Xara Page Layout Designer - 2013 User Guide
2
Copyright
This documentation is protected by law. All rights, especially the right of duplication,
circulation, and translation are reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced in form of copies, microfilms or other
processes, or transmitted into a language used for machines, especially data
processing machines, without the express written consent of the publisher.
All copyrights reserved.
All other product names are trademarks of the corresponding manufacturers. Errors in
and changes to the contents as well as program modifications reserved.
Copyright © Xara Group Ltd., 1994 – 2012. All rights reserved.
Xara is a registered trademark of Xara Group Ltd.
Xara Group Ltd. is an affiliate company of MAGIX AG.
MAGIX is a registered trademark of MAGIX AG.
Other mentioned product names may be registered trademarks of the respective
manufacturer.
This product uses MAGIX patent pending technology.
Xara is a registered trademark of Xara Group Ltd.
Xara Group Ltd. is an affiliate company of MAGIX AG.
MAGIX is a registered trademark of MAGIX AG.
Other mentioned product names may be registered trademarks of the respective
manufacturer.
PANTONE® Colors displayed here may not match PANTONE-identified standards.
Consult current PANTONE Color Publications for accurate color. PANTONE® and
other Pantone, Inc. trademarks are the property of Pantone, Inc. ©Pantone, Inc., 2012.
Pantone, Inc. is the copyright owner of color data and/or software which are licensed
to MAGIX Software GmbH to distribute for use only in combination with MAGIX
Page & Layout Designer 2013. PANTONE Color Data and/or Software shall not be
copied onto another disk or into memory unless as part of the execution of MAGIX
Page & Layout Designer 2013.
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Contents 3
Contents
Copyright 2
Introduction to MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 11
Welcome to MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 11
Page & Layout Designer terminology 12
Getting Help 14
Support 15
Document info 16
About MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 17
Tooltips 17
Getting Started 18
Program Layout 18
Objects On The Page 19
Object Based Design 19
Drawing Tools 20
The Selector Tool 26
Right-click menus 27
Using Templates & Clipart 27
Theme Colors 30
Photos 34
Text 36
Page Size 38
Layers 39
Saving & Exporting Your Work. 39
Document handling 40
Starting a new document 40
Opening an existing document 40
Selected document and title bar 41
Control bars 41
InfoBar 42
Main toolbar 42
Rulers 42
The status line 43
The indicators 43
X/Y co-ordinates 43
4
Normal/full screen modes 44
Opening a second window 44
Changing the zoom value 44
Sliding the document within the window 46
Changing the page size 46
Multi-page Documents 49
Saving the document 55
Closing the document 55
Automatic Backups 56
On-screen grid 58
Rulers 59
Measurement units 60
View quality slider 62
The constrain key 63
Galleries 64
The Name Gallery 73
Naming objects 75
Undo and Redo 77
Drawing Lines and Shapes 78
Drawing a line or shape 78
The Freehand & Brush Tool 78
Editing lines/shapes with the Freehand & Brush Tool 80
The Straight Line & Arrow tool 82
The Shape Editor tool 83
Extending the line 85
Adding a new point handle 85
Selecting multiple point handles 86
Deleting points 87
Moving point handles—Shape Editor Tool 87
Smoothing a line 88
Constraining the line 88
Changing curves 89
Changing a straight line to a curve (and vice versa) 90
Joining lines 90
Splitting a shape 91
Changing the line width (thickness) 92
Variable width lines 93
Line Gallery 93
Brushes 96
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Contents 5
Selecting Objects 98
The Selector Tool 98
Selecting objects 99
Double-click shortcuts to tools 102
Object Handling 103
Moving objects 103
Removing objects from the document 106
Duplicating and cloning 107
Moving objects forward and backwards 108
Rotating objects 110
Scaling (resizing) objects 112
Flipping objects 114
Snapping 114
Guide Objects and Guidelines 119
Grouping and ungrouping objects 120
Editing inside groups 121
Other types of groups 123
Soft Groups 123
Alignment 124
Copying Styles: Paste Attributes 128
ClipView 128
Repeating Objects 129
Shape Handling 133
Closing a shape 133
Joining shapes 134
Combining shapes 135
Creating regular polygons (the Quickshape Tool) 137
Creating stars (polygons with indented sides) 139
Editing stars 140
Creating rectangles and squares 141
Creating circles and ellipses 141
Making shapes editable 142
Distorting Objects 143
Stretching and squashing objects 143
Skewing objects 143
The Mold Tool 144
Feathering 148
6
Page & Layer Gallery 149
The Page & Layer Gallery 149
Pages 152
Layers 152
Layer Operations 154
Special Layers 156
Hiding Layers and Objects 156
Locking Layers and Objects 157
Solo Mode 157
Show All & Unlock All 157
Moving Objects Between Layers 158
Color Handling 159
The color line 159
Applying fill & line colors by drag & drop 161
Editing an object’s color 162
The Color Editor in detail 163
Specifying colors in the Color Editor 164
