Illustrator 101: To Scale or Not to Scale? Strokes, That Is.
As you might be able to tell by the title, this isn’t an advanced feature, but because of the wildly popular “Illustrator Quick Tips” I’ve been publishing, I’m starting a new series of simple, yet very useful tips aptly named “Illustrator 101.” (I will also be doing this for Photoshop, so keep an eye out for “Photoshop 101″ tips coming soon as well) Sometimes the simplest things can be the most helpful, so to kick of the Illustrator 101 series, we’re going to save ourselves some transforming headaches, and harness a simple scaling option in the Transform palette.
In Illustrator, when you draw an object, apply a stroke, then scale that object up or down, you can control wether or not the stroke size gets scaled too, or stays the same. The way you control this feature is from the “Transform” palette (Window > Transform). This can be very useful for things like logos, where you want everything to look exactly the same at every size. Let’s get started . . .
I’ll show you an example of scaling the stroke and the object, and an example scaling the object only, but first, draw a simple shape on the artboard like below, and apply a stroke. (I used a 5px stroke)
1. Scaling an Object and the Stroke:
Open your Transform palette, and click on the options in the upper right. You need to make sure “Scale Strokes and Effects” is “checked.” It works like a toggle switch. If it’s unchecked, and you click on it, the menu will disappear, and it will be checked. Open the options again to make sure you did it right.
Now that you have “Scale Strokes and Effects” active, scale your object (with the black arrow, like normal) and you will notice that not only the object gets bigger, but your stroke as well:
1. Scaling an Object, but NOT the Stroke:
Simply uncheck/deactivate “Scale Strokes and Effects” in the Transform palette…
Now, scale your object, and only the object gets bigger/smaller. Your stroke stays the same!
This feature can save you a lot of trouble keeping things consistent at different sizes, and also works for “effects” if you use those, and brush strokes as well. No trickery, just toggling an option in the Transform Palette :)
Related Posts:
- Working with Illustrator ‘Art’ Brushes: Options and Adjustments
- Illustrator: Rid Yourself of Pesky “Expand Appearance” Woes
- 17 Tips that will save you time in Illustrator
- Easy Illustrator Trick: Oversized Stroke
- Wicked Illustrator Brush Effect
- Fun with Illustrator’s Blend Tool
good job :] thx info
SWEEET!! That would save me so much time, thanks BB!!
Awesome to know this… i used to change it on the preferences =P
I’ve been a long time lurker who has thoroughly enjoyed your tips and freebies. I’m a graphic designer of 11+ years and still find fun, funky, useful posts here. With all that “mushiness” aside, this is a truly helpful tip for me. I know Illustrator pretty well but have always been baffled by this. Thanks so much! Keep up the stellar site…
Thanks, thats an awesome tip, I’ve been manual scaling til now. Cheers!
thanks for the useful tip!
Ahh cool,
I was always going to Object > Transform > Scale and ticking the box there.
Cool, thank you Bittbox, your tutorials is great! Will looking on your site…
your friend from China~~
thanks!never seen before this one
Unbelievable!
I’ve been converting strokes to outlines this whole time. This site is fantastic.
So that’s how you do it! lol
Something so simple, yet it save s SO much time. Thanks.
Another top tip!
Nice one Bitt!
Wanna have this on photoshop
Reading this made me laugh at the memory of one of my early design projects. Back in my “young and foolish” days. If only I knew this tip back then!
Thanks for the great tip!!
Hello, Nice tip!! I knew that strokes doesn’t transformed , So Did it by expanding all of them. Thanx and another thing is that I really need an tutorial for making GIF in photoshop or Illustrator because when i do that it appears a white outline in browser.
Thanks for this blog man.. I am a very old wish comer and ad clicker of it… Keep well….Oh! and I am from Bangladesh…
Good Luck
yes, this was really useful.
this is a very usefull tip…THANK YOU ….anneke
Cool. Great tip! Is this in CS3 only? Thanks a lot
thank you so much for making my life a whole lot easier!!
;)
nick
Awesome! but here’s where I need help. How do I make a dotted stroke in illustrator and then, how do I convert that dotted stroke to a path?
Thanks very much and looking forward to your advice!
thanks
theMunna-
Creating a gif from an Illustrator doc is simple.
Go to File>Save for Web.
Pick GIF from the first drop-down list on the right side.
Click “transparency” on.
Then in the “matte” setting, pick a color that matches your background (you’ll see it showing in the preview).
Unfortunately, one color won’t suit every background. You might need to customize each image for different background colors.
Good Luck
-KSKDSN
Aitch-
This makes no sense to me, but this is how to do it.
Make a line and set its style to dashed.
With it selected, go to Object>Flatten Transparency.
Make sure “convert all strokes to outlines” is selected. Hit OK, and you’re done.
Your original stroke will still be there, but each little dash segment has now been bumped into it’s own shape.
Good luck.
-KSKDSN
Thanks KSKDN Just last week I “found” how to convert a stroke to a path, and I know all about the dashed lines, but I want a dotted line. Seems like no matter what values I set for my dashed strokes, they are still square. I would like round. Thks
Still possible, but a little more advanced. You need to use the “Brush” tab (open it from menus Window>Brushes).
Now, draw a little circle (maybe 1/4″), with the fill & stroke characteristics you want. In the Brush tab, open the little click-down arrow at top right of the tab and choose “new brush”. it will ask you what type, so choose “Scatter” and name it if you want. For now, leave all the settings at the default and choose ok.
Next, draw an empty rectangle, circle or pen shape on the artboard, and click on your new brush icon in the tab. This should stroke your line with the brush you just created. If it’s not quite the effect you want, double click your custom brush icon and tweak the size/spacing percentages (you probably want to keep them set to “fixed”) until you get what you want.
Then, just expand the stroke.
With custom brush strokes, you can get lines made of not just circles, but anything you can draw in Illustrator. I did a project in which I quickly created a swirl of colored flowers, by making a custom flower brush and adjusting the settings to vary the size, scatter and color.
Have fun.
KSKDSN
Thanks for this tip!
Thanks a loooooooooooot!!!
You’ve save my life…and my time.
Your tutorials are excellent for Illustrator users if your a beginner or not. Your teaching methods are very precise, clear and un-patronising.
Thanks
Wow thanks for the great tips!
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Thank you very much.