Despite some problems with brushes including bitmaps, they can bring some softness or realism. Here I use shadows converted to shapes to insert inner shadows to a brush.
The challenge is how to place the shadow in the right orientation inside the brush. The process used here implicates that no or only a few % orientation can be applied to the final version of the brush.
1 Draw the shapes you want to use in your brush; here I have drawn the popular Begonia Rex leaves, based on the technique I explain in the link below.
If you fill it with a bitmap it must be single tiled ;
2 create a brush with this shape, with no scaling and rotate around the path; the line width must be equal to the maximum height of your shapes. Then draw a curvy line with it;
3 convert the line to shape and ungroup (there must be less than 50 objects or 50 groups); align the shapes horizontally;
4 apply wall shadow. Now you see that despite their random orientation the shadow is applied only to below and right (if this is your choice);
5 resize the shapes to a very small height and convert them to editable shapes. The small height is because that will decrease the size of the individual bitmap created to simulate the shadow of each shape;
6 resize up to about one half of the size of the final brush you want to create now if you want to add some randomizing in it;
7 create your final brush; uncheck "tile fills" in Fill properties and "rotate along path" in Rotation. Now you see that your inner shadow is applied in the right direction!
Have a lot of fun with this technique!
ivan
Get the brush here
[This message was edited by ivan louette on December 17, 2001 at 10:19.]
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