The color models 165
Colors on the screen and on the printer 165
Local colors and Theme colors 166
Theme color schemes 166
Creating your own color schemes 167
Creating new named colors 167
Editing named colors 168
Normal colors, Tints, Shades and Linked colors 170
Creating a Tint, Shade or Linked color 171
The Color Gallery 173
PANTONE® Colors 174
Text Handling 178
The Text Tool 178
The Font Menu 180
Simple text 181
Text in a column 182
Text areas 183
Text along a curve 185
Editing text 186
Spell checker 187
Find & Replace 188
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Contents 7
Synchronising text across multiple text objects 189
Tabs, Margins and Indents 189
Repelling text objects 192
Anchored Graphics 194
Embedding Graphics 197
Applying text attributes 197
Text Styles 203
Indents and Outdents 206
Copying text appearances 207
Copying/Pasting formatted text (RTF) 207
Seeing fonts in use 208
Changing text into editable shapes 208
The Fonts Gallery 208
Fonts and PDF 210
Document Font embedding 211
Adding Hyperlinks 211
Fills 213
The Fill Tool 213
Changing the colors in a fill 215
Moving the start or end handle of the fill 216
Bitmap fills 216
Fractal fills 218
Multi-stage color graduations 219
The Fill Gallery 220
Transparency 222
Applying flat transparency 223
Applying graduated transparency 223
Multi-stage graduated transparency 223
Transparency types 224
Enhance 226
Profile 227
Bitmaps 227
Handle/resolution 228
Applying transparency to several objects 228
Bevels 229
The Bevel Tool 229
Applying a bevel 229
Modifying a bevel 229
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Removing a bevel 232
Shadows 233
The Shadow Tool 233
Applying a shadow 233
Changing the shadow color or fill effect 235
Converting shadows to shapes 235
Removing a shadow 236
Copying shadows onto other objects 236
Contours 237
The Contour Tool 237
Contouring objects 237
Converting contours to shapes 240
Removing a contour 241
Blends 242
Blends 242
Using the Blend Tool 242
Removing blends 248
Photo Handling 249
Introduction 249
Photo Objects 249
Photo Groups 249
Importing Photos 250
Photo resolution 254
Zero-memory Copies 254
The Bitmap Gallery 255
Embedded JPEG files 257
Blending & Merging photos 258
Photo display quality 259
Saving & Exporting Photos 260
Photo Edit Attributes 261
Editing the outline of Photos 262
Cropping photos 263
Screenshots 263
Coloring photos 265
Integration with external Photo Editors 266
Resize, rotate and position a photo within its frame 267
Horizon Straighten 268
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Contents 9
Viewing a scaled photo at its full size 269
Making a photo its full size 269
Optimizing Photos and Bitmaps 270
Converting objects or drawings to bitmaps 273
Photo Documents 273
Editing Photo Files 274
The Photo Tools 276
Using the Photo Tools 276
Common photo functions 276
Enhance Tool 277
Clip Tool 280
3D Extrude Tool 282
Extruding a shape 282
Extrude Tool InfoBar 282
Copying 3D extrude attributes 285
Printing 286
Show print borders 286
Selecting and setting up a printer 286
The print dialog box 287
Print Options: Output tab 289
Print Options: Print Layout tab 291
Imagesetting 293
Spot colors 293
On screen printer plate previews 293
Imagesetting dialog 294
Separations dialog 297
Overprinting 299
Printing on all plates 301
Printing & color separating: technical details 301
Importing and Exporting 304
General notes on exporting and importing 304
Import and Export Supported File Formats 305
Importing files 307
Exporting files 309
PDF Export 314
JPEG, PNG, GIF and BMP export dialog overview 333
Other bitmaps Export dialog box 338
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Working with Templates 340
Replacing photos 340
Adjusting a photo in its frame 341
Editing photos 341
Changing text 342
Changing colors 343
Adding Pages 344
Customizing Page & Layout Designer 345
Changing the blank template document 345
Options in the Utilities menu 345
General tab 346
Grid and Ruler tab 348
Internet tab 349
Mouse tab 351
Page Size tab 353
Backups Tab 354
Photo Editing 355
Tune-ups tab 356
Units tab 357
View tab 358
Control bars 360
Menus and Keyboard Shortcuts 364
Introduction 364
File menu 364
Edit menu 366
Arrange menu 370
Utilities menu 373
Share Menu 375
Window menu 376
Help menu 378
Key shortcuts 380
Integrated key shortcut utility 384
Index 389
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Introduction to MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 11
Introduction to MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013
Welcome to MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013
MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 is the ideal solution for creating a successful
business image. You can design your own company logo, create marketing and
advertising material, and present your business in the best possible light. This
program makes it simple to impressively market your products or services using
flyers, posters, brochures, newsletters and more. Professional templates help you get
amazing results in no time and can be easily customized to fit your own unique image.
