Create Outlines

[Dovilė30611071orfi]

Hi, so I downloaded Adobe Illustrator on a free trial and every time i do a text and try to click on create outlines (because i want to also blend in a picture into the text) it doesn't let me - it's greyed out, also the shortcut doesn't work, as well as the ungroup button

[Jacob Bugge]

Dovilė,

Just to make sure, is the live Type selected when you try?

In case you wish to have the letters filled with parts of an underlying image, there is no need to outline: you can just place the live Type on top of the image, select both, and hold Ctrl/Cmd and press 7 to make a clipping set/Clipping Mask.

[Ton Frederiks]

To add to Jacob's remark; use the pointer selection tool (V) instead of the text selection cursor.

[Monika Gause]

You do not need to outline text in order to use it as a clipping mask.

But if you do, afterwards ungroup the text and make a compound path instead.

Check all that in the Layers panel.