The Modern Hippy Male

What is Adobe Illustrator?
For those of you who may not be aware, Adobe Illustrator is a vector based drawing program that has been developed by Adobe.

What is a Vector Graphic?
Vector Graphics are defined on wikipedia.org as:
“Vector graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves, and shapes or polygon(s), which are all based on mathematical equations, to represent images in computer graphics.”

Adobe Illustrator is to Vector Graphics as Adobe Photoshop is to Raster Graphics.

What is a Raster, or Bitmap Graphic?
A Raster Graphic, or Bitmap Graphic, is one that uses individual pictures to define colors.

The best example can be seen here. On the right hand side of this page, at the time of this posting, is an image which briefly outlines the differences between the two, Vector Graphics from programs like Adobe Illustrator, and Raster or Bitmap Graphics from programs like Adobe Photoshop.

My Intention:
As you may be aware, I’m seeking my Associate in Technical Arts in Multimedia and Interactive Technology as a Web / Graphics Designer. One of my many requirements for this degree is a course on Adobe Illustrator. This quarter, I’m enrolled in this class and will be attempting (as long as the amount of work doesn’t prevent it) to share with you the lessons that I learn so that you may better grasp the Adobe Illustrator program. For your information, I will be using Adobe Illustrator CS3. This should be in many ways compatible with past, and even future versions of the program as only subtle features are tweaked between releases. I have no reason to believe that you would not be able to perform these lessons in Adobe Illustrator CS4.

If you are following along as I write these lessons, please be aware that I will edit each of the posts to include links to the other posts, but this will only be done after each of the other posts have been created and submitted.

If you have any questions or comments in regard to this tutorial, either now or in the future, please feel free to submit them and I will reply to the best of my ability.

Good luck, and have fun!