Illustrator (Desktop) Feature Requests
When entering a new feature request, please provide:
- Description
- Why is this valuable to you?
4666 results found
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Allow to make sharp transitions using Width Tool
Width Tool allows us to set width markers on a path, to make its stroke’s outline blend between set cross-sections. We have some limited controls over these markers, we can make each side have its own width, we can snap them to points, but that’s it.
What we also need is way to make this transitions sharp, rather than smooth.
Look at the image attached.The path on the top is a stroke with a variable stroke profile.
The path on the bottom is a demonstration of what we want (an art brush actually).Sure, we can fake this behavior…
11 votes -
Buttons in Pathfinder panel should be disabled when nothing is selected
If you have nothing selected, Pathfinder still have all buttons active, despite clicking one will give out an error message.
What’s a point? Why shout? Why not display a shallow message (like the one we get when a live shape gets expanded)?
Why not disable the buttons in the first place when a selection is empty?11 votes -
Move Blend Mode keyboard shortcuts from the Tools into the Menu Commands section
If you open Keyboard Shortcuts, make sure you have Tools selected, scroll all the way down, you’ll see all 'Blend Mode - [name of the mode]' commands there — empty, ready to be assigned... but. Opt/Alt cant’ be used for these. Because these are in tooools. Which means these can be bound only to naked keys and Shift+keys. Which are all taken, long time ago!
So please move Blend Mode keyboard shortcuts from the Tools section into the Menu Commands section, so we can use all possible modifiers for these, and not only Shift.
Also, why do we even have…
11 votes -
Appearance and Gradient panels need a better way to signal 'No selection'
Very often, working on a complex appearance, we accidentally loose the object selection, and the stack we edit remains unassigned.
The panel then gets 'No selection' in the top row... but if the attributes stack is long, this line can get hidden if you scroll the panel down.
Then, if you select something else, all your changes get lost.The workaround now is to be vigilant (ha) and save your appearance as a temp style before you select back the art you wanted to edit appearance for in the first place.
A better solution would be to make the 'No…11 votes -
Liquid Page Layout (Artboards)
I would love a "liquid Layout" feature like InDesign has for more easily converting artwork and pages sizes simultaneously.
There are many times I create posters on a 11x17 artboard and need to easily reduce the art and page sizes to 5x7 for flyers.
InDesign has had this feature for a long time and I feel it would definitely be useful to my workflow.11 votes -
Make Redefine Graphic Style option better accessible, and from the Graphic Styles panel too
If Ai had a hotkey for this command (like this request is asking for: https://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/333657/suggestions/41254435), perhaps this one would be less painful.
Yes, I know, you edit an appearance in the Appearance panel, and then force this changes to update the original style, using the panel’s flyout menu... but
A. I often start looking the wrong panel, thinking 'I am updating a graphic style, so the relevant command should be in Graphic Styles' — and when I realize it’s a wrong assumption, it’s too late. For some reason this habit is hard to change!
B. Why this command is…
11 votes -
Gradient tool on desktop similar to the iPad version!
Please make the Interactive Gradient Tool work as in the iPad version, where both end nodes behave similarly.
On the desktop version, when one end is dragged, it moves the whole gradient around.
On the iPad, both ends can be moved independently.
It makes the tool counter intuitive!11 votes -
Intertwine needs a better way to display order operations rather than hiding them in a context menus
It’s not clear we can chose methods other than 'swap order' for cases when a freshly created intertwine zone has several possible solutions. Illustrator draws and edge around the current zone (quite poorly signaled, which is a different topic: https://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/601447-illustrator-desktop-bugs/suggestions/45845602-make-intertwine-edit-mode-telegraphed-better), but then a single left-click just swaps and immediately ends editing the zone.
The fact we can click on the highlighted segment with a right mouse button and choose an order is not very obvious... because — let’s admit it — Illustrator can’t do context menus very well and we are not used to have anything really 'contextual' in…
11 votesAuto-zones hover tips are much better now and solve the problem with understanding the reordering proposed.
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Expanding Intertwine creates too many identical copies and doesn’t optimize them
If you expand an intertwine object (with the global Expand: Object command, since it does not have its own specific Expand), the one with a lot of zones, you get a ton of overlapped clipping containers with a reordered copies insides, one per each zone used.
While technically it’s OK, the amount of copies can be just absurd.
Some copies are identical and differentiate only by the location of their clipping masks. Perhaps Ai should track these copies and clip then not with separate masks, but a single compound path mask, when possible?The degradation is not so graceful with…
11 votesIntertwine now tries to optimize the number of clips created when expanding.
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We need custom made shapes to control Intertwines, drawn with other tools, like we can do with clipping masks
Intertwine, as I see it, is a control structure for dynamically generated clipping masks. The only way we can create zones to control these masks is to use pseudo-tools, activated with the specialized Edit command. This is fine for quick appliances, but is not so great when you need to make a precise work, with snapping, complex shapes and several iterations.
