From the course: Deke's Techniques (2018-2021)

971 Aligning to area type in Illustrator

From the course: Deke's Techniques (2018-2021)

Start my 1-month free trial

971 Aligning to area type in Illustrator

“

- [Narrator] All right, now I'll show you how you can align graphic objects with letter forms associated with area type here inside the most recent version of illustrator. All right, so I'll just go ahead and select this type object right here. I've hidden the bounding box so it's very obvious that I'm working with point type that is centered on this point right here. However, I want to convert this type to area type that is type that ramps inside of a frame and so I'll go up to the view menu and choose show bounding box or you have this very handy keyboard shortcut of control shift B that's command shift B on the Mac. I really recommend you memorize that one because after all sometimes you want to see the bounding box sometimes you don't. What in any event, I want to see it so that I have access to this little widget right here. I'm going to go ahead and double-click on it and that will convert the type from point type. Notice the point has disappeared to area type that fits inside of a frame and so if I reduce the width of that frame I'm going to rewrap the text, I don't really want to do that however. So I'll press control Z or command Z on the Mac in order to undo that change. Instead, I'm going to make the text frame wider than the type, just to make my point that much more obvious and now I'll drag this type to an arbitrary location like so. All right, now I want to assign a fill to that frame, which is a little tricky any here's what you do. Click off the text to de-select it and then switch to the white arrow tool. The one that illustrator calls the direct selection tool even though it has a keyboard shortcut of a for arrow and then you want to go up to the view menu and choose outline or you have that old school keyboard shortcut of control Y here in a PC that's command Y on a Mac and then notice this rectangular text frame. I want you to press the alt key or the option key on the Mac and click on it. So click on some edge of that text frame in order to select it independently of the type and now I'll return to the view menu and switch back to the preview mode. You've got that same keyboard shortcut control Y here in a PC or command Y in a Mac and then I'll click on this fill swatch first watch up here in a horizontal control panel and I'll change the fill to this dark shade of gray just so that we can easily keep track of that text frame. All right, now I'll go ahead and click off the text to de-select it and I'll switch back to the black arrow tool which you can get by tapping the V key and I'll click on that text block and shift click on that dash line up here at the top of the document. Now we want to establish the text as the key object. So I'll click on the letters again, notice they highlight and that tells you that they are going to remain stationary and the line is going to move as soon as you click on this option right here vertical align top, which you'll also see inside the monstrously large properties panel. If you prefer to go that route and notice that goes ahead and aligns that dash line not with the letter forms, but with the text frame which happens to be the same size as the bounding box. However, I'm going to go ahead and turn that bounding box off by pressing control shift B, command shift B on the Mac that same keyboard shortcut, because after all I filled that text frame so I can easily keep track of it. All right, now click on the text object and shift, click on the solid line, appear toward the top of the document. I will click once again on the letters to establish them as the key object and then I'll click on this guy, vertical aligned bottom and notice once again, we're aligning to the text frame and so I know I'm making this tediously obvious but here's the thing. This is how it's worked inside thousands of versions of illustrator up to this point, I exaggerate of course and it's also how things work by default at least an illustrator 2021 and just to make things even more painful, obviously I'll show you horizontal alignment. I'll press control A or command A on the Mac to select all the objects. A click on the text to make it the key object and then I'll click on this guy, horizontal aligned, left, and notice instead of aligning those lines to the left edge of this letter G we're aligning them to the left edge of the text frame. All right, I'm going to undo a bunch of those operations here by pressing control Z or command Z on the Mac as many times as it takes in order to get that text frame back into its previous location which is just a little more aesthetically appealing and so here's what you need to do. Select more than one object. So I've got both the text and that dash line selected and then click on the type a second time in order to establish it as the key object. You'll know you have a key object cause this little guy right here will appear as a key. Now, if you have the properties panel up on screen you can click on the ellipsis in order to bring up this panel and then click on the fly out menu icon in the top right corner and she was aligned to glyph bounds. If you're not a big fan of the properties panel that is to say you've hidden it in order to take better advantage of your real estate on screen, then you'll need to go to the window menu and choose a line to bring up the align panel, click on it's fly out menu icon choose the line to glyph bounds and choose area texts. So notice point text has a check mark in front of it because I turned that function on in the previous movie. Now I'll turn on area text as well. There's kind of no reason not to have them both turned on now which one, I'll hide the Elian panel and now click on this guy vertical align top and notice this time around aligned the dash line to the top of the top most letter form, which is this capital T and I want you to see I'll go ahead and zoom in here. Notice the top of that stroke is exactly aligned to the top of that T. So it's a precision alignment. All right, go ahead and press control zero commands zero on the Mac in order to center my zoom, I'll select the text object, I'll shift, click on that solid line and I'll go ahead and click on the letters to once again, make them the key object and finally, I'll click on this guy, vertical aligned bottom and now notice that illustrator has exactly aligned the bottom of that stroke with the bottom of the bottom most letter form which in my case is the lowercase Y and if we want to better see that alignment I'll go ahead and switch to the layers panel right here and I'll drag this top layer below the middle one. So the red layers now below the purple one and that way we can see the letter form in front of the stroke. Now that's not going to necessarily match up with the other, such as descenders, such s the flat descender associated with the lowercase P or the differently curving loop associated with the bottom of the lowercase G. All right, I'm just going to go ahead and zoom out once again and finally, I'll just show you a horizontal alignment by pressing control A or command A on the Mac to select everybody clicking on that text once again and then I'll go out to the horizontal control panel and I'll click on this guy horizontal align, right? And notice now that both of the lines align exactly with the right most edge of this, right most character, which is the lowercase Y and whether you enjoyed every mesmerizing moment of my methodical tutorial that is how you align graphic objects to letter forms associated with area type here inside the most recent version of illustrator.

Contents