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How do you equally space these around the center in Illustrator please?

4 Answers 4

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You really can't in any easy, effective, manner. You'd have to measure between each element and use guides and manually position each object...

It would be quicker and easier to build a circle and the shapes from scratch and then color them as needed.

  1. Draw 2 circles - Object > Compound Shape > Make
  2. Draw a triangle with the primary point at the center of the circles.
  3. Effect > Distort & Transform & Transform with the triangle selected (note settings in animation below -- I counted your spaces which is why I use "17" in the effect).
  4. Object > Expand Appearance on triangles
  5. Select All - > Pathfinder Panel > Minus Front button
  6. Then color as desired. (May need to ungroup first Object > Ungroup)

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This way everything is equally spaced and aligned before you add color.

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  • Clearly I did something wrong because they are not uniform in size. The green is my attempt. It does look much better than my original one. Mar 31, 2017 at 3:02
  • I also included my happy accidents. : ) Mar 31, 2017 at 3:16
  • @ElizabethHart the point of your triangle isn't centered so when you apply the effect, there's a slight skew to the copies. The triangle needs the bottom point to be exactly equidistant from the other two points horizontally.
    – Scott
    Mar 31, 2017 at 4:43
  • Thank you. Scott. I will try another attempt tomorrow when I am more bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. : ) Mar 31, 2017 at 5:12
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Here's a method using a Pattern Brush.

  1. Create a single rectangular shape, fill with green and no stroke, then copy and paste in place a second rectangle, with no fill or stroke, then extended it a little to make a gap.
  2. Select both shapes and make a pattern brush, by clicking the tiny menu icon in the Brushes palette, click New Brush, choose "pattern" option.
  3. Then apply the pattern brush stroke you made to a circle. Change the stroke width in the Ellipse options bar along the top.
  4. Select the circle, then click Object > Expand Appearance, then Object > Ungroup several times until Ungroup is greyed out.
  5. Then you can select each shape, and fill with your desired colour.

Applying pattern brush to a circle

If you have a shape you don't want to be distorted, you can make a Scatter Brush instead, and set the "Rotation relative to path" option, and adjust the spacing.

Example of Scatter Brush

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Assuming that the pieces are given - zero edits to them, only the placing: Move them to the cusps of a star:

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Many pieces needed a little rotation, too.

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You could do it with a dashed stroke...

  • Draw a circle
  • Bump up the stroke weight to your desired width
  • Check "Dashed Line" and set the dash and gap to your liking

You could even color it with a gradient on the stroke (or just expand appearance and set fills on the resulting shapes if setting up the gradient is too much work)...

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