We got a Sax-a-Boom, but now we need a saxophone.
I would like to add any other shapes, created with any other tool Ai offers, as zones, to an existing or a new intertwine — like Live Paint allows.…
11 votes -
Allow to group a single Intertwine object
A way to workaround the bug with the self-expanding Intertwines on effect application (https://illustrator.uservoice.com/forums/601447/suggestions/45845533) would be to group them and apply an effect to this 'protection container'...
But alas, Ai won’t allow that, and grouping an Intertwine object does nothing.
I suspect Illustrator treats it as a group, onle a 'magic' one, and normal group restrictions, such as 'Thou shalt not group a single group' are applied to it.Why then we can’t ungroup an Intertwine... anyway, this one should not be applied, even if you fix the self-expanding.
11 votes -
Hitting Escape while creating a shape, an artboard, while using Rotate, Scale, etc., doesn't cancel the process
When we marquee a selection and hit Escape — it gets canceled.
When we hit Escape while dragging out a guide — it gets canceled.
Dragging out a brush on the canvas — works.
Dragging out a swatch to drop it on a gradient or the canvas — works.
Dragging the appearance form the Appearance panel — works.
...and many other casesEscape does NOT work for these cases:
1. Creating a shape, an artboard, an area text
2. Rotating, scaling, shearing, free transforming...
3. Setting up the width with the Width tool
4. Setting up the gradient with the…11 votes -
Add an option to not zoom to the artboard at newly created files
When you create a document in Ai, it first gets created and they Ai fits the artboard in window. For me, at Windows, it also happens with a noticeable delay, which sucks.
But in the first place — why does it do it? I never asked for it, I want it to be at 100% and have it fitted only when the artboard is larger than my viewport, not smaller!
I’d like to have at least a key value to edit somewhere in Prefs file to disable this auto-zooming.11 votes -
API for getting the reflection/flip property of an image frame
We would like to get the flip property of an image frame..
It can be in a similar way to the way we get the rotation by passing the matrix:
AIAPI void (*AIRealMatrixGetRotate) ( const AIRealMatrix *m, AIReal *angle );If this is not possible, then as a workaround we can get some notifies, for example: kFlipHorizontalNotifier or kFlipVerticalNotifier in order to know that the user selects to flip the image.
Thanks,
Chen11 votes -
Disable smart guides to some specific object/layer
Hi there,
After using Illustrator for quite some time, I found there has one function I need the most.
Which is to disable smart guides to some specific object/layer.Smart guides are amazing but I found that they won't work well if I had a crazy vector texture background.
When I try to align to the main object I am working on, it will just try to align to background vector textures. Which is not ideal.So I have been thinking, could there have a feature, that disables smart guides to some specific object/layer, like we can lock anything that…
11 votesThe latest Beta now has a dedicated option for this in Preferences > Smart Guides section, in Limit Snapping area. We can now choose if we want Snap within Entire Canvas (as it behaves normally) or the Active Artboard.
This is a WIP feature, and the team desperately needs your feedback on it. Please test it and comment if it works as expected (or not).
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Font Height Options - "Cap Height" option by default
The new font height option is great!
However, working in the sign trade, everyone including our clients (who are mostly Architects) specify text by cap height so we are constantly changing the default Em size to cap height.
It would save a lot of time and also eliminate any potential size issues with someone having the wrong option selected which could be very costly.
11 votes -
Absolute mode that always sets a fill a single click and stroke with the Alt+click/right click
Setting a color for fill and stroke depends on what is 'active' in the toolbox. This is a relative mode mode and it's unique for Adobe apps (and their imitators/imitators).
What about giving a direct way of setting fill/stroke, without remembering which is in focus now? somewhat like Corel Draw does?
Give us an option to be able to set a fill with a single click, and a stroke with the Alt+click (and additionally bringing it to focus), or right click.11 votes -
Convert to path object - keep object name
When I rasterise a letter or text in Photoshop, the layer keeps the original name.
Why can't Illustrator do the same? I type the letter A and the object in layers has the name "A". If I now change the letter to a Path object, the group is no longer called "A" but "group". What is still ok with one letter, becomes very annoying with 500 letters. Especially when it comes to special characters like ́ ˘ ̧ ̒ ̋ ̏ ̀ ̌ ̦ ̊ ̄ - ̨ ̣ ̇ ̷ ̃ ̈ ^, which are difficult to read in…
11 votes -
Split "Scale strokes and Effects" into two options...
Please split the "Scale strokes and effects" into two options, one for strokes, and one for effects. See mockup attached.
11 votes -
Add a function to warn / show / forbid white overprints?
Can you please add a function to warn and show white overprints?
11 votes
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