Enjoy the advantages of this flexible software solution for layout and print and save
time, effort and money in the process.
MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 contains a vast selection of high-quality,
customizable design templates for the perfect business image: business cards,
stationery, invitations, menus, appointment cards and much more. With the program
you can make your own affordable advertising material: flyers, posters, brochures,
coupons, create sales-boosting media for successful e-commerce like sales mailings,
PDF documents or add company logos and lettering to promotional material: e.g
cups, pens, keychains etc. It's easy to do it all yourself and save money. To do this, no
previous experience is required!
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All functions are on one screen: Quick layout design, convenient text and image
editing tools and print-ready proofs are all at your fingertips.
Features
• Comprehensive template catalog with license-free designs for all your business
needs: Business documents, presentations and much more.
• Quick formatting of text blocks and large amounts of text: Format your headers,
text blocks or footnotes and easily transfer the formatting to other texts. A
uniform design doesn't get any easier!
• Includes text flow around shapes and images, multilingual spell check,
expandable user dictionary, support for all installed fonts with a live preview as
well as a find and replace function.
• Magic Snap (quick arrange): Arranging elements of all kinds (photos, graphics,
text, etc.) with absolute precision is now even easier and faster.
• Create company logos, extract images and enjoy the advantages of integrated
photo editing.
• Complete PDF workflow from input to creation and output.
• Galleries for a better overview: Flexible organization and full control thanks to the
Page & Layer gallery and the Bitmap Gallery displays all of the graphics that have
already been used. It's the ideal feature for multipage documents.
• Complete file support for all standard formats: Easy import of text files, graphics
and photos.
• Print-ready output: High-quality output thanks to PDF/X, support of CMYK and
PANTONE color separation, spot colors, print color scale previews and much
more.
Page & Layout Designer terminology
This section describes some of the terminology used in Page & Layout Designer.
Document
You can think of a document as a conventional sheet of paper (or a couple of it). Like
a sheet of paper, you can draw lines and curves, place objects like shapes, cliparts and
photos and write text (and erase them later). You can save the document for later use
by storing it on disk or printing it.
Page
This is the white area in the document. You can place objects on the page margin, on
the page, or overlapping both. However, only objects on the page are printed. A
document can contain one or several single pages or double page spreads. A double
page is like two separate sheets of paper placed next to each other.
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Introduction to MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 13
Lines, shapes, and objects
A line can be straight, curved or a mixture
of both. A line must have a start and an
end, thus it is always open. You can apply
a thickness and color to a line.
These are all lines
A shape is a solid or closed object. The
difference between a line and a shape is
that a shape has no start or end. Because
a shape is a closed object, you can fill it
These are all shapes
with a color or leave it empty with no
color. You can apply a thickness and color
to the line around the shape.
In postscript terminology, a shape is a closed path. Page & Layout Designer
sometimes uses "shape" as shorthand for "line or shape".
Object is a general term. This manual
uses it where the same information
applies to lines, shapes, bitmaps and
text. For example, moving a line is
These are all objects
exactly the same as moving a shape,
moving a bitmap or moving text.
Many operations in Page & Layout Designer apply equally to a single object or a
collection of objects. "Object" can refer both to one object and to several objects.
Attributes are the characteristics of objects such as line width and pattern, colors and
so on.
Bars
There are three types of bars: the MAIN TOOLBAR, the INFOBAR, and then various other
button bars which are sometimes just referred to as control bars, e.g. the
GALLERY
button bar.
Attributes
The various characteristics that define the appearance of objects on the page, such as
color, line width, fill style etc are all called
ATTRIBUTES of the object.
The Attributes of objects can be copied and pasted between different objects using
the Paste Attributes (on page 128) menu command.
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Getting Help
If you need some help using this program, here are some sources of information that
may be of use:
• Program help - Choose "
HELP" menu to open MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 Help (containing
"
hundreds of pages of information).
