Getting started with Illustrator Advanced

Course contents
SECTION: 4
Keyboard Shortcuts 14:06

Questions

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Course info

104 lessons / 10 hours 33 quiz questions 31 projects Certificate of achievement

Overview

Hey there, I'm Dan Scott, an Adobe Certified Instructor with over 16 years of design experience under my belt, I'm part of the Adobe Expert program, and my online and in-person classes have been attended by more than a million people, just like you! Join me as we dive into the exciting world of Adobe Illustrator Advanced! In this course, you're not just leveling up in Illustrator, you're transforming into an Illustrator SuperHero!

In this course you will work on a bespoke brief designed to ignite your imagination, coupled with immersive course videos, you'll be crafting jaw-dropping graphics in no time. Throughout our journey together, you'll flex your creative muscles and construct projects that will elevate your portfolio to new heights. So, let's dive in and unleash your creativity!

You’ll learn:

  • - How to use artificial intelligence to boost your creativity in ideation. 
  • - The quick way to take hand-drawn sketches and vectorize and color them. 
  • - The building blocks needed to set you loose on a huge variety of beautiful effects and techniques.
  • - To make beautiful charts and graphs for your documents. 
  • - Color mastery to make quick color adjustments, Pantones, and blend it all together beautifully.
  • - How to master images inside of your illustrator workflow. 
  • - To harness all the secret gems that'll help you level up your typography skills. 
  • - All the tricks of the trade for drawing complex shapes easily. 
  • - To double your creativity with the Transform and Distort section. 
  • - To speed up your personal workflow to get the most out of your creative day.

Explore the full course outline for a comprehensive list of topics that will expand your Illustrator prowess beyond imagination.

If you're already comfortable navigating the basics but want to  unlock the true potential of Illustrator, then this Illustrator Advanced course is your ticket to becoming a master of Illustrator! So join me and the ranks of design superheroes and let's embark on this thrilling journey together.

Requirements:

- All you need is a copy of Adobe Illustrator, you can get a free trial from Adobe here to get started.
- A basic knowledge of Illustrator is required. I recommend watching my Illustrator Essentials course prior to embarking on this epic adventure.

Who this course is for:

- Creative adventurers who already have a basic understanding of Illustrator.
- Self-taught Illustrator enthusiasts yearning for structured guidance.
- Graduates of my Illustrator Essentials Course, hungry for more knowledge and skills.
- Visionaries who have developed their own unique Illustrator approach but crave exploration of the vast universe of tools, updates, and time-saving techniques.

What you'll learn:

- How to use Text to Vector Ai
- How to use Text to Pattern Ai
- How to use Generative Recolor
- When to use the Scissor Tool, Eraser Tool & Knife Tool
- Advanced Shape Builder Uses
- The differences between the Pathfinder Vs Shape Builder
- How to use the Join tool & Joining Path Ends
- Advanced Pen Tool Tricks
- Width Tool Advanced Techniques
- The Curvature Tool
- How to master corners with corner widget effects
- How to work with Compound Paths
- The difference between Expand & Expand Appearance
- How to create Graphic Styles
- How to make Symbols
- How to use the Smooth Tool
- Advanced use of Simplify Path
- What Live Shape Effects are for
- How to make Repeating Grids & Concentric Circles
- How to make Random Objects
- Advanced Keyboard Shortcuts in Illustrator
- How to add a Gradient on a Stroke
- How to add a Gradient in Text
- How to use the Freeform Gradient tool
- How to use Advanced Color Swatches
- How to use Global Color Swatches
- What is the difference between RGB vs CMYK color modes?
- How to proof colors
- How to use Pantone Spot Colors
- Recolor Artwork & Changing all colors at once
- How to use Blending Modes
- How to work with Images & Blending Modes
- How to make Black & White Images
- Learn Advanced Workflow Tricks
- All the Super Selection Mastery
- How to use the History Panel
- Advanced Fonts Tricks & Tips
- Use Retype to know what Font is being used
- How to put Text Inside a Letter or Shape
- How to use the Touch Type Tool
- How to add a Connected Stroke Around Multiple Shapes
- How to Offset a Stroke with Text
- How to make a Bar Chart in Illustrator
- How to make a Pie Chart in Illustrator
- Layer Power Moves
- Advanced Artboard & Pages Tricks
- How to Unlink vs Embedded Images
- How to Crop Images Rather than Mask
- How to Mask Inside Text & Multiple Shapes
- How to you use the Puppet Warp Tool
- How to use the Distort Envelope Shape & Type
- How to use the Envelope Mesh
- How to blend lines together
- How to make a Linocut Effect
- How to make 3D Gradient Lettering Blends
- How to spin text into a ring
- How to turn text into a 3D donut shape
- How to make a Duotone image effect
- How to make a Roughen Stamp Vector Effect
- How to make a Neon Sign Glow Effect
- How to use a Halftone Effect using Plugins
- Advanced Exporting Assets Tricks in Illustrator
- How to use the Dimension Tool

