How To Load Brush Libraries In Illustrator
August 5, 2009 by Joseph
Filed under Adobe Illustrator, Current Articles
If you want more variety when using the Paint Brush Tool in Illustrator, you can load a number of brush textures. There’s every type of brush from chalk charcoal pencil to watercolor to borders and banners. Read more
Type On Path In Illustrator
May 24, 2009 by Joseph
Filed under Adobe Illustrator, Current Articles
Putting type on a path is simple in Illustrator using the Type on a Path Tool. Read more
Making A Contact Sheet With Photoshop
May 19, 2009 by Joseph
Filed under Adobe Photoshop, Current Articles, Tutorials
If you’ve ever had a large number of images and you needed to make a contact sheet, Photoshop has a great feature that will create contact sheets for you. Read more
Pantone to CMYK In Illustrator
May 18, 2009 by Joseph
Filed under Adobe Illustrator, Current Articles
Here is how you convert a Pantone color to cmyk in Illustrator: Read more
Glossy Button In Adobe Illustrator
April 1, 2009 by Joseph
Filed under Adobe Illustrator, Current Articles, Tutorials
Creating a glossy button in Illustrator is easy. Here is how you do it:

STEP 1
Create a new document in Illustrator. Make sure the document is set in RGB color mode (File-Document Color Mode-RBG Color)

STEP 2
Next, draw the shape that you want the button to be.

STEP 3
Add a color gradient to the button shape, with the color at the bottom a darker shade of the color at the top.

STEP 4
Select the button shape, copy it, paste it in the front (Edit-Paste in Front), add a stroke to it (about 2 pts) and send it to the back (Object-Arrange-Send to Back).


STEP 5
Next, draw an oval, centering it on the button shape and raise it so that the bottom of the oval is around the center of the button shape.

STEP 6
Select your button shape (the one without the stroke), copy, paste it to the front and then move the button shape to the front, above the oval (Object-Arrange-Bring to Front).

STEP 7
Next, select the oval and the top button shape and use the Divide action in the Pathfinder palette. After you have done this, ungroup the pieces, and delete all of the shapes except the shape created by the division of the oval and the top button shape.

STEP 8
Select the new shape and fill it with a gradient, going from white at the top to black at the bottom. Then select the shape and using the Transparency palette, set it to Screen, at 80% opacity.

Your button should have a nice gloss finish to it.

This technique can be applied to different shapes and can also be used in Photoshop.
Glossy button tutorial file:
Placing An Image In Illustrator
March 22, 2009 by Joseph
Filed under Adobe Illustrator, Current Articles, Tutorials
If you ever need to place an image into your Illustrator layout, this is how you do it.






