This will ensure that your path looks fluid and is devoid of bumps. Since only you know which area of the Path you want to apply scale and weight too, you’ll be able to keep points to the minimum number. Directly using Pen tool for your design, will enable you to control the number of stroke points in the path.

It’ll give you a better workflow and show proficiency in your work ethic. This is a simple way to avoid unnecessary barriers and have better control over your design. When working with Width Tool, it’s always wiser to opt for either Pen tool or a Shape tool to make Path from the start. In either case, you can always go to Object> Live Paint > Expand, which will enable the Width Tool. It might also happen that the option to convert to basic is available but selecting it won’t make any difference. This might happen when there are a lot of paths selected to convert and might just allow you to change the width profile. In some cases, the option for converting the strokes to basic might not be available. Fair enough! No wonder why it’s widely used in custom hand lettering! 4. Since it’s meant for creating variants in paths, it doesn’t work in Brush and gets disabled. Width Tool is basically used to apply one own’s effect to the basic path, which might be a shape or even a text converted into a shape. When one knows the hows and whys of Width tool, it becomes apparent that the Brush tool and Width Tool, can’t work together. The idea is, you don’t need Brush tool when you have Width Tool and vice versa, which brings us to our next checkpoint. When you already click the Basic and then draw, the default calligraphy brush gets applied to your path, which is devoid of any variant effects. The Basic option in Brush Panel isn’t even a brush but rather means to remove brush strokes for the selected paths and convert it to just a standard path. When you first “ draw the path”, select the “Basic” option in Brush Panel (F5). While using the Brush tool in Illustrator, make sure to convert the Brush Definition to “Basic”. The standard stroke can be converted into any desired shape using Width Tool.

This helps a great deal with the main function of the Width Tool i.e. All the features designed for Width Tool can give best results when the stroke is centrally aligned. The primary reason for this is to optimize the functionality of the tool. This way you will find that the Width Tool is enabled now if it wasn’t working before in case the stroke was aligned other than centrally.

This gets avoided by default when the path is open. For aligning the stroke in the center, click the first option and you are good to go. Just beside ‘Fill Color’, click the underlined word ‘Stroke’ and you will find three options in Align Stroke. The feature is disabled when the stroke is aligned to “Inside” or “Outside”. One of the foremost step while making Paths which you are going to enhance further using Width Tool, is to make sure that the Stroke is aligned to the “Center”. Here’s the checklist to go through for maximizing the use of width tool in Adobe Illustrator: 1. Do remember that as this will help in getting your edits done quickly.īesides knowing the basic functions of the tool, there are many advanced uses for it and right ways of using the Width tool. To make things quick, Shift + W gets handy as a short key for Width Tool. While there is an array of tools available in Illustrator, width tool in Adobe Illustrator is one such hidden gem, which majority of design artists use in their tasks regularly.

Use of adobe illustrator