Line segment and Clipping Mask help

Hi,
I have created a complex shape using just line segments. I want to be able to create a clipping mask using a .jpg photo as the texture inside the shape I have created. I have tried Grouping the path, and also making it a Compound Path, but the most that happens is the line segments themselves get filled in, NOT the inside of the shape I would like filled.
I have went through and made sure every segment is attached, but to no avail.
Any help please?
Thanks.

In CS5 you can select all you lines and then hit Command J and all but last two points will join you then select those two points and do Command J once again but if you wish to have your original art intact then just make a copy lock it and make not visib le until you need it.
Now make your clippping mask

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Draw inside disabled, and clipping mask workaround loses information

I want to use my compound paths, with styles, fills and strokes applied to "draw inside", but that command is greyed out when I select them.
However, if I "cheat" and instead use the compound paths as clipping masks first, I accomplish something which looks exactly the same way in the layer palette as when I do manage to "draw inside" an object.
The trouble is that all my styles, fills and strokes get killed using that workaround, and I have to reapply them.
Am I missing a step somewhere, or doing this in the wrong order?
Any advice will be appreciated.
Also, any word on why "draw inside" is disabled for compound paths?
PS. Another problem using my poor workaround is that when the compound path becomes invisible, I can't find a way to drag appearances to it or apply swatches, even when I select it in the layer palette. I have to redo all styles, gradients, etc. manually, which is not efficient, nor desirable, at all.

Monika Gause wrote:
eobet wrote:
So, if I understand this correctly, two people replying here can draw inside compound paths, and two people can't. Is this a design premium feature, or why does there seem to be a difference?
Has nothing to do with Design Premium.
Maybe you'd like to show us your art. There might be other ways to achieve what you need to do.
Well my problem is that I can't do either of these:
Now, the stroke aligned to the outside, I apparently can never get around unless I choose to outline the path on that stroke, which means I loose flexibility (or add steps to my workflow).
And drawing on the inside... I guess I could make a clipping mask manually, but then I loose that really nice gradient I spent a lot of time to position just right... (either way, more steps in my workflow).
Actually, the whole point of my question is completely lost if I have to outline any path, because the reason I want to work with compound shapes and clipping masks at all, is that I want to easily be able to move one of the sub-shapes which creates the final outline, without having to redo neither the gradient fill or stroke.
And yeah, thinking again, my workflow is completely wrecked either way, since compound paths don't allow aligned strokes.

Trouble with mass amount of text and clipping mask - please help!

I have a curvy vector image that I want text to appear in, then create a clipping mask. When I try this I get a message saying that the text object is extremely complex and might not print. The file is impossible to move around and sometimes crashes my machine.
Here is a screen cap of what I'm doing:
http://www.aaronpenton.net/mask.html
I blocked all the text so there's just a ton of it.
This is for a large graphic (22') that will be placed on glass.
Is there a better way to do this? Or a way of making the file more manageable ?
Any help is much appreciated.

>I have a curvy vector image that I want text to appear in, then create a clipping mask.
Inaccurate description. You are using the text as a clipping mask for the image. That's a lot of text, which means a very complex compound path with tens of thousands of points. No wonder this is slowing things down.
Try using the text as an opacity mask instead, then flatten transparency. Keep a copy of the text and a copy of the wave on hidden layers so you can go back and edit the text or modify the path.

Zebra print - clipping mask help

I'm new to Illustrator and am having trouble getting a clipping mask to work the way I want it to. I have a zebra print pattern over the top of some lettering and I want to keep the shape of the lettering while incorporating the zebra print. See my screen shot. What steps do I need to take? I tried Pathfinder and Shape Modes, but they don't come out right.
All I want is to have the lettering incorporate the zebra print without having points outside the letter shape.
Adrian

There are several ways to do this. Two options are: pattern fill or a clipping mask.
Pattern fill
Create a pattern from your zebra pattern by:
1. Setting the pattern artwork in front of a rectangle that has no stroke or fill.
2. Select the pattern AND the rectangle and drag them into the Swatch panel. A "pattern fill" swatch will be added to the panel.
3. Select your text and assign the pattern fill to the text.
This should ideally be a "seamless" pattern. You can read about that in the online help.
NOTE: If your pattern contains only the black portion of the fill (the white area is blank), you can add a second fill attribute to the text by using the Attributes panel:
1. Select the text.
2. Go to the fly-out menu on the Attributes panel and select "new fill".
3. Drag the new fill below the "Characters" in the Attributes panel.
4. Assign any color to it.
Clipping Mask
1. Set your text above the pattern, in the artboard (no need to convert it to outlines).
2. Select text and pattern and choose Menu item: Object/Clipping Mask/Make (or Cmd-7, mac or Ctl-7 pc)
3. Reselect the text and assign it a new color (objects lose their color when converted to a clipping mask, but it can be reassigned).
Hope this helps.

