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Illustrator has a lot of cool features, tools, and little tweaks that you can apply to almost any object. One of the coolest and most useful tools that illustrator offers is the Pathfinder tool. The pathfinder tool allows you to combine objects in interesting ways. Its almost impossible to explain what else you can do with this tool with out getting hands on, thats why I’ve bundled a worksheet along with this tutorial. To download this click here. So lets get started shall we?
As the above image implies we are going to go in that order. You will see on your worksheet there are numbers for each respective box and you guessed it! The matching numbers go together with the tool we will be testing and practicing.
The first pathfinder tool is the “unite” tool. Basically it takes what you’ve selected and unites it into one shape. So for the first box on the worksheet select all in that respective box and click “Unite”. You will see this creates a heart (an ugly one at that) and it is a blue. Thats because the shape thats on top always gives the color for the object.
Number two is the minus front tool. It does exactly as the name implies. Grab the black circle and square. Now click the “minus front” tool. You will see that where the circle was is now a hole that you can see right through. When using this tool make sure the object that you want to make a hole in is in the back.
This next tool is called the “intersect tool”, the intersect tool takes two (or more) overlapping shapes and what ever is overlapping is left. Try this in the worksheet by selecting all of the shapes in that square and clicking the intersect tool to see for your self.
“Exclude” is the exact opposite of the “Intersect tool”. What ever is overlapping will disappear and what wasn’t overlapping will still be there. Select all of the shapes in the square and click exclude in the pathfinder panel. Try this in the worksheet to get a better understanding of this.
The “Divide” tool is the most useful tool in my opinion, I use this tool all the time. To practice this select all in the number 5 square and click divide. Now unselect the shapes and grab the direct selection tool. Move the parts around just by clicking them and dragging them around.
The next tool is very similar to the divide tool, but it differs in one way. The shape thats on top of another takes that imprint of what was below it with it. You really need to practice this one in the worksheet to understand what I mean by this.
The “Merge” tool is very similar to the first tool that we played with. It does what the unite tool does but it does not become one fill color. Instead it stays all the same colors just their united now.
The “Crop” tool is very cool to play with. Its much like making a clipping mask, all the shapes that are below the top shape live inside the top shape. Practice this in the worksheet because it will make a little more sense when you practice.
“Outline” is out next to last tool that we are going to work with. This tool is cool, and deals specifically stroke. When you have overlapping shapes and you use this tool it takes the fill away and uses that same fill from the objects and turns them into the stroke. To practice this select all of the shapes and click outline. Then go to the strokes panel and turn the weight up to about 4px.
Our very last tool we have here is the “Minus Back”, this does exactly what the name applies and what ever is behind the top shape disappears.
I’ve left the last two squares for you to practice what ever you would like too. Just select the text and delete it. I hope this helps you use the pathfinder tool!
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