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steven lees50590297
steven lees50590297
Known Participant
June 25, 2021
Answered

Pen tip shortcuts

  • June 25, 2021
  • 3 replies
  • 2825 views

Ancient history:
Pen tip short cuts had been clustered in the lower left hand corner of the keyboard, combinations of command, option, control, shift, z, and x. Very very easy.

Drawing with a tablet was fast. The keyboard hand could rest in one position using muscle memory to change pen tip function. The drawing process was not interrrupted and attention did not have to shift away from the work.

They changed the keyboard commands moving from V6 to V7, scattering the short cuts all over the place. Howls of protest brought a quick update to restore the commands to their original positions.

Somewhere between CS5 and CS 6 they did it again. But this time, no one seemed to care?

Now in CC 2021 the pen tip controls sometimes require moving your keyboard hand all the way across the keyboard to p, - , or + and looking down at the keyboard as you move your hand. Or also moving the mouse or tablet hand to select a different tool from the tool bar. This creates an annoying break in work flow attention that happens several times a minute. Kind of a prgrammatocal water torture.

To add crazy-making to annoying, shortcuts change depending on what mode you are in! No matter, no one, single mode allows all of the changes!!!!! In one mode, an awkward control-shift-C contortion is required to access just one tool, the all important bezier control carrot.

IIllustrator allows customization of keyboard shortcuts but will NOT accept all of the necessary chnges. Once again, in any solution I can find, the drawing process must be interrrupted to focus on moving the cursor off the drawing and over to the tool bar or moving a hand over to the other side of the keyboard or you are forced to squinch your left hand into uncomfortable contorsions.

Is there a way to restore complete control of pen tip functions with a small cluster of key commands as it was originally in earlier versions of the program?

This topic has been closed for replies.
Correct answer Ton Frederiks

15 years is not the beginning of time. They will pass for you faster than you think.

Setting the age prejudice aside, which I know you didn't mean:

In drawing with a wacom tablet.

Anchor the keyboard-hand, palm on desktop, fingers hovering over the lower corner of the keyboard.

Draw a bezier line with the stylus-hand on tablet.

Cycle through all pen tip modification short cuts with tablet hand, without looking at the keyboard, and without lifting your hand to access another location of the keyboard, or straining your fingers to reach keys, or without using your stylus hand to select a tool change. The stylus (or mouse, or touch pad hand should do nothing but draw, select, edit, and click points.)
You casn't do it. You haven't been able to do that for a while. 15 years.

Currently, in drawing with the pen tool (P) selected you can access the point tool (Option) or the add point tool (command option) but you can not access the delete point tool. A curious ommission making sense only in some crazy programming world. You CAN get there but you must access that tool by disengaging from your art in one of two ways, both requiring a redirection of attention and or physical movement.

All other CC pen modes behave in this manner, allowing some but not all modifications without a break in drawing flow.

Am I making this clear?

I am coming to understand those not having drawn with pre-CS issues may not know how much faster (and more fun) drawing was.

To me drawing with Illo CC2021 is like digging a trench with a teaspoon and getting laughed at when you ask co-workers "Where are the picks and shovels?"


If you uncheck: Disable Auto Add/Delete in your Preferences, you don't need any shortcuts for adding or deleting points.

Direct Selection tool: Cmd

Select the whole object: Cmd Alt

Anchor Point tool to switch curves/corners: Alt

All modifiers in the same left hand corner.

3 replies

Ton Frederiks
Community Expert
Ton FrederiksCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 25, 2021

Steven, what you are wishing for is to put the shortcuts back to those in Illustrator 6, when Illustrator had many different shortcuts compared to Photoshop.

Andrei Herasimchuk, the lead interface designer at Adobe at that time changed the ui and the shortcuts for Illustrator 7.0 in 1997 and Photoshop in 1996 to make it easier to work with those programs together.

I am still glad he did it, you have to learn one set of shortcuts for the pen tool and use them in both applications.

 

steven lees50590297
steven lees50590297Author
Known Participant
June 25, 2021

YES!!! And the user community howled in complaint. You may remember? Adobe put them back, and left them until some point in CS. Then changed them again.

I don't mind the change. I can relearn. The current set is not ergonomic, it's slower and more combersome. Not to need to move the keyboard hand around nor shift your attention back and forth between drawing and input device is better. Don't you think?

You have given me some detail about who and why, thank you.

HOW to make it possible to draw fluidly, with as little physical keyboard hand repositioning as possible, or NO repositioning is the question!

Can I get that old keyboard set back or is there a CC equivalent? Its about Ergonomic efficiency.

Ton Frederiks
Community Expert
Ton FrederiksCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 25, 2021

I remember that time very well.

I had to demo version 7 during the launch in Germany in a big planetarium like movie theatre.

Studied hard on the new shortcuts, checked the computer the night before.

During the session the next day I found out that they switched the keyboard to a German one.

When that was fixed, they turned off all the lights when I started to demo 😞

All that was not very helpful when showing new learned shortcuts. (They got me a table lamp).

 

I am afraid you are a little too late with your request (and I don't have a workaround for you).

Simmer1
Community Expert
Simmer1Community Expert
Community Expert
June 25, 2021

Hey,

 

I see what you mean. 

 

I think you might benefit from customizing your keyboard shortcuts:

Edit> Keyboard Shortcuts

 

Let us know if that helps.

 

Sim

Ton Frederiks
Community Expert
Ton FrederiksCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 25, 2021

What is different?, the same as in the oldest version I can check CS4

Monika Gause
Community Expert
Monika GauseCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 25, 2021

Can you please give some exact step by step instructions of what you are referring to?

The modifiers for the pen tool functions have not changed in ...  ages?

steven lees50590297
steven lees50590297Author
Known Participant
June 25, 2021

Thank you,

The first paragraph explains the history.

Yes it has been "ages" Pre CS.

A colleague pointed out a generation difference, CS and CC users may not know how easy the pen tool was to modify on the fly in earlier versions. Most current users never drew with Adobe Illustrator 6.

I've been asking Adobe for solutions, the closest thing to an answer is the one posted by Simmert but it does not allow certain changes.

Adobe decided to reassign one of the commands to some other program function. As I wrote, they did this back in the 90s, the community screamed bloody murder then and Adobe put it back. But at some point in transition to CS pre-CC, they changed it again.

If you know how to draw, cycling through all pen tip modifications, without moving your keyboard hand, from a rest position and without taking your mouse or stylus hand away from the drawing line, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE MAKE A VIDEO AND POST TO YOUTUBE!

Monika Gause
Community Expert
Monika GauseCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 25, 2021

Please describe the workflow you cannot do.

If you've been using Illustrator since the beginning of time you should know all those modifier keys so I'm really not sure what is not possible for you.

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