Expert: Kevin Stohlmeyer - 4/23/2008

Question
I am going to trace a picture using layers and the pen tool, but when I try and move my cursor to the artboard, there is a pencil with a bar through it. It won't let me click on any other tools and I don't know how to turn this off.

In trying to do the background the other day, I made a gradient swatch with lots of different colors of a sunset. These hues are more vertical so of course I rotated it to horizontal to duplicate the horizon. The effect of this is that the color comes out in lots of broken up squares instead of one big square. Help!

Answer
Hi Marjorie,

The "do not" icon usually means you are either on a hidden layer or a locked layer that does not allow you to do that function. Try creating a blank layer and using the tools.

Gradients can be tricky. Usually the banding effect comes from two things - low resolution or too many colors transitioning in a small space. Try upping the resolution and recreate your gradient or reduce the number of colors in the gradient itself.

Thanks

Kevin