Corel Corel Draw Graphics Suite - X5 Getting Started

More than you thought possible

5

Getting started

CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X5 is an intuitive graphic design application that gives designers an enjoyable work experience.
Whether you ®work in advertising, printing, publishing, sign making, engraving or manufacturing, CorelDRAW X5 offers the
tools you need to create accurate and creative vector illustrations and professional-looking page layouts.

Here’s a snapshot:

Title bar: Displays the title of

the open document.

Menu bar: The area
containing pull-down
menu options.

Toolbox: A floating bar
with tools for creating,
filling, and modifying
objects in the drawing.

Drawing window: The
area outside the drawing
page bordered by the
scroll bars and
application controls.

Drawing page: The
rectangular area inside
the drawing window. It is
the printable area of your
work area.

®

Rulers: Used to determine the size
and position of objects in a drawing.

Standard toolbar: A detachable bar that contains shortcuts to
menu and other commands, such as opening, saving and printing.

Property bar: A
detachable bar with
commands that relate to
the active tool or object.

Docker: A window
containing available
commands and settings
relevant to a specific tool
or task.

Document palette: A
palette specific to the
current open document.

Color palette: A
dockable bar that
contains color swatches.

Navigator: A button at
the lower-right corner
that opens a smaller
display to help you move
around a drawing.

Document navigator: The area at the bottom left of the application
window that contains controls for moving between pages and adding pages.

CorelDRAW X5 toolbox

A. The Pick tool lets you select and

A

size, skew and rotate objects.

B

B. The Shape edit flyout

C

lets you access the Shape, Smudge

D

brush, Roughen brush and Free
transform tools.

E

C. The Crop tool flyout lets

F

you access the Crop, Knife, Eraser,

G

and Virtual segment delete tools.

H

I

D. The Zoom flyout lets you

J

access the Zoom and Hand tools.

K

E. The Curve

L

flyout lets you access the Freehand,
2-Point line, Bézier, Artistic media, Pen,

M

B-spline, Polyline and the 3-Point curve.

N

O

F. The Smart tools flyout lets you
access the Smart fill and Smart

P

drawing tools.

Q

G. The Rectangle flyout lets you

R

access the Rectangle and 3-Point

S

Rectangle tools.

H. The Ellipse flyout lets you

access the Ellipse and 3-Point Ellipse
tools.

I. The Object flyout
lets you access the Polygon, Star,

Complex Star, Graph paper and
Spiral tools.

J. The Basic Shapes
flyout lets you access the Basic
shapes, Arrow shapes, Flowchart
shapes, Banner shapes and Callout
shapes tools.

K. The Text tool lets you type words

directly on the screen as artistic or
paragraph text.

L. The Table tool lets you draw
and edit tables.

M. The Dimension tool
lets you draw Parallel, Vertical, Horizontal
Angular, Segment and 3-Point callouts.

N. Straight Line Connector tool
lets you access the Straight Line, Right Angle,

Right Angle Rounded and Edit Anchor tool.

Status bar: Contains information about object properties such as

type, size, color, fill and resolution. The status bar also shows the
current mouse position.

O. The Interactive
tools flyout lets you access the

Interactive blend, Interactive contour,
Interactive distortion, Interactive
drop shadow, Interactive envelope,
Interactive extrude and Interactive
transparency tools.

P. The Eydropper flyout lets you
access the Color eyedropper and the
Attributes eyedropper tools.

Q.

Outline

The flyout lets you access the

pen

Outline and Outline color dialog
boxes, a selection of outlines of various
widths and the Color Docker window.

R. The Fill flyout
lets you access the Fill color, Fountain

fill, Pattern fill, Texture fill and

PostScript fill dialog boxes, indicate no
fill and the Color Docker.

S. The Interactive fill flyout lets
you access Interactive fill and
Interactive mesh fill tools.

The welcome screen

The Welcome screen provides users with a centralized location to
access recently-used documents, templates and learning tools,
which include Tips & Tricks and video tutorials. The Welcome screen
also includes a gallery that showcases designs created by
CorelDRAW Graphics Suite users around the world.

Opens recent files

so you can

continue working
where you left off.

Allows you to
open an existing
file.

