Adobe Illustrator CC 2018

Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 has entered the market with a wide range of enhancements and additions such as Variable Fonts, new Properties Panel, Puppet Warp, etc. Some major features updated and added in the new version are worth discussing to truly understand the strength of Adobe Illustrator CC 2018.

Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 – Review

Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 has also many other upgraded features and functions as well such as it now allows the users to select, align and distribute more than one artboard. Users with MacBook Pro will gain the benefit of the new Touch Bar. Likewise, users with Windows 10 will users will enjoy Microsoft Dial support. Finally, Illustrator now allows the users to join the paths that exist in various groups. All in all, Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 is a remarkably improved version and a lot more than the previous ones in performance and efficiency. You may like to visit the official website for a detailed feature discussion.

You may like to download Adobe Illustrator CC 2020.

Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 – Features

Fonts Alterations

Illustrator’s 2018 version is adorned with Variable Fonts that enable the users to make alterations to the selected font in terms of weight and width through simple sliders. Adobe has released Six variable fonts with this edition of illustrator and all 6 vary in characteristics. For instance, Source Sans can only alter the weight of the font while Minion can work on the optical size as well as weight. Acumin adjusts the width, weight, along with the slant.

Moreover, if a user doesn’t want to use sliders, then he or she can select the weight by scrolling through a lengthy list provided in the app. The color options for the fonts in the Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 are still few but one amazing thing is that users can build their own directly with the help of Fontself Maker.

Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 has initiated the support in this version for color fonts. Trajan and Apple Emoji ships are also introduced for the first time. The Trajan is comprised of various styles and textures. However, beginners will require some help in order to switch between them. The default gold color gives a great look, particularly with built-in beveled edges. Users can select one from numerous variants. For this users will first have to open the type panel to choose a variant of their choice from the Stylistic Sets’ submenu.

Styled library Text

Another noteworthy addition done in Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 is Styled library text which allows the users to style a text block with their choice of fonts, styles, colors, and weights. The entire block of text can then be saved in users’ CC library where users can use it with other files of illustrator and by InDesign as well.

Puppet Warp

One more feature that is a major addition in this version is Puppet Warp which was initially introduced in After Effects and Photoshop. Puppet Warp enables the users to place pins into the vector artwork. Users can pull these pins to different localities and can even rotate the artwork around the placed pins.

This tool has great utility for organic shapes including animals because it greatly smoothness and simplifies the task of changing a pose as users will not need to make selections of the complex anchor point. It can be conveniently said that Puppet Warp is one of the key assets of Adobe Illustrator CC 2018.

Properties Panel Enhancement

Adobe has enhanced the Properties Panel in this version of Illustrator. The concept of Properties Panel originally comes from Adobe Photoshop versions and offers context-sensitive info that varies according to the object type that is selected on the panel. When it comes to vector shapes, the Properties panel is reflected with options of stroke, fill, and opacity. Users can click on the respective thumbnails to make the changes. There is a Transform section as well to help users in scaling and rotating the objects easily.

Finally, the buttons on the Properties panel helps in flipping the objects on vertical and horizontal sides which is an addition made in high demand from users. A section is allotted to ‘Quick Actions’ which empowers the users to arrange and recolor objects and also to offset and join paths.

When a text object is selected, the panel changes to show the font, weight, size, kerning, and justification. When multiple objects are selected, the panel displays alignment and Pathfinder options. It can be said with surety that the Properties panel is indeed a major utility enhancement of this version that enables a well-arranged, simple to understand, and clean interface that focuses on only the information that users need for the selection that they have made.

Export Panel

Export Panel is revised in Adobe Illustrator CC 2019. This revised export panel enables the users to export the selected artwork in various formats such as JPG, PNG, SVG, etc. The behavior of this export panel is however changed because in this version if users will drag more than one object into the panel then a separate export asset will be created for each object. However, there might be occasions when users would want to divide the artwork into constituent parts for export purposes.

Luckily, there is a way to work around this option. If users will hold the keys Alt or Option when they are dragging then the Illustrator will revert to the original behavior in which it exports the entire selection as a single asset.

Adobe Illustrator CC 2018 – Technical Details