• Status bar - Try reading the text on the status bar at the bottom of the main
MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 window. It always describes what actions
are currently possible and what they will do (even during drags), and helps you
learn to use the MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 tools. It also gives details
of what buttons and controls do as you move the pointer over them. See Status
Bar for more details.
• ToolTips - If you hold the mouse pointer over a button or control for a short
while, then small message appears telling you what it does.
• Menus - If you want to know what a menu item does, highlight it and press "F1".
• Dialog boxes - If you want to know what a dialog box does or how to use it, click
HELP.
• Movies - Use the menu option "
MAGIX PAGE & LAYOUT DESIGNER 2013 HELP" from the
HELP" > "MOVIES".
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Getting Help 15
Support
Dear MAGIX customer,
Our aim is to provide convenient, fast and solution-focused support at all times. To
this end, we offer a wide range of services:
• Unlimited web support:
As a registered MAGIX customer, you have unlimited access to web support
offered via the convenient MAGIX service portal on http://support.magix.net,
including an intelligent help assistant, high-quality FAQs, patches and user
reports that are constantly updated.
The only requirement for use is product registration on www.xara.com
• The online community - on-the-spot support and a platform for exchange:
MAGIX customers have free and unlimited access to the online community at
www.magix.info, which includes approx. 120,000 members and offers the
opportunity to ask members questions concerning MAGIX products as well as
use the search function to search for specific topics or answers. In addition to
questions & answers, the knowledge pool includes a glossary, video tutorials and
a discussion forum. The multiple experts, found round-the-clock on
www.magix.info guarantee quick answers, which sometimes come within
minutes of a question being posted.
• Email support for MAGIX products:
For every new MAGIX product you will receive, as of date purchase, 12 months of
email based customer service.
Premium email support:
For priority support, or if you want the MAGIX support team to help with nonMAGIX related harware problems you can purchase an Premium email support
ticket. The ticket is for a specific problem, and is valid until it is solved, it is not
restricted to an email.
Please note: To be able to use the Premium email support and free product email
support via the Internet, you have to register your MAGIX product using the serial
number provided. This can be found on the CD case of your installation CD or on the
inside of the DVD box.
• Additional telephone service:
Besides the large number of free customer service offers, we also offer a feebased telephone customer service available to customers that have purchased
from Magix. Here you can find a summary of our technical support telephone
numbers:
http://support.magix.net (on page 218)/
Europe): MAGIX Development Support, P.O. Box 20 09 14, 01194 Dresden,
Mail (
Germany
16
Mail (North America): MAGIX Customer Service, 1105 Terminal Way #302, Reno,
NV 89502, USA
Please make sure you have the following information at hand:
• Program version
• Configuration details (operating system, processor, memory, hard drive, etc.),
sound card configuration (type, driver)
• Information regarding other audio software installed
MAGIX Sales Department
You can reach the MAGIX Sales Department workdays for help with the following
questions and problems:
• Orders
• Product consulting (pre-purchase)
• Upgrade requests
• Returns
Europe
Monday - Friday, 09:00-16:00 GMT
U.K.: 0203 3189218
Denmark: 699 18149
Sweden: 0852500858
Finland: 09 31581630
Norway: 0210 30665
North America
9 am to 4 pm EST Mon-Fri
Phone: 1-305-722-5810
Document info
"FILE -> DOCUMENT INFO" displays information about the selected document such as
its size and any fonts or plug-ins used. This is a good way to find out if you are
missing a required font or plug-in that could prevent the document from displaying
correctly.
Anything you type into the comment field is stored as part of the file. This comment is
displayed whenever you display the document info dialog box.
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Getting Help 17
About MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013
Choose "HELP" > "ABOUT MAGIX PAGE & LAYOUT DESIGNER 2013". This displays general
information about the program. If you contact the support, you may be asked for this
information.
Tooltips
When you move over a button, the tooltip tells you the
function of the button.
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Getting Started
This section gives an overview of the main functionality of Page & Layout Designer.
Later sections go into more detail about each tool.
Program Layout
Info Bar - changes with each tool
Zoom
Designs Gallery
Page & Layer Gallery
Selector Tool
Photo Editing Tool
Drawing tools
Text Tool
Shadow Tool
Color line
Tabs for all open documents - icon identifies document type.
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Getting Started 19
Objects On The Page
Whether you customize a template or create your own graphics from scratch, you
can rotate, resize and position anything on the page, anywhere you like. You can
easily resize the page to be any required size and add new pages as required. Certain
features, such as changing color schemes, work across all pages simultaneously.
