Use artboards greyed out

[finlayg52844763]

Trying to save as, so all layers can be saved as individual files on my machine.

Using latest version of Adobe Illustrator.

The "Use artboards" option though is  greyed out. How do I enable it?

Using latest version of Windows 10 desktop machine.

[Monika Gause]

What do you want to do? Save all artboards to separate files?

It's in the second dialogbox

[finlayg52844763]

Yes, basically we want to save all of the assets/layers within a .ai file to my computer, ideally as .png files but not fussed on format. Can you outline step by step how we do that please?

I also don't have the option "export selection" showing either, which I understand is an option to do 1 by 1 for saving layers?

[Monika Gause]

If you need a PNG, then why use Save as AI?

Which version of Illustrator is this?

[finlayg52844763]

Using Adobe Creative Cloud, and are on latest version of Illustrator. 23.0.1 (64-bit)

My main goal is to extract all of the individual layers and save to my machine at speed. I have been given the .ai file by client and don't have the individual assets/layers/files on my machine. That's all I want to do. Quick Google suggests the "use artboards" checkbox is quickest way to get them all?

[finlayg52844763]

Perhaps the question should have been "How do you save all layers on local computer from a .ai file" ?

[Monika Gause]

Are they organized in layers? artboards? groups? Not at all?

Organizes in layers meaning that there is a main layer for every item.

[finlayg52844763]

Layers

[Ton Frederiks]

There are scripts that can do that.

Google: layers to files illustrator

[finlayg52844763]

Appreciate the reply, I don't want a script, I just want a quick way to save all of the layers. Why is the "Use artboards" option greyed out?

[Ton Frederiks]

A script is the quickest way.

[Doug A Roberts]

You seem to be conflating artboards and layers. 'Use artboards' doesn't have anything to do with layers. It's used for cropping documents to artboards in formats that don't use them (like EPS).

If you want to export each ​layer​ as a separate AI file, the simplest way to do that is via script.

[finlayg52844763]

Ok, noted. Why is "Export selection" not showing on right click of layer?

[Doug A Roberts]

That's a shortcut for the asset export panel, which doesn't have anything to do with layers. You could probably use it to collect layer contents for export, though.

[finlayg52844763]

Ok appreciate all replies. But ultimately am no further forward....... will ask client to supply the assets within the .ai file separately to us before they were uploaded into Illustrator...... Struggle to believe there is no way to export all layers to file path on local machine other than creating/running a script.

[Doug A Roberts]

Is there something that prevents you running a script? I've found this script very useful:

Export Illustrator Layers to SVG files | Thomas Byrne

[Ton Frederiks]

Ha, we are talking about the same script

[Ton Frederiks · Accepted solution]

finlayg52844763  wrote

Ok appreciate all replies. But ultimately am no further forward....... will ask client to supply the assets within the .ai file separately to us before they were uploaded into Illustrator...... Struggle to believe there is no way to export all layers to file path on local machine other than creating/running a script.

Of course you are further forward.

Scripts can do a million things that Illustrator cannot do out of the box.

This script will do what you want:

An Illustrator script for exporting layers and/or artboards into separate files (PNG8 / PNG24 / EPS ...

[Alex265197305uth]

I'm having the same issue. I'm trying to save many layers to separate AI files and if anyone knows why this is grayed out please do tell.

Please don't suggest any alternate solution workaround or anywhere else I could do this, I just want to know if anyone knows the reason this isn't working.  

[Monika Gause]

If there is only one artboard, then the option doesn't make any sense, so it's unavailable.

[Anshul_Saini]

Hi @Alex265197305uth,

Thanks for reaching out. As Monika said, if there is 1 Artboard, then this option will be disabled. Layers & artboards are two different things. One Artboard (i.e., the drawing area) can have many layers. This option will get enabled when there is more than one Artboard in a document.

However, you may try the suggestion on this community post to export layers to separate files.

I hope this clarifies!

Thanks,

Anshul Saini

[marymaru]

I'm having the same issue. When trying to save one artboard out of six as its own separate ai file and use 'save as' or 'save a copy' the option to 'use artboards' and then select a range of artboards is grayed out. This means I have to take the extra steps to create a new ai document and copy and paste everything from the one artboard I want to create a separate ai file for into that new document. Or proceed with 'save as' for a complete set of artboards in the new file and then delete the artboards I don't need. Please, Adobe team, could you make this work so that it's easier? 🙏🏼

[Monika Gause]

Please post feature request to https://illustrator.uservoice.com 

They don't read this here.

[marymaru]

Okay, just posted my request on uservoice. Thanks for the suggestion.

[Anshul_Saini]

Hi @marymaru,

We are sorry for the trouble. We are unable to replicate the same behavior at my end. Would you mind sharing the UserVoice link here? Also, would you mind sharing a couple of files along with a small recording demonstrating your workflow & depicting the issue? It would be really helpful for us.

Thanks,

Anshul Saini