Stupid adobe illustrator problem

May 1, 2006 3:41 PM

Adobe illustrator newbie with a (probably very) stupid question.

Argh! What have I done?

I am trying to learn adobe illustrator (v10). So far I have made a line drawing (not sure if this is the correct term - it is a line with a series of anchor points).

Suddenly the anchor points have become invisible. If I use the "Direct Selection" tool and click on the path, the small blue squares representing the anchor points do not appear.

It appears that I am still selecting anchor points with the direct selection tool, because once I click on the path I can use the arrow keys to move the anchor point - the curve distorts as I would expect. But where have my anchor points gone? What can I do to see them again?

Suggestions for good Illustrator help resources would also be appreciated; clearly I need them.

posted by medusa to computers & internet (6 comments total)

Guessing...

Top Menu: "View > Show Edges" ?
posted by jca at 3:46 PM on May 1, 2006

(or "Show Bounding Box"?)
posted by jca at 3:47 PM on May 1, 2006

jca: thanks, that worked.

I could still use recommendations for good Illustrator learning resources. I have been reading the manual but have found it to be fairly opaque.
posted by medusa at 3:52 PM on May 1, 2006

The manual sucks. You can do all sorts of beautiful things in Illustrator but my manual only has like shitty butterflies with terrible gradients.
posted by Optimus Chyme at 3:57 PM on May 1, 2006

http://www.designertoday.com/Tutorials/Illustrator.aspx
http://www.sketchpad.net/illustrator.htm
http://northlite.50megs.com/illus/index.htm
http://www.techtutorials.info/drzadill.html

Here are a few. I can't say how good any of them are. I used the Classroom in a book to learn how to use it. I may have a few chapters in PDF form if you want.
posted by nimsey lou at 6:21 PM on May 1, 2006

I think the keyboard shortcut is CTRL+TAB -- easy to hit accidentally, but almost impossible to figure out why it doesn't look like it used to if you don't know what you did.
posted by misterbrandt at 8:47 AM on May 2, 2006