Adobe Illustrator is a famous graphic manipulation program available for both Windows and Mac. This program allows you to create 3D logos, multilevel images, prints and web documents. While similar to Adobe photoshop, Illustrator is known for its ability to create typography and logos. You can add outlines, colors and textures to objects to give them a more distinct look. Many textures are available on the Internet and, using simple tools, you can add them to your documents. In this article we will see how to add texture in Adobe Illustrator.
Steps
Step 1. Download a texture from the Internet
There are many free textures on the Internet, which can be found by simply searching for “texture illustrator”. The most frequently used textures are those similar to wood, mosaics, patchwork, colored glass, crimping (similar to "patina" or "plastic"). Choose a light colored texture and save it to your computer.
Step 2. Open Adobe Illustrator
Step 3. Open an existing document or create a new print or web document
Step 4. Select the object you want to add a texture to
Step 5. If you want to assign the texture to more than one object, group them all
Select the objects you want to group. Click on the Object menu in the horizontal toolbar and click on "Group".
Step 6. Click on the Window menu in the top horizontal bar
Select "Transparency" from the drop-down menu. A paddle should appear on the right. You should also see a drop-down menu for gradient and opacity.
Step 7. Select the drop-down menu to the right of the "Opacity" box
Click on "Show thumbnails".
Step 8. Double click on the gray space next to the thumbnail of the object that appears
This will create an opacity mask. The object may turn black because the opacity is set to maximum by default.
Step 9. Select the black box
Select the "File" drop-down menu on the horizontal bar at the top.
Step 10. Scroll down and select “Place”
A window will appear from which you can select the file you downloaded from the Internet. An image will appear in the black thumbnail.
A large, matte texture will appear at the top of the page. You will not see the image but a red box with guidelines that allow you to move the texture on the page. The texture of the main image will change as you move the texture image
Step 11. Experiment by moving the texture until the image or logo appears as you wish
Step 12. Click on the thumbnail of the image again when done
You will go back to the image files and you can make changes to the other layers.
Step 13. Save the file to complete the texture changes
You can repeat these operations with different objects and textures.
