Cari Jansen

Creating PNGs from Illustrator

Cari Jansen — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 15:22:38 +0000

We all get this question as designers: “Can you provide us with a copy of the logo or masterhead design in a format that we can use in Microsoft Word”… or “PowerPoint”? Illustrator CS, released back in 2003, introduced the Save for Microsoft Office command. (File menu), which converts your Illustrator artwork to a 150ppi Portable Network Graphic (.png). Funnily...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

CS5 Recertification Exams Passed

Cari Jansen — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 08:42:15 +0000

Happy to announce that I have today successfully completed my required CS5 Recertifications for Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign. Spending the last 6 1/2-days locked in the house (with the airconditioning on, as we’ve been having a heat-wave in Perth) and studying hard… It’s amazing how many new little things you pick up when you really try and learn the...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Vertical Type from Illustrator to InDesign

Cari Jansen — Tue, 04 May 2010 11:57:38 +0000

In my previous post I provided a solution for setting type vertically in InDesign. Illustrator in contrast to InDesign actually has a Vertical Type tool, and the close integration between the two applications means we can opt to set our type in Illustrator instead and bring it into InDesign as a graphic. Vertical Type in Illustrator Illustrator provides us with...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Colour my swatches…

Cari Jansen — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 15:59:21 +0000

Digitip 093 – Adobe Creative Suite 4. Building a swatch set from an image Updated: 5-Jan-2010: Added Video Tutorial at end of transcript During our InDesign Trivia night at the Perth InDesign User Group in December, we had some fun with colours in InDesign. Here’s one of the scenario’s we used: So you’re working on a layout in InDesign, and...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Stray points removal in Illustrator and InDesign

Cari Jansen — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 16:08:00 +0000

Adobe Illustrator has had a Stray Anchor Points remover for some time. In Illustrator CS3, you can remove stray points by selecting Object > Path > Clean up… The Clean Up command allows for deletion of Stray Points, Empty Text Paths and Unpainted Objects. InDesign on the other hand doesn’t contain such a command. How do we create strays? What...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Nostalgia

Cari Jansen — Sat, 28 Jun 2008 14:53:33 +0000

John Nack back in February posted this digitized VHS video from the Adobe archives to YouTube. Maybe I’m getting old or I’m in the mood for some nostalgia … but I’d love to see more of these old VHS movies converted and shared. This one is a promotional video delivered by John Warnock introducing Adobe Illustrator. Did I see that...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Illustrator and Epson printing

Cari Jansen — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 22:35:21 +0000

If you’re experiencing problems printing to your Epson printer with borderless enabled from Illustrator, this new TechNote from Adobe might provide you with a fix. Web-reference: TechNote (2008, Adobe Systems)

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

3D Pie Graphs in Illustrator

Cari Jansen — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 13:38:33 +0000

Digitip 073 – Adobe Illustrator CS3 Illustrator has had a graph tool for as long as I can remember. The following trick shows how you can use Illustrator graphs to create a 3D pie graph for which the graph data can still be edited. Let’s get started by entering some basic numbers Create Graph Start by selecting the Pie Graph...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Simple continuous pattern

Cari Jansen — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 15:27:57 +0000

Digitip 072 – Adobe Illustrator CS3 Modified 20-Apr-2008 (added Scott C. tip) The following tip shows how you can create a relatively simple continuous pattern using Illustrator. It’s been sitting on the back-burner for well over a month, but is finally here So where do we start. Start by creating a bit of artwork that is going to form the basis...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Temporary Access to Selection Tools

Cari Jansen — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 03:35:00 +0000

Digitip 068 – Adobe InDesign CS3 Ok, not really an extensive tip… more an observation and question – at the end – with some tip elements in it that I thought I’d share. Pressing the Command (Mac) or Ctrl (Win) key whilst you are working with another tool in InDesign will give you temporary access to either the Selection or...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Masked Text

Cari Jansen — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 05:06:18 +0000

Digitip 065 – Illustrator CS3, Photoshop CS3 This tip is Part 3 of a three-part tip and generates the masked text. Part 1 describes how the Photoshop artwork is created and Part 2 outlines how to apply Live Trace and maintain colour editing ability. I’m adding my standard “Bogus” text. Select Text and Background (shift-click each with Selection Tool, or...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Tracing the Trace Graphic

Cari Jansen — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 05:05:56 +0000

Digitip 064 – Adobe Illustrator CS3 This tip is Part 2 of a three-part tip. Part 1 describes how the Photoshop artwork that is placed into the Illustrator file was created and Part 3 will create the Text Effect that will give our finished result. We’re ready to place the previously created Photoshop graphic in Illustrator now. But let’s create...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Preparing the Trace Graphic

Cari Jansen — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 05:04:28 +0000

Digitip 063 – Adobe Photoshop CS3 A month or so ago I demoed a masking technique that works well with text in Illustrator during an Adobe eSeminar I delivered. At the time I promised to write this technique up as a digitip, however, an extremely busy workschedule meant I’d not yet gotten around to posting the tip. But a promise...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Art Files for Illustrator

Cari Jansen — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 13:00:39 +0000

Code Line Communications has produced a stand-alone application for Mac OS (PPC and Universal Binary) that makes packaging Illustrator files for delivery of original .ai file including graphics and fonts to service providers an easier task. Web Reference: ArtFiles (2007, Code Line Communications)

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking

Benday Dots Screen Fill technique

Cari Jansen — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 07:24:59 +0000

Digitip 053 – Adobe Illustrator CS2 The following tip looks at using screen patterns as a fill for selected objects in Illustrator. I must thank Sylvia for asking about benday (or Ben Day) dots on the CTP-Q, Page Layout: Adobe, Quark, MS, PDF forum, as it triggered the creation of this tip. Part 2 of this tip is outlined in...read more →

Cari Jansen - Training, Print & Electronic Publishing Consultancy, Technical Writing/Editing, Public Speaking