Freehand drawing in AI

[lavaspit]

Is there a way to change my setting so that I can draw freely with a Wacom etc? Normally when you draw a shape and then pick the pen or pencil tool up to draw another it cancels out the previous, etc.

[PrintDriver]

:confused:

[lavaspit]

ok-- I cant sketch with the pencil tool in illustrator.

[snarkle]

Do you mean that the line you just drew disappears or do you mean something else?

[Ghastly]

Basically it is beyond the scope of the program for the *pencil* to be a sketching tool as such...freeform drawing of this sort is better done in Photoshop. (yes the name of the tool does contradict this...but as we're dealing with vector paths it has a slightly different purpose to that which you'd expect of your standard 2B pencil)


I'm using version 8 but the pencil tool performs two functions...it allows you to create freeform paths..and with another path selected allows you to modify another path (so long as you are close enough to manipulate it)...you can control the extent to which the software smooths your path by double clicking the tool and changing the smoothness and fidelity settings (fidelity controls the extend to which the tool will be faithfull to your mouse or stylus movements...smoothness controls the smoothness as a percentage)


The smooth tool does share a few similarities with the pencil tool...but this tool is used specifically for smoothing whilst with the pencil tool you can dramatically alter the shape of an existing path or create a new path from scratch.


*edit* someone else may have more info because I rarely (if ever) draw freeform paths, and prefer to use the direct selection / convert anchor tools for smoothing. (adding or subtracting points with the pen tool as needed)