for today's video i've stumbled across something really quite special
and i found a plug-in for illustrator that can do so many different things to
text and also objects now we are going to discover its uses
and its function but also we have to ask the question
is it actually worth it now it's great being able to show people how a design
looks but even more impressive if they can
actually experience it too and this leads to them understanding how it's
going to behave and so learn more about framer later in
today's video and how to show off your designs
we are going to get to the price later as well as the possible free version
but let's first learn about the plugin because you don't want to miss
how to actually use it so once you've downloaded the plugin
you have to actually copy the relevant folder and then paste into adobe
illustrator's plugin folder found here so once you start up illustrator there
are two main locations this plugin can be found firstly there is the window
panel and this is where you're going to find
most of the action there are also things to be found in the effects
menu too we're going to look at these later
but first let's head over to the window menu
and i'm not going to show you every single thing in this menu today because
it's going to take too long but let's firstly take a look
at the 3d path because that's got quite a lot to offer
so i have this neat little panel that shows up
and each panel with this plugin does have some guidance
found in the bottom left corner here however
i did find that clicking this and reading the manual sometimes did crash
illustrator so that is something to be aware of
we can also collapse the panel for better organization and that's always
nice to have so the first action for this plugin
allows you to distort things in a three-dimensional way in adobe
illustrator now my text hasn't been outlined by the
way but watch as i transform the shape of a torus with my text
and the torus is just that classic donut shape by the way
with the live update box checked we can edit things in real time
which is something pretty powerful we can even distort the perspective of
the design like so
also notice the rotate tool found here this helps us maneuver the design in
real time and look how neat that is but yeah remember that i did say the
text hasn't been outlined and so we should be able to edit the
lettering itself right yes we certainly can and it's a
great upshot found across this entire plugin
so as you can see i'm actually removing parts of my text and then i'm going to
add some others as well everything is happening in real time
let's take a quick look at some other 3d options
such as the cylinder here
much like with the torus we saw earlier we can edit things in real time
and make a great use of that rotate tool
the twist option is pretty cool too and i am still amazed that
we can actually continue to make alterations to the wording of our
designs at any moment throughout the process
there are many options in this 3d live menu
we are going to be here for most of the day if i look at all of these
so instead let's move on to the next section in today's video
in this menu again we have many options within
options but let's take a look at the reflection
option here now these plugins often work with both
text and also objects and i can make great use of the reflection
on text so this is going to allow me to make reflections vertically
and also horizontally and yes you can head back in and change your text at any
stage
the live tale creates some nice designs in relation to the settings you choose
and you work with inside the panel
i really cannot get enough of these live edits
what do you guys think about them now if you click
the expand function you will turn every single part of your design
into an actual vector shape for this next one is something i've
wanted for the longest time and if you are aware of the pattern
brushes in illustrator this might appeal to you as well now we
can take a design or an object and we can make a border with a square
or in a rectangular fashion
we do have access to the adjustment settings in the panel and so obviously
we can tailor the design to our needs like i said there are a lot of different
options in this window alone and you can have a nice time you know
looking around and experimenting for yourself
the last two i'm quickly going to show and these are the live generation
and also the life circle both will offer some interesting and some quick
edits in adobe illustrator
so let's take a look at the second half of today's plugin and you can find that
under the effects menu now we do have four different
options and i have tried the fractal function
but it was quite buggy so i'm just going to leave it
alone for today's video the lens option offers up some really
neat distortions to text and also to shapes
the fish eye is kind of bulged within the mask area
and we can move it around in a live function if you check the preview box
so that's the fisheye the next one is essentially something acts like a
magnifying glass and yes it does work in real time as
well
the final one twists and twirls the contents within the mast
area and this might be something that you want to experiment with or even use
for your design
the final two options are warp and wave effects
you can find some of these built into illustrator already
but we don't actually have this nice accessible panel unless we have this
plugin so how much is this plugin going to set
you back now you can get a free trial for 15 days
or 30 illustrator restarts but the price to actually purchase the
filterit5 plug-in when recording this video is 129
and remember i am not sponsored by filtering 5
but is it worth it now money is relative and to some people 130
dollars might be something like one month's wages
and to other people that might just be pocket change and i personally can
afford it but i feel it is a tiny bit expensive i
did notice a few issues and bugs so if they were cleaned up and addressed
maybe i would consider the price fair i'm not quite sure now interactive
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that link is down in the description box below so do give it a try if
you are a web or app developer but yeah if you want to watch another video
with a free plugin in illustrator click the video on screen
and until next time guys design the future today peace
you