So what're you waiting for? Let's start the course now!
Daniel Scott

Daniel Scott

Founder of Bring Your Own Laptop & Chief Instructor

instructor

I discovered the world of design as an art student when I stumbled upon a lab full of green & blue iMac G3’s. My initial curiosity around using the computer to create ‘art’ developed into a full-blown passion, eventually leading me to become a digital designer and founder of Bring Your Own Laptop.

Sharing and teaching are a huge part of who I am. As a certified Adobe instructor, I've had the honor of winning multiple Adobe teaching awards at their annual MAX conference. I see Bring Your Own Laptop as the supportive community I wished for when I was first starting out and intimidated by design. Through teaching, I hope to bring others along for the ride and empower my students to bring their stories, labors of love, and art into the world.
True to my Kiwi roots, I've lived in many places, and currently, I reside in Ireland with my wife and kids.

Certificates

We’re awarding certificates for this course!

Check out the How to earn your certificate video for instructions on how to earn yours and click the available certificate levels below for more information.

How to earn your certificate

Work your way towards your certificate for this course by following these simple steps.

  • Watch the course videos
  • Complete the Class Projects - look out for the videos marked with
  • Upload your class projects into the My Projects area in your account
  • Complete and pass the Knowledge Quiz (Merit level courses only)
  • Complete the Distinction Certificate Project (Distinction level courses only) - look out for the video marked with
  • Upload your Distinction project to the My Projects area in your account
  • Request your certificate when you've completed the requirements for the certificate level you're working towards

Good luck!

Pass certificates

We’re awarding ‘Pass’ level certificates for this course.

You can work your way towards your ‘Pass’ certificate by following these simple steps.

  • Watch the course videos
  • Complete the Class Projects - look out for the videos marked with
  • Upload your class projects into the My Projects area in your account
  • Don’t forget to request your certificate when all your projects are complete

Good luck!

Merit certificates

We’re awarding ‘Merit’ level certificates for this course.

You can work your way towards your ‘Merit’ certificate by following these simple steps.

  • Watch the course videos
  • Complete the Class Projects - look out for the videos marked with
  • Upload your class projects into the My Projects area in your account
  • Complete and pass the Knowledge Quiz
  • Don’t forget to request your certificate when you have passed the quiz and completed all your projects

Good luck!

Distinction certificates

We're awarding 'Distinction' level certificates for this course.

You can work your way towards your 'Distinction' certificate by following these simple steps.

  • Watch the course videos
  • Complete the Class Projects - look out for the videos marked with
  • Upload your class projects into the My Projects area in your account
  • Complete and pass the Knowledge Quiz
  • Complete the Distinction Certificate Project - look out for the video marked with
  • Upload your Distinction project to the My Projects area in your account
  • Don't forget to request your certificate when you have passed the quiz and completed all your projects

Good luck!

Downloads & Exercise files

Transcript

All right, you've made it inside the course. Welcome. You're in here with me. Uh, to get started, I want you  to download the exercise files. Okay? There'll be a link on the page here somewhere.

Okay? Download those exercise files,  unzipped them, get ready for the course. Um, inside those, um, exercise files,  there'll be a shortcut sheet. Okay? You'll see it labeled in there  and you can print that off and stick it next  to your computer to help along with the course. Scribble down any kind of new obscure ones  that are relevant to you.

Okay? Circle the ones on there that you like. Okay? So they're in the exercise files. Uh, the other thing you can do is  speed me up or slow me down. Okay?

Some people think I speak fast,  some people think I speak slow. I don't know how I can be both, but hey, there you go. Uh, there'd be a cog in the bottom corner. You can just turn it up to whatever speed you like, look  for a little gear icon and look for a speed. Uh, also, let's reset our preferences  'cause uh, so that yours looks like mine. We'll jump into the computer now and do it together.

Let's jump in. First up, you don't have  to do this if you don't want to mess  with your illustrator setup. Hey, we're gonna reset a bunch of stuff to the factory. Um, I'm gonna do it now so  that mine's more likely to be like yours. And if you wanna follow along,  exactly, you can do this as well. But if you're comfortable enough  with an illustrator, you don't have to do this.

