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Alright, I downloaded hand drawn AI brushes from https://www.graphicsfuel.com/2019/07/30-hand-drawn-brushes-for-illustrator/ and having an issue w distortion on one of the pencil brushes -

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shorter paths scrunch up the texture. How can I fix this?

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  • The brush has been defined as an Art brush, which will stretch to fit whatever is drawn. What you probably want is a Pattern brush instead. Just create your own one.
    – Billy Kerr
    Jun 15, 2020 at 9:36

1 Answer 1

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Actually this is already said shortly in a comment, but here's some details how to convert an existing art brush to a pattern brush.

Draw a horizontal line (hold Shift for exact direction). Apply a good brush to it. Explode the result with Object > Expand Appearance and Ungroup. As well you can simply drag the brush to the artboard from the brushes collection.

Then make the ends equal for seamless continuity.Draw a couple of horizontal lines for height markers and split both ends by inserting vertical lines and applying Object > Path > Divide objects below. Edit with the direct selection tool the ends to the same height and be sure the ends have the same color.

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When both ends are equal drag the shape to the brushes collection and define it to be a Pattern Brush which is stretched to path length.

You avoid the length distortion if your brush shape is short enough when compared to the final path lengths. The brush shape is repeated as many times as needed. It's useful to have 2 length versions to avoid annoying limit cases. As well it's possible to apply the Scissors to a path to get more even brush appearance.

An example:

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1 is my pattern brush before dragging it to the brushes collection

2 and 3 are two different length paths which both got my new pattern brush. There's no distortion noticeable because both paths are longer than the brush shape. For occasional needs it's a good idea to make a 50% shorter version of the same brush. It's needed for shorter paths.

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  • Thank you - sorry, having a difficult time understanding exactly what you're doing here. I dragged the expanded art brush into brushes as a pattern brush, but that gives me the same distortion issue. Not understanding what you mean with the division etc
    – blue
    Jun 15, 2020 at 18:42
  • Both ends of a pattern brush must be straight and have same color. Straght edge can be got by removing a slice. One way to cut is to use a line, divide objects below and DEL. The distortio doesn't happen if the brush shape is not remarkable stretched nor squeezed. That needs shorter brush shape than the path length, often also 2 different versions of the same brush. to make repeated brush shapes to fit without substantial stretching nor squeezing.
    – user82991
    Jun 15, 2020 at 18:52

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