I'm trying to make smooth pen tool lines, but am having some difficulty. Is there a good method for this? Would I have to mess with the curvature at each anchor point to achieve smooth lines with the standard pen tool? The Free-hand pen tool seems a little difficult to work with at times. Any suggestions? ALso, is there a way to hide paths once I've created them to be able to turn them back on (like a layer)? Thanks

be it in PS or illustrator, to reduce point by point manipulation, I use a click and drag method for all my points when drawing / constructing an item. the handle acts like the angle of a cannon, the curve acts like the trajectory (sp) (the convert point tool makes other things possible) 1, you click to make a new a point and drag it , you get a smooth -two handled- point on the curve that is ballanced, ( how long you drag the handle on a point effects the elasticity of the curve between the previous point and the next point you want ) 2. repeat step 1 around the edge of said shape / object 3. click drag on your starting point when done. objects with holes in them is another area we'll get into later ---- hide paths is simmilar to how you show / hide the grid or you can open up the path pallette , and click below the path icon. (or try vector shape, it is a layer ) good luck, tell us how you go.

I don't know, clicking and dragging is taking a bit to get used to. I really wish I could draw a somewhat jagged line and then "spline" it like in Autocad to smooth it out. Freehand Pen sorta' does this, but I'd rather click points vs. having the pen constantly follow my mouse.

the image provided was used to compare a freehand pen (mouse use not wacom) on left & a controlled click / drag , on right. three click drag actions = happiness VS mouse scribble + 13 anchor point maniplulation = happiness, I would find it easier to move 3 points to come close to left sample, than to move 12 points to match right sample. illustrator: object > path > simplify ... is an option.

Thanks for your help!

I hope it was help, old habbits die hard, man i feel like a noob in cad, and 3d, i expect it it to work lke a bezier, lol

The freehand tool is nice for a quick rough idea or really irregular shapes but the pen tool and drawing dot to dot while holding button down for curves is best and most accurate way to create nice smooth lines. Once you get used to the tricks of using it such as how to subtract points or add points plus the click on last point to convert a curved segment into a straight segment... it becomes really fluid and easy to work with. I used to watch my father create illustrations really quick like using the pen tool in Freehand and never thought I would get up to his speed but after years of using Illustrator... it's quite easy and quick now to use. I still have to spend time tweaking the handles sometimes to get what I want but its minimal these days. You can look in my gallery to see my latest dabbling in Illustrator if interested ;-)