Ok, so let’s say you’ve created a logo or whatever in Illustrator (this tutorial is based on CS3, but should work in all CS, maybe a few older ones too). You’ve created your text and used a stroke to get the right looking weight to it. Now, you need to do something like pathfinder to knock it out of a color block etc, but you can’t because the stroke’s on there. Here’s a quick (2 minutes) way of “fixing” that situation (If you coming here with this problem already, skip to step 4). You can also click on an image to see a slide show with brief overview.

Step 1:

Type your text.

Step 2:

Outline your text (apple-shift-o) or TYPE > Create Outlines

Step 3:

Add that stroke

Step 4:

Place a color block behind the entire text (doesn’t matter what color) — Use the Rectange tool to draw the block, then send it to the back (apple-shift-[ or OBJECT>arrange>send to back).

Step 5:

Select just your outlined type, go to OBJECT > path > Outline Stroke

Step 6:
Select both the color block and your outlined text. On your Pathfinder pallette click the Merge choice (circled in the screenshot).

Step 7:

Use the direct select tool (a) to click on the blue color block and delete it. You’ll be left with just the enclosed areas (counters, bowls, etc).

Step 8:

Still using the direct select tool, select and delete these remaining spots. All done! Screen shot shows original text and post this procedure…