I want to take a shape, a circle or box for instance and make a brush stroke. Then I want to subtract that stroke from the shape. Can I do this? Same thing with text. Can I take a shape and subtract text out of the middle of it or something? Creatinga vecot cirlce or shape with a word "cut out" of it? Please please help. Thankyou.

everyone,

What happens if you select both and Pathfinder>Subtract from shape area?

If I select both, it transforms the brush stroke from cool looking artistic stroke to a straighter like box. It doesnt hold the orginal shape of the stroke. If I expand the stroke, that makes it worse, or if I flatten it same thing. If I rasterize the stroke it says, images, gradient meshes, graphs, placed objects, and text paths cannot be used as compound shape elements. PLease help!!!!!!!!!

Every:

The text over a closed shape (e.g. rectangle) should work fine with the Pathfinder Palette> Subtract from shape area. A brush is applied to a spine path that you draw (make sure it doesn't have a fill), so you will have to first Object> Expand Appearance, and then delete the original spine path (now an unstroked path) before applying Subtract from shape area.

steve

It can be done without first expanding the brush strokes. To give further instructions everyone would have to precisely explain how her brushes are constructed.

So what you are saying is that i first have the draw a path, then apply a brush stroke to it, then delete the original path? im not quite sure what you mean. im sorry.