Illustrator (Desktop) Feature Requests
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- Description
- Why is this valuable to you?
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No existing idea results
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4663 results found
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Locked files on SMB shares (macOS)
There is a weird file-locking problem when files are opened and saved from/to smb volumes mounted on macOS. If files are saved and closed there is still a locking on the files. So colegues are not able to delete/replace this files. There is no problem if the afp-protocol is used. For this reason we had to disable smb-sharing on our server, because macOS uses smb as default if available. (Illustrator 21.1.0 - but at least from version 19 on)
5 votesThank you for the information. i am moving this a feature request to support network drives.
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Dynamic link between Illustrator and After Effects
Please make it easier to make to have changes made to illustrator files reflected automatically in after effects instead of having to re-import.
5 votes -
Ability to customize menu bar commands (hide, as in Photoshop) and reorder
You've added all sorts of stuff to Ai menu that I don't use.
Let us remove Bridge, Stock icons, GPU from topmenu.I'd love to edit the left toolbar as well.
Thanks,
-e5 votes -
Brush Groups
I would like to be able to select several brushes in the Brush palette, then press a 'make brush group' button on the palette.
I would then be able to choose this brush group as if it were a brush. Drawing with this brush group would choose a different brush in the group at random for every new path I created.
I might have a 'brush group options' dialogue box wherein I could choose the relative frequencies of the different brushes in the group, switch it between random choice and cycling between brushes in order, give it a name, and... whatever other features seem to need to be in there once it starts taking shape, really.
Ideally, I would be able to have a brush in multiple groups. I would also be able to have brushes of different types in one group - if I wanted to mix an art brush with a scatter brush, for instance, I could.
And ideally, altering the brush group would alter existing paths drawn using the brush group. This might be a choice similar to how changing the settings of a brush that's in use asks if you want to apply the changes to all existing paths that use it.
I've been dabbling with a more 'natural media' look in Illustrator. For my purposes, art brushes seem to be working best, but I'll often start to notice the same repeated features of an art brush sticking out of my drawings. If I could make, say, ten "dry brush" brushes, and have Illustrator constantly swapping between them, this would make the illusion of real media a lot easier to keep up.
Similarly, I use a lot of scatter brushes for things like trees or grass. It would be useful to be able to have several different 'leaf' scatter brushes and just scribble in a few overlapping strokes that automatically pick between them.
I would also be able to create Graphic Styles that call for the use of a brush group on a stroke instead of a single brush.
I would like to be able to select several brushes in the Brush palette, then press a 'make brush group' button on the palette.
I would then be able to choose this brush group as if it were a brush. Drawing with this brush group would choose a different brush in the group at random for every new path I created.
I might have a 'brush group options' dialogue box wherein I could choose the relative frequencies of the different brushes in the group, switch it between random choice and cycling between brushes in order, give it a name, and...…
5 votes -
Layer freezing
When doing very complicated artwork, sometimes Illustrator's live preview starts to become impossibly slow. Distorted dense fill patterns, lots of art brushes full of translucent shapes, complicated high-res bitmap effects… I can do some stunning things with these but I’m reluctant to use them, because I need to have fast response time in my drawing tool.
Currently, layers can be locked, or unlocked. I would like to have a third mode: 'frozen', where the layer is locked, and a bitmap of the entire layer is cached. This bitmap is then used for rendering the preview, until such time as the layer is unfrozen.
I imagine this being invoked by shift- or control-clicking on the layer's visibility eye in the layers palette; the eye would be replaced by a snowflake or some other indication of it being 'frozen'.
Frozen bitmaps are not saved along with the rest of the file; they’re regenerated when you load it.
(This idea shamelessly swiped from the late lamented Expression, which let me play around with natural media effects at workable speed back around 2005.)
When doing very complicated artwork, sometimes Illustrator's live preview starts to become impossibly slow. Distorted dense fill patterns, lots of art brushes full of translucent shapes, complicated high-res bitmap effects… I can do some stunning things with these but I’m reluctant to use them, because I need to have fast response time in my drawing tool.
