How to use the Dimension Tool in Illustrator?

Hello. It is time to look at a tool called The Dimension Tool Does  exactly what it sounds like adds dimensions to stuff, okay,  angles, radiuses, diameters. Okay, we're gonna use it for this trifold brochure  where we need to kind of indicate what the size is. We'll do it to this logo, add minimum  widths and heights and stuff. Super useful adds arrows basically in text  in one file swoop. It's a dream come true for anybody  that's been doing it the long way with the pen tool  and text tool and,  and all the pain that comes with doing it that way.

So let's jump in and look at the dimensioning tool. Alright? Uh, open up the dimension tool file from your exercise files  and let's look at the basic run through  and then we'll get a bit more detailed. So the dimensioning tool looks like this kinda little,  looks like a dimensioning tool. It's very good. Okay?

The thing is, you need  to have the thing selected first that you want a dimension. So let's go with, let's say this Tri-fold fly here. We need to let the, you know,  we need let the printer know the widths and dimensions. So I'm gonna click on the thing that I wanna measure,  then I gar up the dimension tool, okay? And then I'm gonna start with this first one here,  which is linear dimension. And you can just click on something once  and it kind of puts it in there a little bit.

Willy-nilly. Okay? I'm gonna undo that. I'm gonna click hold and drag it out  to get it to where I want it to be. And you can dimension stuff. Let's go through the other ones real quick.

So select this first, then go the dimension tool. Okay, then go. This is radius and diameter. Okay, it's a bit weird. Watch this. If I click, click, actually you don't even click,  you just kind of like, it just kind of knows.

You just hover right here. Can you see if I click once it  gives me the radius, okay, if I have the thing selected  and go to the edge and click and hold  and kind of go back on itself,  it gives me the diameter, it's a little bit quicky. Let's do angle. So select it first, grab the um,  dimension tool and let's go angle. And you just kind of like point it in the corner here  and I'm gonna click and drag out and you get the angle. Now the first thing I often wanna do  with the dimension tool is go and change the units.

Okay? Because it's used the document units,  which are my cases pixels, okay? And we can do a couple of things. So if I click on this, I can say, Hey, uh, dimension,  you got this kinda like interesting properties panel  where it has all this dimensioning in here. It's kind of like dynamic. You can adjust it.

It's not like just a one  and done it has some options in here, okay? And the units is the first thing I want to do. So at the moment it's using document units. So you might go and say, actually don't use document units,  use millimeters. Okay? So I'm gonna turn off hide units  and it's gonna show me 99 millimeters excellent  or what you could do, I'm gonna undo that.

Okay? And it's using document units. So what I can do is have nothing selected  and say actually I want the document units not to be pixels. I want it to be millimeters. Okay? And nothing actually happens, okay?

What you can do is you can say, all right,  I've changed this, it maybe this'll update. It's kind of a newish tool with it selected, uh, instead  of document units, while it is document units  and I've updated it, what you can do is say, just apply  to all and hide units, turn that off, apply all kind  of resets it and everything kind  of starts working in millimeters. So there is a little quirkiness to it,  but we've got our units updated. Another thing we can do is it's really hard  to see the black against the dark  gray here. So what you can  Do is you can, uh, change either individually  by having this selected and going  and changing things like the dimensioning line  to something else, okay? Something you can see or you can select them all.

So you can go to your layers panel  and what you'll notice is that we only  had layer one when we started. As soon as we use the dimensioning tool,  we got this whole other layer. And who remembers how to select everything on a layer? It's like weird option here, okay, click  that indicates select art, click to select art. Okay? Everything on that layer is selected.

Now if I go back to properties, I have like overall control  and I can say I want the dimensioning line to be uh,  you know, a cyan ish copy that,  and I'm gonna put it, the dimension text  as well is gonna be the same color. I'm gonna change the arrow style to something ugly  and I'm gonna go change the fonts  to something a bit more corporate  that I'm using and make it thicker. One of the other things that I want to do as well is I want  to go through and sometimes let's say I want  to change what it actually says. 'cause at the moment it's quite dynamic. Like, you know, it's kind  of reading the units from the do I just wanna go  and like change it and break it apart? You can go to expand.

Okay? Can you see it's no longer connected to that dimension. Now you're allowed to go through and say, all right,  that is not what it's meant to be. You know, you've drawn it kinda willy-nilly,  let's say that in illustrated. And you're like, it's actually not that at all. It's actually, uh, you know, 5,000,  you've drawn it to scale, okay?

You need to scale it up  and you just need to kind of use the dimension tool  to get the cool arrows that it can be a pain in the butt  to draw and you just want to then expand it and go through  and change it as you want. Like this logo here, we want the arrows and stuff. Um, and we don't want the actual measurements,  we just want like, yeah, we wanna go and change it. So what I did with this logo here is you notice I put a  rectangle around the outside of it with no stroke, no fill,  just so that the dimensioning  tool has something to grab onto. The other thing you need to make sure is working is your  smart guides is turned on. Go to view and go to smart guides and make sure they're on.

Then with this rectangle selected,  we can add the dimensioning to it, okay? And go, you, you, you, you can't work if it's on the angle,  you need to be on the right tool. And then you can drag this up  and then you can either hit the expand option over here,  then you can click on the dimension itself  and either write down the bottom here, say expand,  or we can go to object. And the same thing we've done in the past expand appearance. And it's the same thing as broken,  that connection to the dimensioning tool. But now we can do things like uh, double click, go inside  and say we wanted this just to say minimum, minimum width  of like 200 millimeters, okay?

For whatever you're doing. It's very handy, very quick  and a very welcome new tool for Illustrator, for those  of you who have been doing it the long way for a long time,  especially for brand guidelines or maybe packaging. Super useful, super quick,  and that is the dimensioning tool. Alright? Happy dimensioning. Alright, we'll see you in the next video.