Uh, first thing we're gonna do is just open up a,  any old document on a Mac. Go up to Adobe Illustrator and go to, Nope, yes, we are. We're gonna go to settings  and we're gonna go to the general. Okay? If you're on a pc, go to edit down  to preferences down the bottom here, okay? And go to the same thing, general.

Okay? We go. And all I want you to do is click these two,  reset all warning dialogue boxes,  and then reset preferences. I've already done mine. It'll ask you  to restart Illustrator, and then come back in here. So once you've done that, okay, come back in again  and open up a blank dock and go to window.

I'm gonna go to Workspaces, okay? And I'm gonna be working on this class in Essentials,  and I'm gonna make sure I hit Reset Essentials, so it kind  of re jigs it, how the factory is. And yours might match mine a lot better. A couple of other things is there's a toolbar  on the top that's really handy. It goes away when you reset essentials. You might've turned it on, you might've never noticed it.

So this is a good one. So go to Window. And along the top here,  there's a couple of different options. This one here called control gives you this top app bar. It's just really handy when you're working. I think especially when you're advanced.

There's lots of good stuff up there. You don't have to have it on. Pretty much all of it can be found in the properties panel,  but I like to have both options. The other Handy one is over here, the toolbar. This is the basic toolbar,  and it's just got the tools that people use the most,  or the latest tool that they're trying to show off. Okay?

So this will change a little bit. So if there's something in this course  and you're like, Hey, it's not the,  it's not over here anymore,  it'll be hiding under these three little dots. You can click on them and you might find it being  bumped over to here. Okay? And you can just click on it  and say, all right, I want the polar coordinates tool,  which I don't use very much. Okay?

But I can start using it, okay,  by just clicking at it in there. I can click undo. You can add them to the toolbar  by clicking the three little dots  and say, man, I use this all the time. I'm gonna click hold, hold, drag, drag,  drag, and find a spot for it. If you wanna get rid of a tool,  I'm gonna click over here in the background  and just actually now I'm gonna go back into here. And then you can click and drag it off into no Man's Land.

And it just kind of comes away. What I do want you to do though,  so yours looks like mine is up in the same thing. Go to the three little dots and go to the top right up here  and say, let's switch to Advanced. 'cause we are advanced now. We have no longer basic. Another one to check before we move on,  I'm gonna grab the rectangle tool  and just draw out a rectangle.

Okay? I'm gonna go to my Move tool  and you'll see this thing here. It's called the Contextual Task Bar. Kind of whatever you have selected will give you options  that it think you might want to use. Okay? Uh, this thing might be turned off, okay?

Uh, under window, go down  to Contextual Task bar, turn it on. Okay, problem is, it's kind of in the way. I find it in the way anyway, you might not. So I'm gonna grab the type tool, draw a type box. Okay, that's really awesome. But often I don't, it's kind of covering this.

I like to just grab this edge here. Can you see this like little shady dot thing? Hey, click hold and just drag it somewhere. Then it won't appear underneath and kind of in the way. I just like it. I like it.

It's awesome. I just like it in the bottom here. If you do want to get it to snap again,  see these little dots here? You can say more options and say, let's reset that bar. Okay? And it'll go back to being close.

It's, it's not right or wrong. You might like it really close to it. That's actually really handy. Often doesn't take me long  before I end up dragging it outta the way. Last one is, there are lots of class projects in the course,  and just in case you're kind of newish the way  to save those class projects in this course. Okay?

We'll do exporting advanced at the end of the course. But I wanna do this at the beginning. Okay? You've made this beautiful design is wonderful, okay? And I want to export this to be sent as a class project. So I'm gonna go to file  and we're gonna use the one that says Export.

Export as. That's a real simple one. We'll do more advanced ones later on. And in here you can save our p g's probably the best,  or jpeg if they're getting a little big. Okay? And that will be enough to be uploaded for the course.

But again, we'll go through advanced exporting. You'll see a category at the end of the course  that has a whole bunch of cool exporting  options, but it's towards the end. So that'll do four now. Alright, that's it for now. Boring stuff over. Let's get into the fun course.

Actually, quick outro. Alright, let's get into the course. But actually quickly before we dig your spot, em,  there is a, see that black ball over there? You'll see 'em in the first few videos. He's home. Sick.

Sick. Look how sick he is. So sick. Say hi to everyone. Camera  There. Hi.

Wait, where's the camera there? Oh, hi. Bye. Say enjoy the course. Enjoy. Enjoy the course.

Nailed it.
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