How to add curving points to a custom shape


A reader of this blog is asking: Let's say I made a shape with curves, but then I wanted to add more points to it, how do I do that?

 



This is how:


- press and hold Option (alt) key and move cursor over the border of the shape at the point where you want to add a new point

- when the cursor turns into the little pen with a plus sign next to it click on the border and you get a new point

- the point is a white circle with red border which means it is ready to be moved and to take part in changing your curves

- when you finish click outside the shape.

 To delete a point just select it by clicking twice, slowly, not double-clicking, and when it turns white hit Backspace or Delete. 



You may find that deleting points is more useful than adding new ones. When you create a Custom Shape with smooth curves, you may find that fewer points make it easier to achieve exactly the curve you want. On the other hand, when the shape must have a very particular contour, e.g. a map, adding more points does help.


Whenever I use draw tool I can't help but feel a little bit nostalgic. It reminds me of the technical drawing classes we had at school back in the early 70-s.  We used to spend hours making complex curved shapes by connecting dots manually with a pencil and a tool called French curve (photo by Radomil Talk). By sliding the tool this way and that you had to find the right curve to connect three dots, then add another one, and again, looking for a connecting curve. Some of us were actually driven to tears... With computer aided design it's all but history. Still, even now I find that the skill learnt in those classes helps me, even though many of us thought it was completely useless.

It seems that many Pages users are simply unaware of the power that Draw Tool gives. It is not just curving lines you can create with it,  with drawing tool you can do exactly what it says - draw. And 'write' too. In fact, you can create your own full alphabet in any language - and original cards and drawings. I have published several articles here on various uses of the drawing tool. With the holiday season approaching many of you will be looking for ways to do greetings projects. Pages is a fun tool to accomplish them - with all the family taking part.

Here is a list of posts about curving lines and irregular (custom) shapes:
Curving lines and shapes - make them in Pages
Doodling memorable dates in Pages
Creating clipart and original shapes in Pages
Designing D-Day map in Pages
Doodles: Picasso's room
Jigsaw cutouts with Pages
Christmas graphics and clipart: a few easy tricks
Valentine: make your own in Pages
Drawing letters and numbers in Pages: Happy New Year
Yes, we can: drawing in Pages
Keeping your lines straight
How to design folders
Maps in Pages

Please feel free to send me your own ideas, questions and links to what others do with Pages.

Read more in my new book 'iWork for Mas OSX Cookbook' (2012)

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Designing D-Day Map in Pages. Part Two

Note: see the finished map and read Part One of this article here


THE FIRST STEP is to find a relevant map and make a cut-out of the area you are going to use in your project.

Scan the map from a book, atlas or take it off the internet, Google maps for example. One simple way of doing this is to make a screenshot: Command+Shift and type 4. The cursor turns into crosshairs. Drag it over the area and let go, after a camera shutter sounds you get a .png graphic file on the Desktop. Import it into your Pages document.

NEXT STEP is similar to working with tracing paper. You need to cover your map with a custom shape. Click on Shapes in the toolbar and slide down to Draw tool. The cursor changes into a fountain pen tip. Each click of the 'pen' leaves a red dot in the document, the consecutive dots are connected to each other and as you continue clicking they form an outline of the map, the seashore for example. At this stage it can be done roughly, just to create the shape. Later the shape of the map can be edited: each dot you leave while creating the custom shape can be moved in editing mode.

The custom shape will have default wrapping, colour fill and stroke (frame). It is better to uncheck 'object causes wrap' in Wrap Inspector for the main shape as well as for all the next objects and text boxes, so that text on the map is not affected by wrapping.

In Graphic Inspector change colour fill and colour and thickness of stroke. You may want to choose 'no fill' to see the map under the custom shape, or, as I did, change opacity of the colour fill to about 50 percent (see picture below left). That way you get a feel of what your own original map will look like, but also see the cutout map area you are tracing.














When the custom shape is finished roughly, edit it to follow exactly the contours of the cutout. Click on the shape, pause and click again. The red dots will show. Click on a red dot and it changes into a circle. This can be moved with cursor or with keyboard arrows. 'Snap to grid' function can be annoying at this stage as the circles will try to align themselves with other objects. To disable this function press Command as you start moving the dots.

To show the sea on the map, insert a rectangular shape, in Graphic Inspector choose a sea-like colour and resize the shape to fit with the right angles at the bottom of the map. Then under Arrange menu Send to Back.

After fine tuning the custom shape you are ready to add other map elements. Please come back to read my next posts.

Read how to add and edit arrows to the map here.

Read more in my new book 'iWork for Mac OSX Cookbook' (2012)

Follow me on Twitter at iworkinpages  

Like my page I Work in Pages on Facebook 

and add me to your circles on Google+ 

D-Day Map: making maps, schemes and plans in Pages

Designing original maps in Pages is a fiddly business, so make sure the work is worth your time and effort. But the end result may be extremely satisfying creatively and add a striking difference to your project. If you are not sure, just use one of the many internet mapping services, Google Maps are excellent for example.

Here is one of the maps I made for the forthcoming 65th anniversary of the D-Day - Allied landings in Normandy in June 1944, when 200 thousand men went ashore or parachuted in France to fight the nazis. For many of the surviving veterans it may be the last opportunity to take part in remembrance ceremonies. In Britain there are only 500 men left now.

The map was created entirely in Pages. It shows the coastal area of Lower Normandy with five landing beaches where American, British and Canadian forces attacked on the morning of 6 June 1944.

In the coming days I will describe the techniques used here, please come back to read more.

Read Part Two of Designing D-Day Map in Pages here.

Maps in Pages

4 Jan 07

There is a map in one of the Pages ready-made templates 'Classic Brochure' (three panel, Vineyard B&B) - but the map image does not really give clues as to how to construct it....

Macs are famous for being user friendly because they replicate operations we are already used to doing with pencils, scissors and glue. There is very little that you can't do in Pages. One challenge for me was to create a map. As it turned out constructing maps in Pages is very similar to using tracing paper.

Well, here is one way of putting together a nice looking map:

1. Scan a real geographical map or take it off the internet - in JPG or PDF, it doesn't really matter so long as it can be imported in Pages.
2. Drop it into your pages document.
3. Use draw tool (a new feature in Pages 2) to create a custom shape lying on top of the scanned map. Follow the contours of the area you need for your map in a Pages document.
4. Fill the custom shape with colour (green or light brown for land area), gradient colour, or even an image - whichever suits your project best.
5. If it is a seaside area, create square shape, colour fill it with blue, put the blue square shape over the custom shape (map outline), adjust dimensions so that they match exactly and under Arrange menu 'Send backward'.
6. Use text boxes for placenames. They can be rotated to fit the map.
7. Use arrows for directions.
8. Use oval shapes or create more custom shapes to show areas needed on maps.
9. Move place name boxes and arrows into required position.
10. Command or Shift Click to select all objects and Group (under Arrange menu)

So here is what I constructed to show the area in Normandy where a huge, but long forgotten German WWII battery was recently uncovered.

Note: wrapping should be killed or set at zero.

Now your map is ready to be placed on page - resized, rotated etc. Remember to check the 'constrain proportions' box in dimensions inspector when resizing. It may also be useful to 'Print' your map as a PDF document and then import it into your project.


If anyone knows a better solution I'd like to hear very much.


Addendum (2011): Read later articles on designing maps (with illustrations):
D-Day Map: Making Maps, Schemes and Plans 
Designing D-Day Map in Pages (Part Two)
Add Arrows to Maps in Pages (how to change the shape and curve of the arrows)