Title: Draw Assignments Outline
Course: WILSON MC - INTRODUCTION TO COMPUTER GRAPHICS HYBRID > Section: Week 3: Draw

- INTRODUCTION TO DRAW

Underneath all the bells and whistles, effects and gimmicks, Illustrator is a drawing program. And when you draw in Illustrator, you generate anchors (pivot points for paths) and paths (the line segments between anchors). For that reason, we’ll dive right into drawing paths. And throughout this course, we’ll refine, enhance, and deepen our understanding of drawing paths.

There are many ways to draw paths. You can generate paths with the shape tools (Rectangle, Rounded Rectangle, Ellipse, Polygon, Star, and Flare). You can draw with the Pencil and Eraser tools to simulate the experience or drawing with a real pencil (or eraser).

As you develop your comfort level with Illustrator, and as you get more steeped in the logic of anchors and paths, you will prefer to work directly with the Pen tool. The Pen tool dispenses with generating paths “behind the curtain,” and allows you to define anchors and paths directly.

The Pen tool is not only the most direct way to generate anchors and paths, it is the most powerful way to control paths. Even if you find it more intuitive and efficient to use the shape tools or the Pencil tool, you will want to use the Pen tool to fine-tune objects.

Paths in Illustrator exist in three dimensions — you can draw in front of, or behind, a path — even without resorting to layers (as you would need to do in Photoshop or other non-vector-based programs). Illustrator CS6 has a Draw Behind mode, as well as a Draw Inside mode that allows you to draw only within a selected path (use Shift+D to toggle between these three modes, or select one from the Tools panel).

There are many techniques to assist you in aligning objects and elements of objects, but the most interactive and handy are Smart Guides. Smart Guides appear at helpful and intuitive moments to help you align anchors, paths, and groups of anchors and paths.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
- SET Pen tool stroke and fill color
- DRAW line segments with the Pen tool
- DRAW curves with the Pen tool
- CREATE open and closed paths
- ADD and delete anchors
- CONVERT anchors
- MOVE anchors and segments with the Direct Selection tool
- USE Smart Guides and the Align panel to align anchors
- DRAW and edit paths with the Pencil and Eraser tools

ELEMENTS OF THIS LESSON INCLUDE:

- CHAPTERS
ILLUSTRATOR CS6: VISUAL QUICKSTART GUIDE
Using the book Illustrator CS6: Visual QuickStart Guide refer to the following chapters for Draw:
Chapter 7: Freehand Drawing
Chapter 12: Reshape
Chapter 21: Pen Tools

- PRESENTATION
  - View the 24 slide presentation on Draw in MGLab to familiarize yourself with the basic concepts and the terminology.
- VIDEOS
  - Watch the following lesson videos in MGLab. As with the slide presentation, use the video content to expose you to the techniques demonstrated. You may need to re-watch portions - or all-  of a video for complex techniques.
    - 1 Drawing with the Pen Tool
    - 2 Drawing with the Pencil Tool
    - 3 Live Paint
Extra Video:
YouTube video on pentooling the Twitter Logo
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