Nstocks said:
No it's ok, I have done it the proper way now. But what I mean was, when you use the pen tool you have to go over the left and right side of the road outline in order to fill the road. I was asking if you can make the pen tool have a ticker line so it's more like a brush and just draw straight down the middle of the road, which will fill the entire road, rather than having to draw both sides.
ah ha... just a moment
There's several ways to do it. The really nice way Chris Spooner does it in his tutorial.
The clunky way I sometimes do it or another way...
firstly just draw 1 path for the roads... and make the stroke thicker, no need to go round the roads twice.
Then you can do the proper chris spooner way (I'm so changing to that method) orrr the clunky way.
1. Change your base lines to a thicker stroke (I make main roads thicker than B roads, etc).
2. Then select all the roads and group them. (I usually have roads on 1 layer, buildings on another, place names on a nother.) Ctrl/ Cmd + V then Ctrl/Cmd + F this pastes the new roads ontop of the base lines. While they're still selected make the stroke another colour (any will do) and then make it smaller so it sites 'inside' the roads outlines.
Clunky way #2 Which is unnecessarily complicated.
1. Draw your lines, make the strokes thicker and select them all. Goto Object > Path > Outline Stroke.
2. Then go to Object > Path > Offset path and set it to a negative figure so it offsets inside the path
3. Then select with the (Direct Selection tool) the inside area and recolour it.
although in all honesty I prefer this method:
Creating Road Maps in Adobe Illustrator
and yes you can. If you organise your document, put the tracing image on the bottom layer and in the layer properties set it to Template so it dims the image and locks the layer. Then Press CTRL/CMD + Y so you can see the paths not the final image... this makes it waaaaaaay easier to deal with paths and points. Using the direct select tool (the white arrow) you can select individual points and edit, twist, move them as you see fit.
If you click and hold the pen tool icon some different versions of the pen tool appear if you need to switch a point from a corner to a smooth (Convert Anchor Point Tool) point you can do so by clicking on a bendy point or click and dragging on a corner point.