Currently, layers can be locked, or unlocked. I would like to have a third mode: 'frozen', where the layer is locked, and a bitmap of the entire layer is cached. This bitmap is then used for rendering the preview, until such time as the…
5 votes -
SQUARE blob brush would be great
The blob brush is a really great tool for an illustrator like me, but it would be so much more versatile if Illustrator would made available a SQUARE brush next to the round brush.
(CC Animate provides both round and square brushes and it is just great.)
It would allow us to easily draw by hand things with square angles like windows, buildings etc.
A square brush also makes it possible to draw in a woodcut style.
You would even make me happier if it would be possible to stretch and/or rotate the (both round and square) blob brush.Attached an example of a woodcut-style typography handwritten in CC Animate with a square brush (with pressure sensitive tablet pen).
Thank you!
The blob brush is a really great tool for an illustrator like me, but it would be so much more versatile if Illustrator would made available a SQUARE brush next to the round brush.
(CC Animate provides both round and square brushes and it is just great.)
It would allow us to easily draw by hand things with square angles like windows, buildings etc.
A square brush also makes it possible to draw in a woodcut style.
You would even make me happier if it would be possible to stretch and/or rotate the (both round and square) blob brush.Attached…
5 votes -
Select same fill colour selects text with same fill colour too. Tricky I know
When I hit select same colour and there is any live text box with multiple colours in it it does not select the text. Would be really handy if it did.
5 votes -
Allow the app to send projects to Sketch
If I want to outline a drawing in Illustrator Draw but color it in Photoshop Sketch, right now I have to save it to the creative cloud as PSD. There should be an option where I can open the full project in Sketch app, in both apps where in Photoshop Sketch I can choose to either import a project from Illustrator Draw, or while in Draw I can export a project to Photoshop Sketch.
5 votes -
Pinch to zoom for Illustrator while the free transform tool is active.
When I have something selected and I activate the Free transform tool, pinch to zoom no longer works, this is my primary method of navigation. This block forces me to go back to the selection tool and then zoom in and then return to the free transform tool then I had. I don't like that it's very inconvenient. I am on a laptop and have the latest version of Illustrator installed.
5 votes -
A lock for the current style (stroke weight, fill, color), but tool specific
When I need to adjust a filled object and then return to say, the pen tool. I first have to reset the color and stroke before I can go back to my line work. I would love it if there were simply a lock for this on the pallet so that while drawing I can lock it to a certain color, fill, and stroke weight/style. Perhaps a simple lock on the tool pallet under color. Gray out lock icon over color when I turn the pen tool back on would be a good indicator. So it is attached to that tool only, but easily unlocked when finished.
When I need to adjust a filled object and then return to say, the pen tool. I first have to reset the color and stroke before I can go back to my line work. I would love it if there were simply a lock for this on the pallet so that while drawing I can lock it to a certain color, fill, and stroke weight/style. Perhaps a simple lock on the tool pallet under color. Gray out lock icon over color when I turn the pen tool back on would be a good indicator. So it is attached to that…
5 votes -
Keyboard Bindings
I would appreciate being able to bind the ESC key to any shortcut I want, such as deselect. I use Full Screen with Menu Bar all the time and out of Photoshop habit, hit ESC to deselect. But every time, it boots me from full screen. I hate it.
Can you give us some love?
5 votes -
Change arrow cursor back to how it used to be.
I would VERY much like to be able to change the arrow cursor style back to how it was prior to the most recent update. I do not like the arrows no longer having a handle; perhaps I'm irrational, but it's really throwing me and disrupting my workflow.
5 votes -
Export quality for EMF or WMF
When exporting to emf or wmf formats to get editable vectors into PowerPoint the details in curves or small marks get all messed up. For example the details of a registered trade mark on a logo will be distorted or the curve of a letter o will become choppy. This is a huge issue for us and I'm hoping quality settings like the options provided for exporting and svg would fix the issue.
