make the mesh 1×1. Then reshape. It works on live text or paths or whatever.
You’ll get better results if you do it manually, as it seems like you’re doing, manually adjusting the points of outlined type.

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

No, actually. I’m not telling you that.
You’ve seemed to come in here with a head of steam. What’s the deal?

Vince

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[Vincent Rosati]

Is there something I’m missing with Illustrator?
Yes.
I’d chalk it up to a behavioral difference.
So why is it that in Illustrator…
Because the conversion is complete and Illustrator is more sophisticated than whatever you’re comparing it to.
To do further manipulations after the anchor conversion is complete, click A for the Direct Select tool.
The Convert Anchor tool works with both Click/Drag and just Click, which is particularly useful for resetting curves to corners.

Welcome to the big boy club.

Vince

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