[Ask BB] How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator
I recently received an email from Zosia asking me an Illustrator question. Zosia had a vector shape of Africa in Illustrator and wanted to fill the shape with a texture. It’s not as difficult as you might think, but for those of you new to Illustrator, this is a very useful thing to know. You can’t actually “clip” or “cut out” the shape from your texture, but it’s very easy to make a mask, and you still get the same effect.
![[Ask BB] How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator](http://www.bittbox.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/clipping_mask_1.jpg "[Ask BB] How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator")
Step 1
Make sure your vector shape is on top of your texture.
![[Ask BB] How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator](http://www.bittbox.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/clipping_mask_2.jpg "[Ask BB] How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator")
Step 2
Select BOTH your texture and the vector shape, then right click or control click and select “Make Clipping Mask.” (You can also go to the Object menu and select Clipping Mask > Make, or hit Command/Control +7.)
![[Ask BB] How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator](http://www.bittbox.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/clipping_mask_3.jpg "[Ask BB] How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator")
Step 3
Done! Now, that you have your texture masked to fill your shape, you’ll notice that Illustrator has made the texture and the path into a new group. You can move the group as a whole with the Select tool, or you can use the Direct Select tool to move the texture itself, without moving the path, and vice versa.
Tags: clip, clipping mask, Illustrator, Texture
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I always do this in Photoshop, I never really thought about doing this in Illustrator.
Thank you!
WOW, I just find your site while looking for this exact explanation! Very straight forward, and you make it look so easy! like the previous poster, I’ve done this a thousand times in photoshop, never in illustrator! This will save a LOT of time! Thanks!
*goes off to peek through the rest of your site*
It’s good to know that someone helps the new designers to do such easy things like this. The first thing I thought when I saw this question was “How come she/he is going to ask such an easy thing?”, but then I stop for a little while to think about my beginnins as a designer, and I have to admit, it was not an easy thing so I had to do it all by myself. I would be very thankful if I had a mentor when I started, since i never had an Adobe teacher at university(I live in Panama and back in the eary 2000´s, teaching ACS was not planned). One good advice: Don’t let the others teach you all the good things u can do with ACS; try to explore it yourself and you will feel very good with yourself.
Is there any way to have selectable only the “africa” and not the rectangle (original texture shape)? when i’m clipping some bigger photo in Ill, the whole thing (ie the mask and the “invisible” picture) is selectable which makes it quite unusable. I’m distributing these objects to separate layers, but i would like to know, if i’m doing something wrong and if it couldn’t be done better.. thx
I spend 15 minutes yesterday to find this trick (i’m a beginner in Strator)^^ Anyway, it’s very useful!
Tutorial added to thewebtuts.com
Hi,
thanks for answering my question, this is actually something I figured out myself (after long hard think ;-) the problem is you can’t edit it, for example drop shadow and stuff like that. I was hoping there was a way of doing it so it becomes an independant item. Still thanks for explaining it!
How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator…
It’s not as difficult as you might think, but for those of you new to Illustrator, this is a very useful thing to know….
Be very wary of using bitmap images in Illustrator, it is not really designed for that and can have problems or run very slowly, especially if they’re big images.
Depending on the way you want to use it, you’d probably be better off copying the path from Illustrator and pasting it as a path into Photoshop, then using that path to make a vector mask for the texture layer. As I say, it depends on how you want to use it though. Context is everything!
In CS4 make sure you compound the clipping path object first (ctrl/cmd + 8) otherwise it won’t work and it will look clear. So if you are ending up with no image, go back and compound the clipping path object and then try it.
Zosia,
Under effects-stylize-drop shadow you can add drop shadows or other effects to the clipped object. To edit the drop shadow double click the effect in the appearance pallette (view/appearance)
Lo0m,
The rectangle is just a place holder to show you where the original image sits. It will not print or show up except when you select it. If you want to modify the clipping mask you can use the direct selection tool (a key, the white arrow) and select the nodes (the dots on the lines/paths) and move the around. Or you can right click-release clipping mask, make changes then re-apply a clipping mask. Alternatively if you hate the the box showing you can place or paste the image in the document, size it to your object, drag and drop the image into your swatches pallette (view/swatches), select your object, then apply the new swatch you just made. This will fill the image into your object giving you a look similar to the clipping mask, however the image will not move with the object when you move it. Test it out to see what I mean.
Jotham: thank you for your answer. The problem in CS2 is that any part that is “clipped” (I mean the part not shown) is still selectable with makes a mess as I use clipping a lot. Anyway, I’ve forced our company to buy upgrade to CS4 and in this version everything is working as I would expect. But thanks again for valuable tips!
Great info. I thought this could only be done in Photoshop. Thanks
Your should also show us how to make an alpha channel mask for Illustrator elements (I do it using the Transparency pallet). Useful for the web 2.0 wet floor effect…
http://www.fondu.com.au/download/Illustrator_trans.jpg
Very nice simple lesson. This is something it took me a while to work out when i was learning.
For those who would like to take this further and actually crop the image (i.e. remove the mask) i have a tutorial here which may help http://www.melsbrushes.co.uk/?p=593
Hahahha
Cool. I do mine in flash.
Nice and easy tip here with lots of good applications.
I made this one of my three links for the day on my daily Design Thought for the Day blog:
http://designthoughtfortheday.blogspot.com/
Ted
Great post here!
Great detail on the steps to take on this action, this will help out me with Illustrator tremendously. I’m kind of new to it right now and I’m learning everyday.
I’m glad I cam across your post, and the content on here is very valuable. I look forward to visiting your blog again soon, and reading more about the value you bring to the design industry.
Jason Braud
when I make the clipping mask, everything dissapears except the path outline? what I’m I missing?
Not 100% Cs, but I think you have the layer/object order backwards. The pattern needs to be underneath the vector shape you want to fill.
Wow, I’ve had two or three years with Illustrator now [coming up to a year with CS4], and I never knew you could do that. I always did it the Photoshop way.
Thanks alot!
Great info, very useful.
[Ask BB] How to Make a Clipping Mask in Illustrator | BittBox…
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I have started learning illustrator and thought would start learning from BB.hope m able to get most out of you guys blog.