Flattening Artwork???

[Maud46]

Hello again!
I just finished a project in Illustrator and Now I want to flatten my artwork.
The only problem when I flatten my work is that It doesn't keep the transperencies and blending modes of certain layers!
I havn't really investigated the problem yet, I just wanted to know if this is a quick fix?
How do I keep my transperencies and blending modes the same when I flatten my work?
any advice would be great!
Maud:)

[Scott Weichert]

Hello again!
I just finished a project in Illustrator and Now I want to flatten my artwork.
The only problem when I flatten my work is that It doesn't keep the transperencies and blending modes of certain layers!
I havn't really investigated the problem yet, I just wanted to know if this is a quick fix?
How do I keep my transperencies and blending modes the same when I flatten my work?
any advice would be great!
Maud:)

Hi Maud,

First, let me ask you, what is it you expect flattening to do? Why are you flattening the artwork?

Flattening is purposely used to remove transparency and blending modes in order to create a flat file format. That is the entire reason files are flattened. Perhaps you've got another goal in mind?

[Ratatoskr]

if you group the whole thing it will all move to one layer if that's what you wanted.

[Xoote]

thanks for the tip. I was wondering the same thing

[Maud46]

Um, I just thought flattening was the thing to do when you've finished a project, mainly to save space!
I guess I was wrong. What I did do was copy all to one layer and that seemd to work just fine. I don't no if it's normal but when I see all those layers in the layers pallette I just want to reduce to only a couple layers.
I'm not entirely sure why I concieved this notion in my head but, like I said," I thought it was the thing to do!"

Thanks,
till next time
Maud

[The Repro Kid]

Hello maud46. Layers in an Illustrator file are an organizational tool. They do not increase your file size, the way multiple layers in photoshop would do. They are merely a way of isolating objects in your stacking order.

Illustrator works with a stacking order of objects. the first object drawn is at the bottom of your stacking order and last object is at the top of the stacking order.

if you notice in the layers palette, there is a button that will expand individual layers to reveal each and every object in your stacking order of that particular layer. This can be very confusing to view and work with, but it can help select one single object when you have so many that it's hard to select things.

Adding layers is an organizational tool to help you manually isolate objects in your staking order, to make your drawing easier to work with, and make certain objects easier to select by allowing you to turn off other layers, either by locking them, or hiding them altogether.

Moving all your objects from multiple layers to one layer will not affect file size and only make it more difficult to organize the objects on your drawing.

Flattening an illustrator file is not the same as moving all objects to one single layer. That is what photoshop does, but not Ill. Flattening in Ill is done when exporting a file or saving as an EPS. the Ill flattening process Rasterizes transparent objects.