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Draw and edit flares

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    1. Drawing
      1. Drawing basics
      2. Edit paths
      3. Draw pixel-perfect art
      4. Draw with the Pen, Curvature, or Pencil tool
      5. Draw simple lines and shapes
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      7. Draw and edit flares
      8. Trace images
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      10. Symbolism tools and symbol sets
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      12. Design a flower in 5 easy steps
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      1. Creative Cloud Libraries in Illustrator
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  8. Printing
    1. Prepare for printing
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  9. Automate tasks
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  10. Troubleshooting 
    1. Fixed issues
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    3. Crash issues
    4. Recover files after crash
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    15. Share crash report with Adobe
    16. Improve Illustrator performance

Learn how to create stunning light effects and add a touch of brilliance to your artwork.

The Flare tool creates flare objects with a bright center, a halo, and rays and rings, producing an effect similar to a lens flare in a photograph.

Flares include a center handle and an end handle. Use the handles to position the flare and its rings. The center handle is in the bright center of the flare—the flare path begins from this point.

Components of a flare
Use the Flare tool to add flares to your artwork.

A. Center B. End handle C. Rays (shown black for clarity) D. Halo E. Rings 

Create a flare

  1. Select the Flare   tool.

  2. Drag on the canvas to set the size of the center and halo and rotate the rays. Before releasing the mouse, press Shift to constrain the rays to a set angle. Press Up or Down arrow keys to add or subtract rays. Press Ctrl (Windows) or Command (macOS) to hold the center of the flare constant.

  3. Drag again to add rings to the flare and place the end handle. Before releasing the mouse, press Up or Down arrow keys to add or subtract rings. Press ~ key to randomly place the rings.

Create a flare using advanced options

  1. Select the Flare   tool, and click on the canvas where you want to place the center of the flare.

  2. In the Flare Tool Options dialog box:

    • Specify the Diameter, Opacity, and Brightness of the flare’s center.
    • Specify the halo's Growth as a percentage of the overall size and Fuzziness of the halo (0 is crisp, and 100 is fuzzy).
    • If you want the flare to contain rays, select Rays, and specify the Number of rays, the Longest ray (as a percentage of the average ray), and the Fuzziness of the rays (0 is crisp and 100 is fuzzy).
    • If you want the flare to contain rings, select Rings, and specify the distance of the Path between the halo’s center point (center handle) and the center point of the furthest ring (end handle), the Number of rings, the Largest ring (as a percentage of the average ring), and the Direction or angle of the rings.
    Flare Tool Options dialog with options to specify settings for Center, Halo, Rays and Rings of flare.
    Use the Flare Tool Options dialog to create a flare.

Edit a flare

Once you create a flare, you can edit it using the Flare Tool Options dialog box:

  1. Select the flare using the Selection  tool.

  2.  Double-click the Flare   tool to open the Flare Tool Options dialog box and change the settings.

  3. To reset a flare to its default values, press Alt (Windows) or Option (macOS) and select Reset.

    Note:

    Reset button replaces the Cancel button when you press Alt or Option key.

Expand and edit a flare

To make the elements of the flare editable, select the flare, and then select Object > Expand. 

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