Make Illustrator inform users about the live shape nature of the path used for area type and provide associated controls for it
Currently, when we use a live rectangle as a path for an area type, it secretly stays live shape inside, and it allows us to scale the object with the round corners honored. If we round corners for a rectangle-looking path (not live shape), corners will get stretched.
However, there is no way to distinguish these two cases with UI, or to convert a rectangular path used for the area type into live rectangle shape, or to have shape-sepcific controls.
Please refer to the discussion in comments for the details.
This request is based on the original declined bug report below. Full text is given below.
Area type rounded corners distort when resizing.
Is it possible to make the corners remain live so they don't distort? See attached image.
Lisa
shared this idea
-
Lisa
commented
Ok, got it to work, apparently you have to click on the line. I'm going to see if this will do what I'm trying to do... Thanks!
-
Lisa
commented
Hmmm... Can you please say how I can make this live path shape and fill it with editable text? When I make a rectangle and try to add text to it I get an error.
Also, while this might explain the difference in behavior - I'm not sure what the benefit of having the corners scale improperly is.
-
Lisa
commented
Hmm... how did you make the one on the right? It would be nice to be able to make boxes that autosize and allow for rounded corners - something similar to the way it works in PowerPoint (but better!). Is there actually a way to do that in illustrator??
-
That’s an interesting case.
Take a look at the GIF recording and the filу attached.This two objects seem almost identical (except for their size). Layers panel (not shown in the GIF) shows these as just text (Ai doesn’t list paths for text there,
sadly). If we select paths only, AI will recognize them as just 'Path' in the Control and Properties panels...Corners get changed the same way with the widget... feels the same.
But as long as I try to resize these, there is a clear difference — the one on the left gets the corners squished, the one on the left keeps them circular.The one on the right is secretly a live shape rectangle, and that’s why Ai keeps the corners tracked — but Ai doesn’t show it is! Transform panel doesn’t show Rectangle-specific controls, Object > Shape has both options disabled.
The one on the left is just a path — and Ai doesn’t try to keep corners undistorted for just paths.
This is not exactly the bug, but definitely a problem: Ai doesn’t allow to detect the difference via UI, doesn’t allow to convert a path to a shape when used as a type’s path or vise versa.
Thanks for the report!
