Design Center Tutorial
Creating scatter brushes in Illustrator
Scatter brushes in Adobe® Illustrator® CS3 are intuitively named. They scatter a pattern along a path. Thinking of a leaf blower being pushed across a lawn gives you a sense of the chaos you can generate by using a scatter brush stroke to create a path of objects.
You might use a scatter brush, for instance, to populate a field of stars (Figure 1).
Figure 1: A star field being drawn using an art brush.
You can draw interactively with a scatter brush, or you can apply a scatter brush pattern to an existing path.
Requirements
To complete this article, you will need the following software:
Adobe Illustrator CS3
Prerequisite knowledge:
None
About the authors
David Karlins is a veteran Web designer and digital graphics consultant. He is the author of more than 20 books on digital graphic and interactive design, including “Build Your Own Web Site”, “The Complete Idiot's Guides to Dreamweaver and Flash”, “Dreamweaver CS3 How-Tos: 100 Essential Techniques”, and “Illustrator CS3 How-Tos: 100 Essential Techniques”. David's clients have ranged from Hewlett Packard to the Himalayan Fair. His articles and reviews appear in online and print publications, including CreativePro and Macworld magazine. David has taught at the University of California Extension School of Graphic and Interactive Design and for the San Francisco State University Digital Video Intensive program. He currently teaches Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Dreamweaver for the San Francisco State University Multimedia Studies Program. Visit David at www.davidkarlins.com.
Bruce K. Hopkins has been a professional illustrator for more than a decade, creating everything from fine art to technical drawings. His clients range from Joe Boxer to technology firms. His cutting-edge Space series breaks new ground in using Illustrator for fine art. Bruce’s Web site is www.bkhopkins.com.
Excerpted from “Adobe Illustrator CS3 How-Tos: 100 Essential Techniques” © 2007. Used with the permission of Peachpit. To purchase this book, please visit http://www.peachpit.com.
