Expert: Kevin Stohlmeyer - 5/11/2011

Question
Dear Kevin,

I am using a Power PC G4, Mac OSX 10.4.11, 768MG RAM, 268GB Hard Drive. The applications I'm referring to are Adobe Illustrator 10 and Adobe Photoshop 7. This is regarding exporting from PS to AI.

I exported from PS to AI. The image was saved onto my desktop in an AI file. When I opened this AI file, the file was blank. All I saw were crop marks in 4 corners. There was no image.
Is there something I did incorrectly? What are the correct steps I need to follow, in order to successfully export from PS7 to AI10?

Details of my actions are as follows:

I opened a jpg file in PS with the color format RGB. I selected File-Export-Path to Illustrator. The export path box opened. Save As: AI file; Where: Desktop; Write: Documents Bound. I clicked Save. The exported file appeared on my desktop as an AI file. I opened this file and its color format was CMYK. The file was blank with 4 crop marks in 4 corners.

Thank you for your assistance,

Tracy

Answer
Hi Tracy,

The reason your AI file is blank is because exporting paths to Illustrator only exports out paths that you have created in Photoshop using the pen tool. It does not export out your raster artwork. If you created paths and are looking for them, they should be there but will not have a stroke or fill.

If you are looking to bring your image into AI you can import PS files into an Illustrator document via File>Place.

Thanks

Kevin