Expert: Amy - 1/25/2004

Question
Hi,
I've been using Adobe Illustrator now for about 6-7 years..
There is one little thing I havent been able to master at this
point. Actually, I did it once but dont remember exactly
how I accomplished it. Anyways, I was wondering if you
knew how to outline a stroke that was made with the
artistic brush (or any other brush library). If I go to outline
path, it change the brush stroke to a regular line path (no
pattern... Reason why I ask is because some of my printing
presses that I use do not have the same brush strokes and
can not print the stroke properly without it being outlined
(ex: txt into create outlines) Any suggestions?
I'm using AI 10 (MAC)

Answer
Hi Scott!

Short and sweet.

Select your brush stroked object
Then choose Object>Expand Appearance from the menu.

After that, you can ungroup the new path it from that original stroke, which will still appear as a line in the center.  Get rid of that stroke, and fill/stroke the new object as you would any outlined path.

Good luck, I hope this helped!
Amy Pace