Adobe Illustrater 10

[Shao Feng-Li]

I have this program but frankly I don't know how to use it. It's not like Photoshop... Any help here?

[shooraijin]

The long and short of it is that every stroke, line, text object, etc., you make is moveable and changeable. This is useful for vector art, although less useful for drawings and typical raster art. I use Illustrator mostly for maps and other heavily line oriented work, and for complex path tracing where Photoshop is unsuitable or cumbersome. However, I don't use it a great deal generally because Photoshop meets my needs in other ways.

What specifically is giving you trouble?

[inkhana]

Yeah, it's definitely not like PS. Not at all. Like Shoo said, it's very versatile in that very little you do is permanent. I hated it when I first started using it, but now everything is becoming second-nature. I use it for simple graphics where only cel-style shading is needed, and it works very nicely for that. What would you like to use it for?

http://www.sketchpad.net/illustrator.htm <---the site where I learned some of the fundamentals of using Illus. It seems complicated but it's really not, just takes patience. (In my case...lots of it..haha)

[Ashley]

The only thing Photoshop and Illustrator really have in common are some of the same terms and icons...other than that, yes it's a whole different ballpark. I took a semester of school with each program, so I'd be happy to help answer any specific questions you have too. ^^

[Shao Feng-Li]

For one thing, I can't seeem to be able to save things... like save things as JPEGs or use simple brushes. I have notice that PS pictures will open and still be in layers and everything but not the other way around.

[Ashley]

For one thing, I can't seeem to be able to save things... like save things as JPEGs

Go File > Export...>and in the window that pops up you should now see everything from AutoCad to Photoshop, including JPG.

use simple brushes.

You have to have the brush pallet up. Click Window and you should see a little check by it. To change brushes, click the button with the arrow in it, and you'll find a menu similiar to the photoshop one.

have notice that PS pictures will open and still be in layers and everything but not the other way around.

That's because Photoshop is raster-based; Illustrator is vector-based. So you can export into Illustrator much more efficiently than into photoshop. I recommend you do everything in Illustrator FIRST, and THEN go into Photoshop, or export your layers seperately.

[Shao Feng-Li]

You have to have the brush pallet up. Click Window and you should see a little check by it. To change brushes, click the button with the arrow in it, and you'll find a menu similiar to the photoshop one.

The problem is, I think I did have the pallet open...

I just havta mess with it for a few hours and visit that link Inky provided, methinks.