How to set a transparent black artboard for white-on-black projects?

[IAN4000]

I'm working on a project that requires white-on-black text, but whenever I set an artboard background to black, the export has a black background as well. I'd like the background to be transparent, but appear as black so that I can see what I'm doing, but export as text on a transparent background. Is there a way to do this? 

[Brian_J]

Set the artboard to transparent: Document Setup > enable Transparent Background (not sure how to get to document setup on a tablet). With the Rectangle Tool, create a rectangle with a black fill the size of your artboard. Then just hide the rectangle layer before exporting.

[Alfred]

7 hours ago, Brian_J said:

(not sure how to get to document setup on a tablet)

There’s an option for making the background transparent when creating a document, but I don’t know how to change it in an existing document. I also can’t find way to convert an artboard to a shape or vice versa.

[walt.farrell]

8 minutes ago, Alfred said:

but I don’t know how to change it in an existing document.

Document. Canvas > Transparent Canvas. (Does not matter whether you have a Canvas or an Artboard; works for either.)

 

[Alfred]

17 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

Document. Canvas > Transparent Canvas.

Duh! Thanks. (It didn’t occur to me to look at ‘Document > Canvas’ for an artboard property.)

[Brian_J]

Side note: The reason I create a shape layer with a fill set to the background color is I can hide/unhide a layer quicker than I can change the canvas property. I always save the .af file with the background layer visible so I can see the artwork when previewing the file on my computer. Just a personal preference.

[IAN4000]

Yeah, creating a black background object seems to be the most efficient way of doing this. Thanks!