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Chapter 12. Using Filters and Effects

In This Chapter

• Applying effects

• Getting to know the Appearance panel

• Discovering graphic styles

• Making artwork 3D

• Playing with additional fills and strokes

Effects give you the opportunity to do jazzy things to your Illustrator objects, such as adding drop shadows and squiggling artwork. You can even use Photoshop filters right in Illustrator. In this chapter, you find out how to apply, save, and edit effects; this chapter also gives you a quick tour of the Appearance panel (your trusty sidekick when performing these tasks).

Working with Effects

If you're an Adobe Illustrator user from any version before CS4, you might be wondering ...where's the Filter menu? (If you're just starting to use Illustrator, you really don't need to know about, or even care about, this major change.) All the items that appeared in the Filter menu are now in the Effects menu.

Filters applied permanent changes to artwork, referred to as destructive changes, because after you save and close the file, you couldn't undo the results for the filter. On the other hand, an effect is connected dynamically to the object. Effects are very different in that you can apply, change, and even remove effects at any time with the Appearance panel (Window

Understanding the Appearance panel

You can apply multiple effects to one object and even copy the effects to multiple objects. This is when a ...