Glyphs in Illustrator tutorial

glyphs in illustrator and how to tutorial

How to use the glyphs in Illustrator for instant access to all the designs in a typeface

window menu in Illustrator
type category
glyphs (to see Illustrator glyphs panel)
select the font to be examined
select show such as entire font
type tool
click artboard
select one of the glyphs by double clicking

How to use glyphs in Illustrator CC etc. The key panel is the window menu and type and glyphs. You can see all the characters in the selected font (or any font you select from the bottom of the glyphs panel). You can also see alternates, superscripts etc depending on the font. The glyph panel makes it super easy to access and see all the designs in a font. To use the glyph panel, you must have created some type or at least clicked on the artboard with the type tool. You can double click the glyph to add the character to the type selection in Illustrator. You can also select type and replace the current selected characters with any glyph double clicked in the Illustrator glyphs panel. You can change the font as well as the font style via the same panel. This tutorial shows you how to quickly use the glyphs panel to change and add characters to any type (point or area or type on a path etc)

Basics of the glyphs panel in Illustrator and accessing decorative designs etc in a font

fonts and type tool in Illustrator panel glyphs

Select type tool and apply to current artboard
Go to the glyph panel
Double click character in glyph panel
Repeat with other characters (probably a very slow way to type a letter though)

The glyph panel is a useful feature to quickly access all the characters in a font without the need for any special characters / codes / decorative designs etc.

Select the type tool
type some characters
select the type.
Go to the glyph panel.
You can change the font and font style.
You can double click the glyph and that will change the current selected character or characters to the new glyph.
You can also double click the Illustrator glyphs (without something selected) and that will generate other characters in the current type selection

Glyphs panel and special features such as alternates, changing size of the glyph etc

You can show the entire font as well as alternates for the current selection and many more (depends on the font). You can also increase the size of the glyph display by clicking the zoom out and zoom in at the bottom of the glyph panel. You can also change the font for the current selected characters as well as setting the font for any subsequent characters

type tool
add some characters in the current font to point or area type or type on a path etc
select that
go to the glyph panel
change the font from the current font to a new font
change the font style if one exists

If you select something like Myriad Pro then you can show

alternates for current selection
entire font
numerators
case-sensitive forms
lining figures
stylistic alternates
superscript
slashed zero and many others

Change selected type using glyph panel

type tool in Illustrator toolbar
Create some type (point or area etc)
Select some characters
go to the glyphs panel
select the font
double click the character to replace the selected

That is a very quick and easy way of changing designs in any selected type. It makes it a whole lot easier to use the fonts / typeface sets from graphicxtras. The graphicxtras sets all contain a PDF showing the keyboard and decorative design relationship and that can be printed out and used as a reference but it is a whole lot easier to use the glyph panel in Illustrator to access the designs and change the curret selected artwork with another unique artwork.

You can find all our font sets via the artworks link above (the font sets include the artworks in TTF format as well as EPS) and there are often many characters that cannot be accessed easily (without some obscure codes to access them) and the glyph panel makes it so easy to select the many 'hidden' designs in the fonts. Of course, not all fonts have this.

Add type via the glyph panel to the current type in Illustrator

click the artboard with the type tool (or create area type etc)
go to the glyphs panel in Illustrator
select the font
select the font style
double click to add a glyph / character to the type
repeat double click to add more characters etc

Sources and references

1) Glyphs in Illustrator on Adobe.com

2) Creating type in Illustrator on Adobe.com