Calling all compound path and clipping mask experts...

I am attempting to get all the white areas in the attached "globe" artwork to knockout to the background color. I have tried making the entire thing a compound path, tried clipping mask and different combinations in pathfinder with no success. The image on the right is what happens when I make it a compound path. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated, thanks!

The simplest way, I think, would be to set the white line work as an opacity mask on top of the tan circle. That is not a clipping mask, but does the same thing and it's much easier.
Otherwise, outline white strokes and "Unite" using pathfinder tool, then delete outside path (the circle), from the compound shape. That will leave the appropriate compound object to make the clipping mask:

Layer clipping mask help

having trouble with layer clipping masks - I guess I've never really used them before. I want to make a clipping mask from a layer but that layer has more than one path on it. It doesn't seem to be working. Does it need to be a single one? Can I use a compound or a group(i've tried both but they didn't work for me...) help?
also - Is there a way to invert the mask?
thanks!

Hi Oompal
Simple, let´s see if I´ve understood your problem
Create any shape and position where you like. Now go to layers pallete and click create clipping layer button (bottom of the layer, the first left buttom). That´s it
Now that shape will be used as clipping layer, and everithing you create inside this layers will be clipped.
Am I right?
Guidelines: Path intended to be a clipping shape must be the topmost of the layers, be selected on the artboard and its layer must be highlighted on the layers pallete to enable the action.

Scaling and Clipping Masks

I have a 2 color carton that I am trying to layout in Illustrator CS3. It has spot Black, a dieline, and a solid 109 yellow. I need to make the yellow bleed over the outline of the die by 1/8". I tried scaling the die larging and creating a clipping mask but I don't understand the process, and therefore have come up unsuccessful. Any help

I answered your question in another post. Here it is again. This method uses a Live Paint object of your dieline and requires no scaling, masking, nor joining of paths.
You can usually select the dieline, copy it, then paste behind. At this point the original dieline should be unselected on top of the pasted dieline which will be selected although you may not be able to see that's what happened.
Now go to the Object menu and select Live Paint/Make. Immediately change the stroke to 18pt like mentioned by Hans and set the stroke and fill both to 109 yellow.
You should now have the shape of your carton filled yellow with a 1/8 inch yellow bleed with the original dieline showing the knives and scores on top of that.

Trying to make clipping mask - HELP!

So I'm trying to make a clipping mask for this graphic in picture 34, I want it to look like picture 35.
I've got the contruction guy on layer 1, and the two cut outs on layer 2 above, I've grouped them all and click on clipping mask/make and nothing happens. I want the two cuts to cut out those sections on the contruction object.
Any suggestions on what I'm doing wrong?

Dan, hold on,
Here's what I did:
1. bring the two white shapes to the front
2. send the black construction guy to the back
3. select everything
4. Effect/Pathfinder>Minus Front/Subtract
Do not use Effect, use the Pathfinder palette, bundled with the Transform and Align palettes.
Then it should work.
Minus Front is the name of the option in the newest version(s), Subtract from Shape Area in older ones.

Clipping mask help???!!!

Hi Guys
I have recnetly made an image up of a number of shapes. i have then placed a rectangular clipping mask over to get the desired effect. however i wouldd like to envelope distort the rectangle but its selecting all the single pieces and not the rectangle. van anyone tell me how to correct this.
Many Thanks

You would have to group the items or use Pathfinders to unify them, then define the warp. This has nothing to do with teh clipping mask. Clipping masks merely define the visibility and don't affect items beyond that...
Mylenium

I have photoshop 6.0 and clipping mask

I have photoshop 6.0. I was wondering how i could enable the clipping mask. This is the first time i've used an old photoshop. @Thank you in advance

Since a Clipping Mask can mean a couple of different things, i'm guessing your looking for what is Layer>Create Clipping Mask as it's called in newer versions of photoshop.
In photoshop 6 it would be Layer>Group with Previous

Clipping mask is clipping my lines and not the actual object.

Hi all,I'm using the latest CC Illustrator.
I'm so frustrated and hope someone can help me, I've already spent a few hours trying to figure this out and looked through a number of tutorials and troubleshoot forums and I cant find an answer.
How do I stop the clipping mask from clipping inside the line itself, instead of my within the object. I'm still a newbie and I know I've done something wrong somewhere. I just cant figure out what.
Here are a couple of screenshots of my problem.
The end result looks pretty cool, but since this is for an assignment, I need it to work properly.
Help!

