Hi helpers,
I'm trying to create the letter D in the following design:
I would like to curve one of my blue bars so it follows an arc or circle that I would use as a guide. Is this possible? I think it is in Adobe Illustrator. The envelope tool is difficult to use for this and I can't find an easy way to do it.
The blue bars are really just rectangles with filleted corners and thick outlines. When I'm done, I will make the top of the arc overlap the straight bar of the D letter, and the bottom will lay underneath, to replicate the effect in the letter A.
Thanks!
I found a way to do it, but it's a lot of work. I'm sure there's a better way.
I used two circles to create a donut with about the same thickness and outlines as the blue bars, which I cut in half with a rectangle (using the Trim tool):
Then I added two circles about the same thickness again to create the rounded tips, which I welded (Weld tool) with the arc:
Then I placed the arc in position overlapping the straight D bar. Once there, I duplicated the straight bar and made it small enough to get out of the way of the top of the arc, making sure outlines don't scale:
Then I used the Back Minus Front tool to create the overlapping:
There has to be a way to bend rectangles easily!
One approach would be to work with an arc - an "open" Ellipse - with outline width to match your other letters, and with round end caps.
After tweaking it to the shape you want, you can then use "Convert Outline to Object" to create a filled object. Then, copy the Fill and Outline characteristics from one of the existing letters.
as suggested
You don't even need to "convert to curves". An ellipse can be a "pie" or an "arc"; by dragging with the Shape tool.
Oh yeah, forgot about that!
As is so often the case, there are multiple ways to approach that.
Sometimes it's faster to do a five-click operation quickly (because you know all the moves by heart) than it is to do a three-click operation that feels clumsy because it's something you don't do very often.
I use the Shape tool to edit an ellipse, like, once in a blue moon!