These are the basic types of page element:
• Text: Using the
TEXT TOOL you can create anything from single word headings to
columns of text or even blocks of text that flow from one block into another. You
can also create bulleted or numbered lists. The
TEXT TOOL InfoBar provides
controls over the font, size, line spacing and more. You can resize text either by
using the
SELECTOR TOOL or by selecting the text in the usual fashion and
choosing alternative point or pixel sizes. Perhaps surprisingly you can even rotate
text by any angle, and by using
REPEL TEXT UNDER (right click an object to see this
option) you can automatically flow text around objects on the page, such as
photos.
• Graphics: Any type of logo or heading on your page is graphic. Page & Layout
Designer is a vector graphics program which means you can edit the shape,
rotate and resize your graphic objects with no loss of quality (unlike pixel photo
editing tools such as Photoshop).
• Photos: You can drag and drop photos directly from your camera or File Explorer
window onto the page, rotate, enhance and crop it. Replacing existing photos in
templates is as easy as drag and drop - and you can alter the size and angle of
photos 'inside' their frame very easily.
Object Based Design
All the types of elements are collectively referred to as objects.
One of the unique benefits of Page & Layout Designer is that you have complete
freedom to place any object anywhere on the page, and your document will faithfully
reproduce this.
The SELECTOR TOOL can be used to select any object on the page, and to move
(just drag it), resize and rotate the objects.
You can adjust the stacking order (that is whether an object appears in front or
behind others on the page) using the
ARRANGE. With the SELECTOR TOOL you can resize objects by dragging on the corner
ARRANGE menu options or right click and choose
resize handles. You can rotate any object by dragging just inside the corner selection
handles.
To add some text to your design, select the
the page and start typing.
TEXT TOOL and click anywhere on
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You can also create text columns, by clicking and dragging horizontally in the Text
Tool, or text boxes by dragging horizontally. See the Text section (on page 36) below
for more detail
reference of te
s and the Chapter Text Handling (on page 178) for a complete
xt functions of MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013
You can use the drawing tools to create rectangles, rounded
rectangles, circles and ellipses, and just about any shape you like
using the
more detail.
SHAPE EDITOR TOOL. See the Drawing tools section for
Stacking Order
All objects on the page are placed one on top of another. The most recently drawn or
created object is always on top, that is, in front of any others. You can adjust the
stacking position by right clicking and choosing
ARRANGE or using the ARRANGE menu
options.
For example, when you draw a new rectangle it always appears to cover all the
objects behind it. By right clicking and choosing
ARRANGE" > "PUT TO BACK") the object is moved behind everything
menu "
ARRANGE or pressing "Ctrl + B" (or the
else. Similarly "Ctrl + F" brings any selected object to the top, that is, in front of
everything else.
There is an added complication: layers. All objects are collected into named layers,
and each layer can be turned on or off to show or hide everything on that layer. See
the Layers section for more detail.
PAGE & LAYER GALLERY allows you to easily see and adjust the stacking order of
The
objects and layers. Objects are listed in order from front to back in the gallery. See
Page & Layer Gallery (on page 149) for details.
Drawing Tools
Page & Layout Designer provides all the graphics tools you need to create just about
any graphical object on your page, as well as a range of pre-designed graphical
elements in the Designs Gallery. There are several basic drawing tools that let you
create rectangles, ellipses, regular polygons stars or any shape you like.
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Getting Started 21
Page & Layout Designer provides vector drawing tools, which means you can resize,
edit the outline shape and re-color with no loss of quality. You can zoom in to see
almost infinite detail, and all edits can be undone. For details on drawing
rectangles/squares, circles/ellipses and other shapes, see Drawing Lines and Shapes
and Shape Handling.
The SHAPE EDITOR TOOL allows you to create detailed vector based shapes,
and also to edit the outline of any shape.
Refer to the section
"THE SHAPE EDITOR TOOL" (on page 83) to learn how to use this
very powerful tool.
STRAIGHT LINE & ARROW TOOL adds arrow heads and tails to any type of
The
line as well as drawing single lines.
Shapes are an important part of any drawing, the other essential element
that we’ve ignored until now is freehand drawing. Click on the
TOOL. See the FREEHAND & BRUSH TOOL (ON PAGE 78) for more
BRUSH
FREEHAND &
information.
Current attributes
An ‘attribute’ is some characteristic of an object which you can modify in MAGIX
Page & Layout Designer 2013. For example a shape’s attributes include its color, its
outline width and its outline color.
As mentioned above you can change the attributes of an object after you’ve drawn it,
by selecting it and then changing its fill color, line width, or any of its other attributes.
But MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 also keeps track of the ‘current’ attributes,
which are the attributes that get applied to newly drawn objects as they are created.