Thank You
5 votes -
Display 'Save' in those History steps which were followed by saving, as Photoshop does it
It can be hard to navigate History, and when we do, we often need to see specific points of it.
Save operations are important turning points, and seeing 'Save' added to those operations that happened right before saving happened works great... in Photoshop, but not in Illustrator. Please add these.4 votes -
Illustrator and Photoshop show fractional CMYK color values differently
I have a CMYK document, and it has a linked image in it, with an intentionally chosen profile, with some specific colors set for the background, and these have to be the part of the background, because of blending modes used.
Now I need to grab those colors form the clear parts of the background to quickly transfer them into vector part of the design. But when I try — Ai lies about values.Instead of
70-15-0-0
0-35-85-0
0-95-20-0
I get
69.8-14.9-0-0
0-34.9-85.1-0
0-94.9-20-0Not much, right? Just 0.2%, why are you mad?
But these would be enough to break Select Same Fill later, duplicate swatches if added next to existing ones in other documents, drop my trust level for the tool and force me cleaning this mess in the time I need I can’t spend. Sure, there are methods to help with this, but it’s not MY error. It’s Ai’s lie....later Ton Frederiks suggested it’s Photoshop that is rounding numbers.
To quote: if the placed file gets rasterized, it gives the fractions in Illustrator. But if the file gets exported from Illustrator as .tif, Photoshop will show the same rounded numbers it started with. Photoshop will not allow fractions and force round numbers when we try to enter percentages like 69,8%. CMYK values go from 0-100 while image values have a range from 0-255.Indeed, I tried to rasterize a rectangle with fractions in CMYK color (55.69) and opened the image in Photoshop — and got integers, 56...
But then I mix the very same color in Ps, making integers manually, fill half of the image with this new color and try to pick colors from this image in Ai: Ai still picks the original 55.69 from the original half of the image... and 56.08 from the half I flooded with Ps’s 56!
And Ps SEES them as different color when Color Picker is used, displaying different Lab, RGB, HSB values, but CMYK stays the same, rounded.In my experiment below I did a similar thing: created these in Ai first (but no fractions), rasterized it, used to make a composition and placed back into Ai.
Double conversion and forcing integers (visually) would explain it.So Ai is rather precise... but the irritation stays.
Now the question would be — what to do with the uncomfortable truth? 'Fighting ignorance' is my favorite choice, but...I don’t have a clear solution to this — and I invite others to a discussion — but perhaps the Eyedropper can get an option to Emulate Photoshop Eyedropper (round CMYK values)?
I have a CMYK document, and it has a linked image in it, with an intentionally chosen profile, with some specific colors set for the background, and these have to be the part of the background, because of blending modes used.
Now I need to grab those colors form the clear parts of the background to quickly transfer them into vector part of the design. But when I try — Ai lies about values.Instead of
70-15-0-0
0-35-85-0
0-95-20-0
I get
69.8-14.9-0-0
0-34.9-85.1-0
0-94.9-20-0Not much, right? Just 0.2%, why are you mad?
But these would be enough to break…4 votes -
Set Custom Scale based on artwork for Engineering Plans Measurements
I need to add measurements for lighting layouts, outlets, smoke detectors and fans on electric plans. The current measurement tool has a custom option but it's difficult to figure out the scale when it's 1:98 or 1:49. Trial and error gets frustrating and it's not always 100% correct.
**I need a way I could calibrate a custom scale like in CAD/Bluebeam. So, clicking two points and telling Illustrator that space between equals 4ft so it sets the scale for me. This would be more efficient. **
I know there are other programs I could do this in but I don't have access to them at my job. We use illustrator for mostly everything in my department.
I need to add measurements for lighting layouts, outlets, smoke detectors and fans on electric plans. The current measurement tool has a custom option but it's difficult to figure out the scale when it's 1:98 or 1:49. Trial and error gets frustrating and it's not always 100% correct.
