Crop Photo

Very simply, in Illustrator, we can not crop photos.
But a free course would not be a free course, if it can not find a solution.

To crop a picture, we use the “Mask” option that you find in the options bar when the picture is selected.

When the button is clicked, blocks appear at the edge of the photo (1).

Clicking and dragging these blocks (2) will only show the picture that you want. Please note that clicking and dragging these blocks does not scale the picture, it only hides parts of the picture.

You can see this when you look at the outline mode.
Just click the “View” button in the menu bar and select “Outline” in the pop-up menu.

As you can see the whole picture is still available (1) in the document, but only the part that lies beneath the mask (2) is shown.

To show complete the picture again, double click in the “Preview” mode.

 

 

Another way “to cut” a picture is by means of a clipping mask.

The first thing you do is to draw a form, no matter what form.

As an example I have drawn an oval.

I’ve given it some color, but this may equally well be transparent, it does not matter. This is even better, you see what has been masked.

With the oval still selected, select the photo. Hold the Shift key on your keyboard pressed.

Then click the “Object” button in the menu bar, choose “Clipping Mask” in the drop-down menu and click “Make”.

At last, the reunited couple again:

You can modify the content of the mask at any time by double clicking the mask and moving or scaling the picture in the isolation mode.

If you want to remove the mask, click the “Object” button again in the menu bar, choose “Clipping Mask” in the drop-down menu and click “Release”.

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