Setting current attributes manually
If, for example, you want the next rectangle you draw to be red, make sure you have
nothing selected (press "Esc" or click an empty part of the page) and then click red on
the color line. You’ve now set the current fill color attribute to red. Now when you
draw a new shape, it will be filled red. You can set other current attributes the same
way – by first making sure nothing is selected before changing the attribute’s value.
Setting current attributes automatically
By default, MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 automatically updates the current
attributes for you, to match the object you last drew, or last selected. So for example if
you draw a rectangle and then make it green, the next shape you draw will also be
green. If you have a blue rectangle in your design and you wish to draw another one
just like it, first select the blue rectangle (this makes its attributes current) and then
the next shape you draw will also be blue. So by simply clicking an object, you set the
current attributes to match that object.
22
This allows you to use existing objects as a ‘palette’ of available styles. Click an object
to select it, then draw new objects in that style.
You can turn off this behavior in the
OPTIONS" dialog. Select the GIVE NEW OBJECTS MOST RECENT ATTRIBUTES checkbox.
"
GENERAL TAB (on page 346) of the "UTILITIES" >
Now the current attributes will only change when you set them manually, as
described above.
Attribute groups
Many designs consist of a combination of closed filled shapes and open shapes (lines
where the start and end points are not coincident). Normally it wouldn’t be desirable
to have the attributes of an open shape used for a closed shape, nor vice-versa.
Therefore the attributes for open and closed shapes are kept separate – these are
known as attribute groups. Setting the values of one group does not affect the other
group. So for example, selecting a filled rectangle with no outline will not change the
current line width to zero for open shapes.
For the same reasons, text attributes make up a third attribute group. The text
attribute group is only set when you select text objects, or when you set the attributes
manually while in the text tool.
Exempt attributes
Some attributes do not get set as current automatically even when ‘Give new objects
most recent attributes’ is on. This is because some attributes can cause problems if
they become current.
For example if you applied a 10 pixel feather to a large object (to blur the edges) and
then drew a new 10 pixel sized shape, that new shape would be invisible if the feather
attribute was copied to it, due to the amount of feathering!
Other attributes can adversely affect the way designs export, or significantly increase
the time taken to render the design and so should not be applied unnecessarily.
Examples of attributes which are copied automatically:
• Fill colors, fill styles, line width, line color, line style, line join style, line endcap
style, arrow heads/tails, text font, text font size, text margins.
Examples of attributes which are not copied automatically:
• Feather, transparency, shadow, bevel, contour, 3D extrude, live effects.
Resetting current attributes
You can reset all current attribute groups instantly by pressing "Esc" when you have
no objects selected. If you have objects selected, pressing "Esc" clears the selection,
so just press "Esc" again to reset the current attributes back to their default values.
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Getting Started 23
Fill Tool
You can easily put a graduated color fill onto a shape using this tool
(and a lot more besides). Select the tool and just drag across your
object.
The fill arrow can be adjusted by dragging the ends to alter the direction, angle and
extent of the graduation.
Rounded rectangle with a graduated fill.
Note: If you drag with the FILL TOOL across a grouped item, such as a text panel,
then everything in the group takes on the same fill style. To overcome this you must
first select just the item you want to fill. You can do this several ways. A single click
on the item with the FILL TOOL will select just that item, as will a click in the
SELECTOR TOOL with the "Ctrl" key pressed (this is called 'select inside' because it
selects just the one item inside the group). Now when you drag it will fill only the
selected object.
To edit the start or color of the fill just drag and drop a color from the color line onto
the shape, or you can select the end of the Fill Arrow in the
FILL TOOL and use the
Color Editor ("Ctrl + E").
You can create a multi-stage graduated fill by making sure the fill arrow is visible
(select it with the
FILL TOOL), now just drag a color from the Color Line and carefully
drop it on the arrow line where you want the new color. You can now drag this fill
point, or select "Ctrl + E" to adjust the color using the Color Editor. There are different
fill styles, for example this is a circle with a circular fill.
The shadow is another ellipse with a graduated color fill and feathered (see below).
24
Transparency Tool
You can adjust the transparency of any graphic or photo to make it see-through. More
than this, Page & Layout Designer supports graduated transparency. It works very like
the graduated color fill. In the Transparency tool just drag across your shape and you
can see the transparency fades. You can adjust the degree of transparency of each
end of the fill arrow, by clicking on either end of the arrow, and adjusting the
Transparency slider. See Transparency (on page 222) for more information.
