Expert: Amy - 12/21/2004

Question
Last week you solved my isssue of how to blend shapes (small circles to big circles) but then distribute those shapes so that the EDGES (not centers) were equally spaced. Otherwise, the bigger circles start to overlap one another.

But now, I'd like to go the next step: I am able to blend a small oval to a big oval (blend)and able to merge that blend so it follows a path (replace spine) but THEN I would like to distribute the ovals so their spacing "makes sense" -- that is, each oval gets spaced from the next bigger oval relative to its size.

This Completes the illusion that a series of evenly spaced ovals are winding their way towards you.

FINALLY, I would ideally LOVE to have the option of changing the orientation of the individual ovals so that they follow the direction of the path.  

Answer
Well Scott,

Not a simple endeavor in Illustrator, I'm afraid. Perspective is a feature that AI just doesn't have. To create that effect, the space between each of your ovals would be calculated by a not-so-simple formula that Illustrator can't calculate automatically.

If you set up a perspective grid you should be able to place each oval in space so that it looks like it's coming toward you, simulating perspective. It's been awhile since I took drafting so here's a little generalized perspective grid tutorial I found:

http://www.counton.org/explorer/gridwarping/perspective.shtml

There's also a discussion about this topic on the Adobe forum. If you don't use this resource, now's a great time to sign up, it's free. Go to http://www.adobe.com/support/forums/main.html

Once you've registered, try this link:
http://www.adobeforums.com/cgi-bin/webx?13@2.oPDeddh5wvp.4786361@.3bb5db84/7

That should all be on one line, by the way.

If that doesn't get you there, search in the Illustrator (Macintosh) forum for a thread containing any of these terms "Problems spacing symbols along a path using a blend"

There's a repy from James Talmage that describes what you'll need to do to achieve the effect, but his sample object (a street lamp) doesn't rotate in space.

As far as the rotating, I'd first space everything where it needs to be, then use the rotate tool and rotate each oval on its center point.  If you wanted the oval to make one complete turn on its journey to the front, you could divide 360 by the number of steps you've got between ovals and rotate each shape by that amount.  You can click on the rotate tool, then ALT+click on the object's center point to enter the measurement you need.

If you search for artwork on the internet, you can see that achieving perfect perpective in Illustrator is no easy task. There are some galleries on there where people critique each others' artwork and you see a lot of "the perspective's not right."

Good luck Scott.
Amy