You are welcome. No you don't need to undo, you are on the right track, you expanded the lines in order to clip mask with a lighter image, now you need to use PathFinder to fill the holes (the turtle's shells) and clipmask them with a darker image like two turtle I created a few years ago. To use pathfinder, place a large rectangle behind the turtle expanded lines (compound path), select the expanded artwork and the rectangle and click PathFinder Divide button, at this point you will have the holes filled with paths and grouped with the original paths, so ungroup them. Then you select the newly generated paths and clip mask with a different and darker image. This attach image was done with PathFinder, pen tool and live paint. The images I used are real wood species, that I scanned into .jpg files.

Some help required with Clipping Masks

Hi,
I'm quite new to illustrator - I've made designs before but really just playing at it.
Now, though, I have a design which I had "grunged" up by applying a texture and knocking out the sections of the design with it in Photoshop. However, I want to learn how to do that in illustrator and thought that clipping mask was the answer.
I can get the clipping mask to work except it creates the opposite effect I am after...It masks the portions of the image I want to keep visible leaving those areas I want masked visible.
In effect I need to inverse the mask but I don't know how to do it in illustrator.
Hopefully, I've made it clear what I mean and I appriciate any advice.
Ta
Malc

You can use the Transparency panel to make an opacity bask as well and inverse that.
Or if you wish use the pathfinder panel to minus front. I think the second icon on top from the left.
Read the help files about opacity masks, pathfinder and clipping mask
and it might also work as a compound path Command 8 or Control 8.
Read about compound paths

How to replace a line segment?

Here's what I want to do:
Take the selected line segment, and replace it with a series of line segments, scaled to the length of the line.
I'm not quite sure how to go about this. I don't see any line object relating to a path item. All I see are anchors. I know I can access the two anchors of the line segment that's selected, but to begin with, how to I delete the line connecting the anchors?

Here's an image to help illustrate. The object on the left has a line segment selected. The script runs and removes the segment, then replaces it with the door path, scaled up to the correct width to fit:

Fillable object from line segments

I've created a tree object from line segments and it looks how I want it to look. I made it a compound path. When I fill it, I get weird results. I used live fill and that works fine, but I still dont get the pointed edges that I would like to see on the outline and I feel like there is a more elegant way to go about this. I have attached the image of the tree. The blue circle is the weird fill. The red circle is the pointed edges that I want. I got this point using the pen tool, but it doesn't act correctly with the rest of the path.
I am probably doing this all completely wrong, but I'm a bit impatient for classes and I learn best through trial and error.

Select your object and in your stroke panel increase the miter limit to a higher number
The weird gren or blue fill is probably because your points are not joined. Use the hollow arrow tool to select a point and move it you will see. You can fix by using the hollow arrow tool to select only the 2 points, then using object >> path >> join

Line Segment Intersection Checker

Hello all,
I am attempting to design a program that will take a set of n line segments and check which pairs of lines intersect. The lines are finite line segments, and they each have two end-points. I am supposed to be able to store a good amount of "Line Segments" into a data structure (Array, LinkedList, BinarySearchTree), etc. I am then supposed to be able to test each line segment against all of the other line segments that are read in in a text file in the format L1: (x,y),(x,y)
I figured out how to test whether or not two finite line segments intersect, that is not the problem. What I am concerned with is the method(s) I can use to read in all of the line segments and then output the intersecting pairs of line segments in the form (L1,L2) means Line segment 1 and Line segment 2 intersect.
I was thinking that reading the text file, I could just create an array with n slots that holds Line Segment objects (assuming I have created a Point class for keeping track of end-points), start with the first line segment in the array, and use the points from the first line segment's endpoints to all of the other line segment's endpoints in the array and check to see if they do intersect. Has anybody ever had to do something like this, and if so, what approach did you take to complete?
Thanks in advance.

Donojuana wrote:
... What I am concerned with is the method(s) I can use to read in all of the line segments and then output the intersecting pairs of line segments in the form (L1,L2) means Line segment 1 and Line segment 2 intersect.
I was thinking that reading the text file, I could just create an array with n slots that holds Line Segment objects (assuming I have created a Point class for keeping track of end-points), start with the first line segment in the array, and use the points from the first line segment's endpoints to all of the other line segment's endpoints in the array and check to see if they do intersect.
...That sounds like a good plan.

Line segment and Clipping Mask help

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