Drawing Shapes


Drawing Shapes

Sometimes you don't need a complex graphic in your documentyou just need something simple, such as an arrow or a box. Word's Drawing toolbar lets you quickly draw all manner of arrows, rectangles, ovals, callouts, banners, and so on. (You can also create text boxes, which are discussed at the end of this section.) Figure 9.13 shows one example of a drawing you can create with Word's drawing tools.

  1. Click the Drawing button on the Standard toolbar.

  2. The Drawing toolbar appears docked at the bottom of the Word window by default. In Figure 9.14, it has been moved and is floating over the Word window.

    Figure 9.14. Click the Drawing button on the Standard toolbar to display the Drawing toolbar.

    graphics/09fig14.gif

  3. Click the drawing tool that you want to use. The tools for basic shapes (lines, arrows, boxes, and so on) are available directly on the toolbar. If you want a more unusual shape, click the AutoShapes button, point to the category that you want to use, and click the shape in the submenu. In Figure 9.14, the Stars and Banners submenu is displayed.

  4. Point with the crosshair mouse pointer to the upper-left corner of the area where you want to draw the shape, and drag diagonally down and to the right (see Figure 9.15).

    Figure 9.15. Drag to create the shape.

    graphics/09fig15.gif

  5. Release the mouse button to finish drawing the shape.

Figure 9.13. This floorplan is a simple example of what you can create with Word's drawing tools.

graphics/09fig13.gif

graphics/lightbulb_icon.gif

If you plan on drawing several objects using the same tool (for example, you want to draw several lines), double-click the button in step 3. It will stay turned on as long as you want to use it. When you're finished, click it again to turn it off. (This does not work for the tools in the AutoShapes menu.)

If you are using the Rectangle tool and want to draw a perfect square, hold down the Shift key as you drag. This also works with the Oval tool to get a perfect circle, the Star tool to get a perfectly proportioned star, and so on.


To delete a drawing object, click it. It will gain small white squares (selection handles). (If it doesn't, click the Select Objects button in the Drawing toolbar and then click the object again.) Then press the Delete key.

One drawing object that deserves special attention is the text box. The Text Box tool on the Drawing toolbar lets you draw a rectangular box in which you can type text. Putting text in a text box gives you control over the position of the text in your document because you can drag the text box around just as you do other drawing objects. In Figure 9.13, you saw that the text labels in the diagram were all created with text boxes. (Their borders were removed, and they were placed on top of other drawing objects.)

To create a text box, click the Text Box tool, drag to create a rectangle of about the right size, and then release the mouse button. An insertion point appears in the box to let you type text (see Figure 9.16).

Figure 9.16. When a text box is selected, an insertion point appears in it to let you type.

graphics/09fig16.gif

After you've typed your text, you can apply all the usual font and paragraph formatting to it. In addition, you can format the box itself, adjusting the appearance of the borders, changing the fill color , and so on.

graphics/lightbulb_icon.gif

In addition to creating text boxes with the Text Box tool, you can type text into any drawing object (with the exception of lines and arrows) by right-clicking it and choosing Add Text in the context menu. An insertion point appears in the object. Type the text as you would in a text box.




Sams Teach Yourself Office Productivity All in One
Sams Teach Yourself Office Productivity All in One (Sams Teach Yourself All in One)
ISBN: 0672325349
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2003
Pages: 474
Authors: Greg Perry

flylib.com © 2008-2017.
If you may any questions please contact us: flylib@qtcs.net