Feather
This is a graphical term for blending the edges of objects. Page & Layout Designer
provides a feather control that enables any object, graphics, text or photo to be
feathered - giving it a blurred edge that blends with the background. The Feather
control is not a tool on the left, but one of the controls on the top bar. Try it on your
rectangle shape. Select the shape and then click this Feather control on the right of
the top bar.
The shadow below the ball drawing above has a feathered edge. Combining all of
these controls you can very quickly produce amazing layered graphics for your design,
all directly in Page & Layout Designer without needing any other graphics tools.
This is an example of a rounded rectangle with
grad color, grad transparency and feathered
edges with some text placed on top of it.
This has a graduated color fill, light to dark green
going left to right. It also has a vertical graduated
transparency fading from top to bottom. The
feather gives it a soft edge. It takes a couple of
seconds to create such an image, and it's
automatically converted to the right graphic
when you save your design.
Shadow Tool
A very popular graphics effect is to create a soft drop-shadow under a graphic or
some text. This serves to lift the object away from the background.
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Getting Started 25
The SHADOW TOOL lets you add a soft shadow to any object, text, graphics or
photo. Select the
SHADOW TOOL and just drag on the object. You can adjust the
shadow blur and transparency using InfoBar controls.
Some text with a soft shadow.
To adjust the position of an existing shadow, go into the SHADOW TOOL and drag on
the shadow.
Example Graphics
This button combines many of the features described above - it's drawn by combining
just a few feathered shapes, and using graduated transparency (the white reflection
effect). The text has a slight soft shadow and the button has a glow shadow. The
whole thing is grouped. (You do not need to draw this button as it's provided in the
Button category of the
DESIGNS GALLERY).
The huge benefit of vector graphics, compared to 'bitmap' graphics created in pixel
editing software such Photoshop, is that you can re-color, edit, rotate, and resize the
button with no loss of quality. Make it huge and it remains pin sharp:
On top of that you can re-color using the Named Color system, and it will even
stretch as required - everything in Page & Layout Designer remains non-destructive
(which means you can always edit it, with no loss of quality).
Something that would take skill and time to produce using alternative graphics
software, is trivially easy in Page & Layout Designer.
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The Selector Tool
This tool is a general purpose tool that allows you to select, move, resize and
rotate all objects on your page.
You can do all these things by just dragging on the objects on the page, or on the
selection handles around the object, or you can enter precise numeric values. The
selected object is shown with 8 handles around the outside, and the status line at the
bottom of the screen also tells you what is selected.
Drag on any corner handle to resize an object. Drag just inside the corner handles to rotate.
Nudging Objects
The arrow keys can be used to nudge the selected object, one pixel at a time. If you
hold "Shift", it nudges objects 10 pixels at a time.
Rotating Objects
There are two ways to rotate an object. Either click on the object a second time, so
the selection handles change to show rotation handles, which you can then drag on to
rotate the object. Or, when it's showing the square selection handles, move the
mouse pointer just inside the corner handles until you see the mouse pointer change
to a rotation indicator - you can then also drag to rotate the selected object.
Unusually you can rotate just about anything in Page & Layout Designer, including
photos, headings, even blocks of text.
InfoBar
When an object is selected, the InfoBar - just above your document - shows all the
relevant controls for the current tool. This bar changes depending on which tool is
selected. This is the InfoBar in the
The InfoBar, just above your document, shows controls for the selected tool.
SELECTOR TOOL:
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You can enter numeric values into any field. e.g. to reduce the size of an object by
20% you can enter 80% into the W field (which is a % size). The little padlock
selects whether both the width and height change together.
Getting Started 27
Copying Objects
You can use the usual "EDIT" > "COPY" ("Ctrl + C") and "EDIT" > "PASTE" ("Ctrl + V")
options or right click an object and choose
item is drag on it with the right mouse button.
You can also copy and paste a page anywhere in your document from the current
document or another document – see Copying and pasting (on page 52) pages.
COPY, but a really quick way to copy any
Right-click menus
When you right-click any object in the MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013
workspace, a drop-down menu lists useful operations that are relevant to the object
clicked on. For example, if you right-click a rectangle you've drawn previously, the
drop-down menu allows you to perform actions only relevant to a rectangle.
If you right-click a photo, however, some of the menu options that appear apply only
to photos, while others are similar to the actions you can perform on a rectangle. The
object-specific operations are listed towards the top of the right-click menu's list, e.g.,
in the case of a rectangle the first three actions above apply only to rectangles.
You can also right click both the page and pasteboard to see a menu of page- and
pasteboard-related operations you can apply.
If you select more than one object and right-click, the menu lists actions specific to
multiple objects, such as group, align and combine, as well as the common operations
such as cut, copy and delete. Similarly if you right-click objects that you have
previously grouped, actions specific to a group are displayed.
