Applying Grid System (Material Design) with guides.

[kaihin30]

So recently I was trying to bring the Design System into my graphic design workflow.

https://material.io/design/layout/responsive-layout-grid.html#grid-customization

The one thing which is different from the grid system before is that now the grid is no longer a line but a flat rectangle.

I was trying to represent the two sides of a rectangle with two guides. Yet I found it very hard to accurately adjust the distance of two guides in exact pixel amount,

Is there any efficient way to do this, let say I want to create a pair of guides with 8px width and then with 4px gutter?

I've tried the "create grid" and then "make guides" feature before like the video below did,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79YT26cj8Rc&ab_channel=CurtisPyke

But what I really want is that I can drag and drop the guide, and then adjust the distance with the exact pixel amount later on, which could give me more flexibility.

[kaihin30]

Hope this picture can better describe what I meant.

[Ton Frederiks · Accepted solution]

You can also use a rectangle and make that into a guide, it is easy later to adjust the height of the rectangle. But to change the position of single guidelines you can also the Illustrator do the work, just enter + or - befor the value you want to add. Like, if a guide is 60px from the top and you want it 80 px, enter 60px +20 in the Y coordinate field in the Transform panel.

[kaihin30]

Oh I never realised the guide can interact with the Transform panel!

[Ton Frederiks]

Yes, as long as they are unlocked (or on a dedicated layer that can be locked/unlocked).