Each week you will need to respond to a question posted. Your response should be a minimum of 300 words for both questions. You should also include at least one response to your fellow students. The responses are a requirement for participation part of your grade.
Question 01 –
What is the important thing to remember when creating your pattern so you don’t get gaps?
Question 02 –
Why would you save your Peel Technique as a Graphic Style?
What is the important thing to remember when creating your pattern so you don’t get gaps?
When creating a pattern in Illustrator, there are a few things to consider so your pattern turns out seamless, and with no gaps. It is important to work within a bounding box, and to also mirror your objects around the edges of your canvas. For example, whatever objects you have hanging off the top edge of your canvas, copy it and paste it in the exact position, but on the bottom edge of the canvas. This is most accurately done if you go to Object —> Transform —> Move. Since you’re moving this down vertically to the bottom edge, type in the appropriate position, then click Copy so you’re not moving the original, but creating a copy of it instead. Repeat the same concept for the left and right edges. If they are not matched perfectly, the pattern will not be seamless. Arrange the objects within the canvas however you like, but make sure the edge elements are perfectly matched. When adding a background color, it is also important to make sure this is the exact size of your canvas, or else there will be gaps.
Why would you save your Peel Technique as a Graphic Style?
Saving any technique, such as the Peel Technique, as a Graphic Style in Illustrator is a great way to save time and make things more efficient. Saving techniques as a Graphic Style allows you to store Appearance settings which can be reused within the same file, or another, without having to redo the entire process of creating the technique again.
The important thing to remember is that, to make sure that your icons are around on the outside perimeter of your shape, when you place your icons on the inside of your shape they are evenly spaced out and create visual balance within the icons. The reason why we have to make sure of this is because once the pattern starts repeating and the shape gets bigger it’s now very easy to see if there’s any spacing in between the pattern. There are other important things to remember as well when you’re creating a pattern, for example, you have to make sure the height and size of the artboard are the same size because when you move your icons from the left outside of the perimeter of the shape you have to move your icons the exact position of the opposite side outside of the shape. The way you’re supposed to do it is to, go to the direct selection tool to select the items that are partially outside of the shapes, then in the menu section go to object>transform>move, the move menu will be open, make sure the preview option has already been selected. This is where the accuracy of the size of the artboard is important, when you go to the horizontal value of the menu make sure you type in the accurate size of the artboard and 0 for vertical value,After that press copy to get your result, pressing copy is the best choice than to option shift click and drag in order to avoid the icons going up or down, the goal is to go straight across on the opposite side of the artboard.This can also go vertically as well. Another tip is to make sure the upper right side and the bottom of the artboard are not touched due to having the icons cut off or having too much clutter.