Illustrator Quick Tip: Faster Gradient-Color Adjustments

Illustrator Quick Tip: Faster Gradient-Color Adjustments

A reader recently asked me about using the eyedropper tool to adjust the (one of 2+) colors in an Illustrator gradient. If you’ve never witnessed this frustration, it is quite annoying. In Illustrator, when using the gradient palette, (Adobe should have figured this out by now) you can’t double-click on one of the gradient color…

Photoshop Quick Tip: See Newly Installed Fonts Without Relaunching

Photoshop Quick Tip: See Newly Installed Fonts Without Relaunching

Have you ever installed a font you just downloaded, and had to restart Photoshop to see it in the list? Me too. I install fonts all the time, (while I have Photoshop open) and it’s not only annoying, but a waste of time to have to restart the entire application, just to see the new…

Quick Tip: Beveled Text without Filters or Effects

Quick Tip: Beveled Text without Filters or Effects

Every once in a while we might find ourselves needing to get that “inset” or “beveled” look for text, probably more often for buttons and web design, than anything else. But whatever reason you might need or want inset text, here’s a quick tip to get that effect without using a filter, effect, layer style…

Improve Your Illustrator Workflow with Layer Masking

Improve Your Illustrator Workflow with Layer Masking

You may or may or may not know/use this Illustrator feature, but Layer Masking is a very under-used feature of the Adobe Illustrator series of software. I’m not talking about making a clipping mask. This is entirely different altogether. By making a “layer mask,” you can save precious time by not having to release and…