**I need a way I could calibrate a custom scale like in CAD/Bluebeam. So, clicking two points and telling Illustrator that space between equals 4ft so it sets the scale for me. This would be more efficient. **
I know there are other programs I could do this in but I…
4 votes -
A key to reverse "object selection by path only" while using selection tools.
Mostly I like to work with this setting off but there are times when it would really be nice to turn it on by holding down a key while clicking in the middle of a path.
I don't know what key to suggest, command swaps selection for direct selection (and vice-versa), alt widens the selection of the direct selection tool and does nothing for selection, shift adds to/subtracts fom the selection. Maybe `?
4 votes -
Perpendicular Line Tool to Path
When I draw a line at any angle with the pen tool, I want to be able to draw a new line exactly perpendicular to that line. The name of the feature I want is "Perpendicular Line Tool". A tool that will ensure that the second line I draw is perpendicular to the first line when I draw a line in any direction, and will find and show me the 90 degree angle to each other. Please add, this should be a default feature in Adobe.
4 votes -
Share for Review - Ability for teams to update links
Currently in InDesign and Illustrator, the person that created a review link is the only one able to update the review link. There are times when another person on my team needs to update a file and send an updated review link, but to do so, they have to create a copy of the file and make a brand new link. This is a bit tedious and doesn't keep the history of comments, which we sometimes need to refer back to. I would like to suggest the ability to allow teams on Create Cloud to be able to work on the same files together and update the same review links.
Currently in InDesign and Illustrator, the person that created a review link is the only one able to update the review link. There are times when another person on my team needs to update a file and send an updated review link, but to do so, they have to create a copy of the file and make a brand new link. This is a bit tedious and doesn't keep the history of comments, which we sometimes need to refer back to. I would like to suggest the ability to allow teams on Create Cloud to be able to work on…
4 votes -
There is no documentation for the vector effects in the Effect menu. Write some, please.
There's three major sections to the Effect menu: Illustrator Effects, Photoshop Effects, and Additional Effects.
Additional Effects is the domain of plug-in effects, and properly documenting these is of course in the hands of whoever wrote the plug-in.
Photoshop Effects is full of bitmap effects. There's a page in the docs that runs down the whole list and describes every one of them with a sentence or three. Great! https://helpx.adobe.com/illustrator/using/summary-effects.html
Illustrator Effects, though? Some of it's documented. There's a page about the Scribble effect, which is also for some reason about the Object Mosaic menu item. There's a page about the Drop Shadow, Inner/Outer Glow, and Feather effect. But where's the rest? There's an entirely unrelated section about the new 3d effects halfway across the manual, and nothing about the "classic" ones and the reasons you might still choose to use them now. How do the SVG effects work? What are the various Pathfinder effects useful for? What on earth is Outline Object supposed to do?
Seriously I have been using this thing for 25 years and it is only today that I learnt what Outline Object is for because someone posted a question about this in the Illustrator subreddit; someone else posted a link to a video Monika Gause made explaining this and lemme tell you, I never would have stumbled across what it's useful for in a million years of using Illustrator normally.
I assume there was documentation for this once, but it's vanished in manual rewrites. I know other things that are completely undocumented now like "holding down the ` key while transforming shapes switches to transforming their fill patterns, as long as you're not using transformation tools written after this fact vanished from the manual like the Free Transform tool". So much knowledge of how this program works is now lore passed down from one artist to another and that's really kind of annoying. Please dig up all the old docs you can find, figure out what's gone missing, figure out what menu items and tools have no docs, and write some new ones.
There's three major sections to the Effect menu: Illustrator Effects, Photoshop Effects, and Additional Effects.
Additional Effects is the domain of plug-in effects, and properly documenting these is of course in the hands of whoever wrote the plug-in.
Photoshop Effects is full of bitmap effects. There's a page in the docs that runs down the whole list and describes every one of them with a sentence or three. Great! https://helpx.adobe.com/illustrator/using/summary-effects.html
Illustrator Effects, though? Some of it's documented. There's a page about the Scribble effect, which is also for some reason about the Object Mosaic menu item. There's a page about…
4 votes
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