Filling individual glyphs with a gradient

[DougKatz]

There used to be a trick for filling individual characters within a type object with a gradient (at least back in CS5, before my upgrade to CC2017):

1. Create a Point or Area text object, then select it with the selection tool

2. Apply Effect>Path>Outline Object

3. Select an individual glyph with the Type tool

4. Apply a gradient.

With this trick, you could fill each glyph in a string with different gradient colors, angles opacities and so forth. (This is different than adding a new fill to a type object and applying a gradient, which fills the entire object with a single gradient – across the characters.)

In CC2017, the same steps fill the highlighted glyph with a flat black, even though the Color and Gradient panels display a gradient fill. This is the case with GPU on or off.

Can anyone duplicate this? (And does anyone know of an alternative method for filling individual characters with gradients?)

Thanks.

[macpawel]

Select your text and use Apperance Panel (Shift+F6) then add new fill (box on the bottom part of this panel) and use gradient.

You can prepare any gradient you want and text remains as text

Pawel

[Ton Frederiks · Accepted solution]

I did not know about that trick, but it seems that the magic has gone.

I tried it in CS4 and it works, saved the file, opened it in CC but the gradients are invisible, just like you described it.

Maybe a feature request?

Illustrator Feature Request/Bug Report Form

[DougKatz]

Thanks for the timely confirmation, Ton. Over the years, your posts have taught me tricks that I can use. I taught you one that's obsolete! Not an even trade.

It's unfortunate to lose this capability. Not that I made glyph gradients a steady diet, but it was something that came in handy on rare occasion. And I can't think of an alternative that keeps the type live and doesn't require duplicate glyphs, precise alignments and easy editing. Oh well, with progress comes inescapable losses. To go forward, some things need to be left behind.

[Ton Frederiks]

Thank you for the compliments.

But I think that features/functions should be added, not lost. So maybe the bug report/feature request  will bring it back one day.

[DougKatz]

I will find that out!

And they may be compliments but also statements of fact.