What is: Effect > Path > Outline Object & Outline Stroke for?

[Mathias17]

They've mystified me since I noticed them.

Lords of Illustrator, forgive your humble servant's blatant ignorance, but searches and experimentation have come up disinsightful (possible a new word) - what do you do with these?

(Right now, I'm making a focused effort to figure out everything I can do with live Appearance Panel effects - the more I know, the better I feel I set up artwork, non-destructively. It's great. Correct Answer will manifest happy dancing.)

[Mathias17]

(sweet, we can link Youtube's right in the posts, never tried it)

I'm sorry man . . . I'm still mystified here . . . I can't get Outline Stroke to work like the above-linked Illy 10 Style Demo.

I took her Distort > Roughen circle, with Outline Stroke applied so that the stroke becomes an outlined path and the subsequent Roughen affects it like it's been outlined and tried to duplicate the outcome from scratch, but I can't do it!

Doesn't work me . . . yet look at the Appearance Panel and compare - they're the same.

What is going on?

[emil_emil]

Is there a difference when you click on the eye in the Appearance panel to hide the Outline Stroke effect? If yes, it is working.

[Mathias17]

Hey, emil.

No, no difference. Tried that.

As you can see - my Roughen is affecting the path with no outlining taking place, it has a constant width, unlike Teri's stroked path.

[[[ FILE INCLUDED ]]]

This shouldn't be that hard . . .

[emil_emil]

Hmm, works fine here.

Try this, select your path and from the Appearance panel menu choose Clear Appearance. Then take the eyedropper tool, make sure it is set to copy appearance by double clicking the eye dropper in the tool box. Then while your path without any appearance is selected click on Teri's path to see if it will copy the effect. It may be helpful to turn the smart guided on to make it easier to click on the path with the eyedropper.

[Mathias17]

Yeah, I've always been able to copy her path's Appearance to any other path. That's actually how I've been getting the effect into my files since then.

Are you able to duplicate her results from scratch?

[emil_emil]

Yes, I can do it from scratch without a problem. The point of my suggestion was when you start from scratch, after you draw the path, first clear its appearance to make sure it is not inheriting something by default. And also create it on a brand new layer.

[tromboniator]

Mathias, I'm seeing the same problem (even after clearing the appearance), but can solve it by shifting the effects around the Appearance panel at what I think is random before putting them in their proper places. At least I have not yet determined which changes precede proper functioning. I got it to work on your "crappy" example by shifting both the outline and roughen effects a couple of times each, including applying them to the fill before shifting them back to the stroke. If there's any sense to it I haven't found it yet.

Peter

[Mathias17]

Wow . . . I still can't get it to work, even after shifting the effects around in the Appearance Panel for about a minute. No change. Very odd. I'm doomed to keep Teri's circle as a Graphic Style I'll have to apply to my own paths if I want the effect to work. What the heck.

No wonder I could never figure out what these effects did, in the past.

[Monika Gause]

Maybe you would like to post an example of what doesn't work.

But in addition to that: Teri's example is from Illustrator 10. There has been a change in the appearance panel in Illustrator CS4 which affects exactly the outline stroke and outline object effects. Stuff that has been possible until Illustrator CS3 is not any more:

http://www.vektorgarten.de/outline-object-and-stroke.html

[Mathias17]

Did you miss the file I linked above, with the big black and white image in the post? My curvy path should show what Teri's circle is doing, but doesn't.

Your link led me to here - http://tpettit.best.vwh.net/adobe/index.html

I looked at a bunch of the webpages and files she makes available there. You speak of there being fundamental changes to how Illustrator handles basic things - like Outline Stroke. Well here in Teri's Fill and Stroke Behavior for Compound Shapes she talks about some changes. So, while it's possible that the way Outline Stroke is handled has changed it seems odd that it still works as intended on Teri's circle even in my CS6.

[Monika Gause]

OK - sorry, I overlooked that.

Looks like it has changed again. You cannot operate freely with outline stroke like you used to.

[Wade_Zimmerman1]

I think Teri is responsible for developing the Appearance Panel.

[Mathias17]

My kinda lady!

[Anjika]

how do i download that file?

[Steve Werner]

That looks like it was on Teri's personal FTP server, which is no longer at that address. Perhaps someone else archived it.

[Monika Gause]

It moved to here: inside Adobe Illustrator index

[Kandl Studio]

Hi! I am trying to download the same file too! But it looks like I need to connect to a server (?).  

Test this file 'Fun with Transform Effects (AI CS)' it downloads fome! The styles one doesn't. Anyone has it to share please?

[Kurt Gold]

This question has been Answered.

Time to abscond then.

[JETalmage]

Applying Outline Path effect can also make text wrap work on an open path:

JET