How do I save the art without the art board

[Dandelion222]

This is probably the biggest reason I so often turn to Photoshop instead of Illustrator. The whole artboard thing drives me crazy and I can never seem to do what i want. Right now I am working with my logo file. I need a version of it that is smaller and web friendly so I can add my logo to an online service. So i need a version that is only 150 pixels wide. No problem. I grab a corner and resize my logo - looks great except now it's a small logo in the corner of a large art board.

And I cannot figure out how to just save or export the art. It always saves the whole artboard with my small logo in the corner. I can't find any option or setting to just save or export or save for web for just the layer, i.e. just the art/logo.

So what I always end up doing at this point is opening a Photoshop file of the size I need, pasting in the art from Illustrator as pixels, then doing a 'save for web' to make it a jpg.

Surely there must be a way to save something from Illustrator at it's correct size ignoring the art board. If you know, please tell me!

[Larry G. Schneider]

Have you tried Object>Artboards>Fit to ArtworK?

[Dandelion222]

No I haven't because I never knew about or could find that option. So thank you for that! In this case, however, I do not really want to change the artboard size. My file is called "Logo for resizing". The idea is that I open the file, drag the corners to be whatever size I need for whatever I am doing at the moment (letterhead, setting up social, adding my logo to a footer or sidebar, etc.), then export the art and get on with my project. Is there no way to do that? Or do I always have to resize the artboard as a second step?

[Myra Ferguson · Accepted solution]

You could select your artwork and right-click on the context menu Export Selection... (or go to File > Export Selection.. It brings up a dialog where you can set the location where it should be saved, whether you want the location opened after exporting, the scale, a suffix that can be added to the end of the filename, the format, and any additional version at other another scale.

The Asset Export panel does basically the same thing through a panel.

[Dandelion222]

Thank you Myra, that's just what I was looking for! (And would have never found myself.)

[andreamaestri]

If you mean resize the canvas as you go by just dragging the corners you might be confusing with the artboard for photoshop, see more here: Use artboards in Adobe Photoshop In Illustrator isn't so straightforward, but almost similar, this article will help you to set up multiple artboards on Illustrator : How to set up multiple artboards in Illustrator

[Dandelion222]

Although not the solution to this specific issue, it's good to understand artboards in Illustrator better. Thank you andreamaestri.

[andreamaestri]

No problem, I was confused by your last post! Also, another way if you get bored to change size every time, using export for screen option will help you saving multiple size with just one art-board at the same time, Adobe Illustrator’s Export for Screens Saves You Time – Big Time | Creative Cloud blog by Adobe