Shorthand Typography Glossy Effect using Appearance and Graphic Style

Are you repeating an effect over and over again while creating different text types?

Today is your lucky day for visiting my blog. I will teach you the step by step tutorial in creating a reusable effect / dynamic effect.

At the end of this tutorial you should:

• Learn the importance of Appearance Panel
• Learn about Graphic Style
• Apply Graphic Style to "Text Types" or "Paths"

Let's Start!

Step 1: Open your adobe illustrator program and create a new document with the size 330 x 250 pixels (you should know this by now)

Step 2: Create a "Text Type" by using the Type Tool (or by pressing "T" in your keyboard) with your preferred text and Create Outlines from it.

Step 3: Make Compund Shape (using pathfinder panel options) then "Expand" (also in pathfinder)

FROM HEREON AND TO MY NEXT POSTS LET US US M.E. for Make Compound Shape and Expand since we will be using it often.

Step 4: "Add New Fill" using our Appearance Panel (Be sure that the object/path is currently selected). Check if the fill is added.

 Note: the stack of the Fill, Stroke, Effects, etc., are not in random order. It shows how the object will display the effect based on their stacking order.

Step 5: Now, with the "New Fill" Selected, Fill it with Gradient using our Gradient Panel.

Gradient Details (From Left to Right)

Gradient Type: Linear;

Gradient Angle: 90 deg;

• 1st Gradient Slider: Opacity: 0; Location 0; Color: White;
• 2nd Gradient Slider: Opacity: 0; Location 50%; Color: White;
• 3rd Gradient Slider: Opacity: 100%; Location 50%; Color: White;
• 4th Gradient Slider: Opacity 100%; Location 100%; Color: Rich Black;

Change the slider direction by Clicking/Selecting the Gradient Slider, then fill in the Location value and press "Enter"

The outlined text should now be look like this

Step: 6: Modify Transparency type as "Screen" and Transparency Opacity as 40% (or as needed)

Step 7: Be sure that the object where you are applying the effect is selected. Change the color of another Fill effect in Appearance Panel (I changed it to "Blue")

Step 8: Put the Stroke effect at the top of the Stack by Dragging it up

Step 9: Add Color and Stroke Weight to your Stroke as shown below:

CONGRATULATIONS!! You just created a dynamic effect to your object/path!

Step 10: For much more dazzling effect apply the options shown below:

CREATING APPEARANCE EFFECT AS GRAPHIC STYLE:

Step 1: Be sure that the object/path that was applied with effect is selected; Now go to your Graphic Style Panel and Click "New Graphic Style" (This copies the effects that we have added in appearance panel and save it as a Graphic Style Item and use this to apply the Appearance that we have done. This way we do not need to repeat the steps we have done in adding Fills, Strokes, etc. in Appearance Panel).

Notice that a new Graphic Style item was added.

Step 2: Now let us try creating new text type named "This" and apply a Graphic Style that we have previously saved.

Step 3: After applying the effect you can then make changes to the text if you need to and the style effect is dynamic (meaning you do not need to repeat the steps that we have done to create the effect).

Bonus Tip: for Color Changing you just need to change the color of the Appearance items that we have added to a new color/gradient color and add it as New Graphic Style item so that you do not need to do this over and over again for the same color.

Most of the time you need to change the Stroke weight based on the size of the object/shape/path.

Follow the images show for different glossy effect.

Note: to apply an effect to different paths, you should select the paths and do a M.E. (Make Compound Shape and Expand);

Thank you so much for visiting my Blog. I Hope this helps you a lot and saves you more time in the future. Please do not forget to make comments/suggestions for the future improvement of this tutorial. Also you can follow me on twitter @iamkimwan for random updates :D.