In need of very particular randomly scattered pattern fill

[Wrong Quintuplet]

Hello. I’m new to this Forum, but consider myself familiar with Illustrator.

I’m after a semi-random fill utilising variations of the same shape. I’m good with repeat patterns but this needs to be lacking in some of the consistency that would come with those. I’ve just discovered the scatter brush, which I believe is almost the solution, but not quite with my skillset.

I need a random pattern to spread far across two axes (as opposed to the Scatter brush’s following a one directional path). The objects in the pattern can only be slightly skewed, rotated, rescaled, must be within certain distances of each other without overlapping and need to vary between being in an almost (inconsistent) grid formation and also inconsistent bricks and random placements. I do not know how to accomplish this.

Here are the most favourable brush parameters I could find to partially achieve this:

I then need to apply a custom envelope distort and duplicate the efforts with a different  but similar object, with all the same placements. I need the duplicate so I can mask an underlayer that needs to give extra room for the original pattern. I do not know if it is possible to perfectly replicate the placement of something initially random.

Here is an example of the difference in base shape comparing both side by side, and one with the original layer on top. It will just be a slightly larger, simpler outline:

The much simpler pattern underlayer I’m masking I’d describe as: random blotches of organic looking vectoral noise, varying in length. I have some ideas on how to achieve this but I’d still love a suggestion.

These effects, I need to repeatedly do to the same pattern, so I can fill the random placement into several shapes. But I was hoping to find a (non manual) way so that the base shapes are not clipped apart within the external shapes and are rather completely deleted.

I’m guessing this is quite a complicated question, so thank you for reading.

[Mylenium]

Without using an elaborate script I can't think of anything.

Mylenium

[Wrong Quintuplet]

I'm guessing I'd have to be a lot smarter to accomplish that. I'm really keen on accomplishing most of something at least similar to this so I'm trying to see if I could come up with a different question to achieve the same result. The last two queries I can figure out on my own. I could probably find a work around for the masking random envelope myself if I plan ahead... but the main conundrum... Could I use several brushes in a way that'd keep them close but not overlapping? Is the best solution maybe to develop such a big repeat that you won't notice the seams?

[Monika Gause]

Can please show a sketch or a mockup of what you need?

At the moment I'm not even sure if you want to have just a row of things or if this needs to fill an area?

[Wrong Quintuplet]

Hoping this'll help:
For the main issue, I'm wanting something to the same affect but in such a wide scope that'd it'd be foolish to place one by one. It's hard to articulate what's in my head so I don't know how other's would interpret it.

[JETalmage]

Is this akin to what you are trying to do?

JET

[Mylenium]

Brushes have no self-collision detection, so this is not an option. I really think you need something like Jongware's circle fill scripts ([Ann] Design effect - image made of perfectly arranged circles ). It may be easy enough to modify for your purpose by substituting the circles with symbols and making it less random.

Mylenium

[Wrong Quintuplet]

That looks very promising. Thank you. I'll look into it and get back here.

[Monika Gause · Accepted solution]

You could also try the plugins Stipplism or ColliderScribe

[Wrong Quintuplet]

I've trialled these. My computers slowness didn't make it easy enough to get perfect but it's easily the best solution, so thank you very much. And thank you all for responding.