It's recommended that you right-click any object or multiple objects in the workspace
to access the menu specific to those objects. Once you've done this a few times you
will know which actions you can quickly perform with right-click menus.
Using Templates & Clipart
Open the Designs Gallery by clicking the DESIGNS GALLERY tab in the Galleries
bar (or use "
This shows folders containing collections of template designs and clipart. Browse
through the folders and double click to open any file as a new document or drag and
drop designs and widgets onto your page.
FILE" > "NEW FROM DESIGNS GALLERY").
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The Designs Gallery
The Designs Gallery contains thousands of professionally designed graphics and
templates. This includes small pieces of graphical ‘clipart’ you can drag onto any page
design, whole page templates or complete multi-page templates for newspapers,
flyers, brochures, calendars, etc.
Opening the Gallery
By default the Designs Gallery is available as a flyout near the top right corner of the
MAGIX Page & Layout Designer 2013 window. Just hold your mouse pointer over the
"DESIGNS GALLERY" tab to make it appear. When you move the mouse pointer away it
closes again, or you can make it stay open by ‘docking it’ by clicking the ‘pin’ icon at
the top of the gallery.
Or choose "
FILE" > "NEW FROM DESIGNS GALLERY".
See Document Handling (on page ) for more information on using galleries generally.
Gallery folders
If you are online, the gallery is automatically updated with any available new and
modified content each time you start the program.
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Getting Started 29
To open a folder in the gallery, click the folder icon, or double click on the folder name.
To open a design as a new document, double click on the design thumbnail. To import
a design into your current open document, drag it from the gallery onto your page. If
it’s a whole page template, a new page will be added to your document, after the
currently selected page.
If you are running a trial version of the program, folders shown in red can be
previewed only (that is, you can view the design thumbnails inside these folders, but
not open or import the designs). When you purchase the program online ALL the
contents of red folders become immediately available to you and the folders turn blue
to indicate this.
If you are running the full unlocked program, you may see additional red folders
appear at the bottom of the gallery. These are additionally available folders of designs
that you can preview and then use immediately when you buy online. Double click on
an item in a red folder to see purchase options. Additional content that you have
already purchased appears in blue folders, just as the main gallery content does.
You can also right-click on a thumbnail and choose
IMPORT TO NEW PAGE to force any
design to be imported onto a new page in your document. The gallery also contains
color scheme files, which allow you to change the color of your design (drag and drop
onto your page, or just double click to apply the scheme).
Adding New Pages To Your Document
You can drag any template design from the DESIGNS GALLERY onto your page. If this is
a page template, it will add a new page to your document, after first asking if you
want to match any color changes. If you drag a clipart item, heading or photo object,
this gets added onto the page where you dropped it, and again you will be asked if you
want to match any color changes you've made.
Your imported graphic is just another object on the page, and can be re-positioned,
resized and rotated using the Selector tool as usual.
To add a new page of the same design, the easiest way is to use the duplicate
Or use the option under the
page option in the page flyout bar on the top bar.
EDIT > PAGES menus. This replicates the current page
below. You can then just delete or edit the elements as required. You can add a new
blank page by selecting the menu
EDIT > PAGES > NEW PAGE.
Or you can copy and paste an existing page in the same or another document. Rightclick an empty part of a page and choose
right-click a page and choose
PASTE > PAGE (or press "Ctrl + V").
COPY PAGE. In the destination document
The page on the clipboard is added as a new page immediately following the current
page. The pasted page adopts the page size of the document it’s pasted into (as long
ALL PAGES IN DOCUMENT THE SAME checkbox is enabled in FILE > PAGE
as the
OPTIONS
). Page layers and attributes and all the objects on the page are also pasted.
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You can delete pages using the same
click a page and choose
You can also use the
pages.
CUT PAGE.
PAGE & LAYER GALLERY (on page 149) to add, delete or duplicate
EDIT > PAGES menu or the flyout bar. Or right
Theme Colors
Most templates use a small set of theme colors, and various shades of those theme
colors (also referred to as 'Named colors'). If you don’t like the provided colors you
can edit the named colors individually yourself almost as 'Named Colors' appear on
the left side of the Color Line along the bottom of the window easily.
Current Outline and Fill Color
Color Editor
Eye dropper color picker
‘No color’ patch.
Named ‘Theme’ Colors and Linked Colors
Fixed palette of standard colors
Hold pointer over a color to see its name
Status line. Shows what is selected, and provides hints
Simply right-click on any of the Named Colors and select the Edit option (if you hover
the mouse pointer over the color you will see a tooltip name).
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