Using Symbols

You can use symbols to enhance your illustrations. You can open the Symbol Library palette, and drag and drop symbols onto your illustration, or you can use Symbol inks to draw a line or shape.

Using the Symbol Library Palette

The Symbol Library palette comes stocked with a range of symbols you can use in your Canvas X Draw documents, or you can create your own symbols and add them to the Symbol Library. You can create symbols from any vector, text, group, or paint object. If you change the symbol in the palette, all the copies in the document will also change. For example, if you add a logo to the Symbol Library, and the logo is updated, you can simply replace the logo in the Symbol Library, and all instances of the logo in your document are updated.

To Open the Symbol Library Palette:

Choose Window | Palettes | Symbol Library.

To Place Symbols:

1. Select the symbol in the Symbol Library palette.
2. Move the cursor into the layout area. The cursor changes to a place pointer.
3. Do one of the following:
   • To place the symbol at its original size, click in the layout area where you want to place the upper left corner of the symbol.
   • To scale the symbol while you place it, drag the pointer to set the bounding box size. Canvas X Draw scales the symbol to fit the bounding box.

To constrain the proportions as you drag the point to set the bounding box, press Shift while scaling.

To Create a Symbol:

1. Create a vector object, group of vector objects, or composite object in Canvas X Draw.
2. Choose one of the following:
• File | Symbol Library
• Window | Palettes | Symbol Library
3. In the Symbol Library dialog box, click the drop-down arrow next to the Category field and choose My Symbols.
4. Press the Convert to Symbols button.
5. In the Name Symbol dialog box, do one of the following:
   • If you want Canvas X Draw to automatically name the symbol for you, select the Automatic Naming checkbox, and enter a Prefix and Keyword.
   • If you want to create a name for the symbol yourself, deselect the Automatic Naming checkbox, and type the Name in the Name field.

   Adding one or more keywords will allow your symbol to be found easily by the search function.

6. Click OK.

You can use the Verify Name button to check that the name you have entered has not already been used for another symbol.

Using Symbol Fill Inks

To Apply Symbol Inks:

1. In the Presets palette, select the Pen or Fill Ink icon.
2. Click the Symbol ink icon. 
3. Select a color.
4. Do one of the following:
   • If an object is selected, click on the Symbol Ink cell. 
   • If an object is not selected, click on the Symbol Ink cell  and drag the ink to the object.

To Create Symbol Inks:

1. In your Canvas X Draw document, create an object to use in your new Symbol Ink.

If you want to use more than one object or object type in the Symbol Ink, you must group the objects.

2. Deselect any objects in your Canvas X Draw document by pressing Esc.
3. In the Presets palette, click the Symbol Ink icon , and then the Edit button to open the Symbol manager.
4. Click the Create button.
5. Click the object in your document that you want to use in the Symbol Ink.
6. Adjust the settings for the Symbol Ink in the Symbol manager.
7. Click the Add Preset button to add the new symbol ink to the preset inks.