Drawing brushed paths with the Paintbrush tool
The Paintbrush tool lets you draw a path and apply a brush stroke simultaneously. Illustrator sets down anchor points as you draw; you do not determine where the anchor points are positioned. However, you can adjust them once the path is complete. The number of anchor points set down is determined by the length and complexity of the path and by tolerance settings in the Paintbrush Tool Preferences dialog box. These settings control how sensitive the Paintbrush tool is to the movement of your mouse or graphics-tablet stylus.
To draw a path with the Paintbrush tool: - Select a brush in a brush library or the Brushes palette.
- Select the Paintbrush tool
. - Position the pointer where you want the path to begin, and drag to draw a path. A dotted line follows the pointer as you drag.
- Do one of the following:
- To draw an open path, release the mouse button when the path is the desired shape.
- To draw a closed path, hold down Alt (Windows) or Option (Mac OS) as you drag. The Paintbrush tool displays a small loop
to indicate that you are drawing a closed path. When the path is the desired shape, release the mouse button (but not the Alt or Option key). After the path closes, release the Alt or Option key.
To modify a brushed path with the Paintbrush tool: - Select the path. (See Selecting objects.)
- Position the Paintbrush tool on or near the path, and drag until the path is the desired shape.
To continue the existing freeform path, position the paintbrush tip on an endpoint of the path and drag.
To set preferences for the Paintbrush tool: - Double-click the Paintbrush tool.
- Set any of the following options, and click OK:
- Fidelity to control how far you have to move your mouse or stylus before Illustrator adds a new anchor point to the path. For example, a Fidelity value of 2.5 means that tool movements of less than 2.5 pixels aren't registered. Fidelity can range from 0.5 to 20 pixels; the higher the value, the smoother and less complex the path.
- Smoothness to control the amount of smoothing that Illustrator applies when you use the tool. Smoothness can range from 0% to 100%; the higher the percentage, the smoother the path.
- Fill New Brush Strokes to apply a fill to the path. This option is most useful when drawing closed paths.
- Keep Selected to determine whether or not Illustrator keeps the path selected after you draw it.
- Edit Selected Paths to determine whether or not you can change an existing path with the Paintbrush tool.
- Within: _ pixels to determine how close your mouse or stylus must be to an existing path in order to edit the path with the Paintbrush tool. This option is only available when the Edit Selected Paths option is selected.
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