®

Starts a new
graphic with the
current default
template.

Starts a new
graphic using the
template of your
choice.

Templates and search capability

When starting a new project, you can easily find
the right template. You can browse, preview or
search for templates by name, category,
keywords or notes. You can also view useful
information about the template, such as category
and style.

CorelDRAW ConceptShare

CorelDRAW ConceptShare™ is a valuable collaboration tool that lets

® ™

®

you share designs and ideas and receive real-time feedback from
clients in a Web-based environment. You can create multiple
workspaces, upload your designs, and invite others to post comments.

Working with pages

You can begin working on a drawing by specifying settings for the
size of the page (standard or custom) and the orientation
(landscape or portrait). You can also add and delete pages.

To access the Page Property bar, use the Pick tool to click in the
Drawing Window

Calibrating the rulers

You can have one inch on your screen equal one inch of “real”
distance. You need a clear plastic ruler for comparing real-world and
on-screen distances.

Click Tools; in Options under Workspaces,
select Toolbox and click Zoom/Hand tool

Click Calibrate Rulers. Place a clear
plastic ruler under the on-screen
horizontal ruler

Click the up or down arrows on the
Horizontal box to match one unit of
measurement on the actual ruler

Repeat for the vertical ruler

Setting up the grid

The grid is a series of intersecting dashed lines or dots that you
can use to precisely align and position objects in the drawing window.
To set up the grid dimensions, click View menu, Grid and Ruler Setup.

Guidelines

Guidelines are lines that can be placed any­where in the drawing window to aid in object
placement. After you add a guideline, you can
select it, move it, rotate it, lock it in place or
delete it.

Add guidelines by dragging from the vertical or
horizontal rulers into the drawing window or
click View menu, Guideline Setup.

Dynamic guides

Dynamic guides help you precisely move, align and draw objects in
relation to other objects. Dynamic guides are temporary guidelines that
you can pull from object snap points, such as edge, node, center,
midpoint and quadrant.

To activate dynamic guides, move an
object over the snap point of the object
that you are aligning with.

Snapping

You can have objects snap to grid lines, guidelines or other objects,
so that when an object is moved near a snapping point, the target will be
highlighted and releasing the object will lock it to the snapping point.

Choose a
preset
page size in
the Paper
list box.

Go to the
previous page

Go to the
first page

Set the page orientation
to Landscape or Portrait

Specify a custom page
size by type values in the
Width and Height boxes.

Add a new

page

Open Go To
Page dialog

Use the Page Tab to go to a
specific page

Go to the
next page

Go to the
last page

Use the Current Page
button to set the page
size and orientation for

an individual page in a
multi-page document

Right-click a page tab to
open the context menu

Select the
Unit of
Measure
you want
to work in

Working with pages and layout tools

You can customize and display page rulers, grids and guidelines to
help you organize objects and place them exactly where you want.
To view or hide grids, guidelines and rulers, open the View menu and
toggle the check mark next to the layout command.

Working with layers

Layers are edited independently for each page of
your document. Local, independent guidelines can
be added for individual pages and master guidelines
can be added for the entire document.

grouped
objects

visible

printable

editable

layer
name

Working with objects

Before you can change an object, you must select it by clicking on it
with the Pick tool (Use SHIFT to select multiple objects). This
activates the Sizing handles. Clicking on a selected object activates
the Rotation handles.

When you group two or more objects, they are treated as a single
unit. Grouping lets you apply the same formatting, properties,
and other changes to all the objects within the group at the same time.

Sizing handles let

you change the

dimensions of an
object proportionally
by preserving its
aspect ratio.

Stretching handles
let you change an
object’s vertical and
horizontal dimensions
non proportionally.

Center of

The

Rotation

dragged to a new
location to change
the effect of the

Rotation handles.

You can position a selected object by
dragging its to a
new location, or by nudging it using the
Arrow Keys, (+ CTRL = Nudge ÷ 2 or
SHIFT = Nudge X 2).

45° (1.5 in)

can be

Positioning handle

Dynamic Guides help you precisely

move, align and draw objects in
relation to other objects.

Rotation handles
let you spin an
object around its
rotation.

Skewing handles
let you slant an
object.