Illustrator question...

[dema]

I'm a newbie to Adobe Illustrator and I wanted to create a repeated pattern, with different characters positioned within each shape (a la the honeycomb picture from http://www.freewebs.com/snaaake/M2.htm). However I can't figure out how to crop the characters so it preserves the lines of the shape, nor can I figure out how to fill the shapes with particular colors. Since I'm doing the 30 day trial version I didn't want to go out any buy the books, and I've already spent all night playing around with it and reading up on things. I figured I could do it in Photoshop and then import the pre-cropped image, but it would be much more efficient to do it directly in Illustrator.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Rahzel]

I'll try to explain this without illustrations.

Make a honeycomb shape with the shape tool, place it on top of the image you want cropped (make sure the honeycomb is on top of the picture layer or it wont work. To bring it to the top layer press Ctrl + Shift + ]). Also, make sure the image is grouped together so the whole thing will be cropped instead of an arm or a leg ect. Then select both layers and press Ctrl + 7 to make a clipping mask. This will crop the image you have into whatever shape you put over it. To release the clipping mask select the object and hit Ctrl + Alt + 7.

Theres also a way of doing it with something called an Opacity Mask that has more advanced features but thats a bit more complicated.

[dema]

I'll try to explain this without illustrations.

Make a honeycomb shape with the shape tool, place it on top of the image you want cropped (make sure the honeycomb is on top of the picture layer or it wont work. To bring it to the top layer press Ctrl + Shift + ]). Also, make sure the image is grouped together so the whole thing will be cropped instead of an arm or a leg ect. Then select both layers and press Ctrl + 7 to make a clipping mask. This will crop the image you have into whatever shape you put over it. To release the clipping mask select the object and hit Ctrl + Alt + 7.

Theres also a way of doing it with something called an Opacity Mask that has more advanced features but thats a bit more complicated.

That's what I've started doing, after searching up on the subject for hours. It's kind of a pain because I'm going back and forth with pictures from Paint Shop Pro and Illustrator, but it does seem to do the kind of effects I'm looking for. It sure does take a while though. Illustrator is great but I wish there were some paint-type options so you could do it all in one program and save time.