cancel
 

 

Job type :

Zip Code :

community forums

Featuring over 100 topics of interest to DoItYourselfers.

How to Use the Tools for Creating New Assets in MS Expression Blend 2

AlertThis content requires Flash

To view this content, JavaScript must be enabled, and you need the latest version of the Adobe Flash Player.

Download the free Flash Player now!

Get Adobe Flash Player

Video Transcript

Now that I got a nice, fresh window to work with, let us go ahead and take a look at what we can do with it. The first one under the brush transform is the pen tool. Let me go ahead and select it, move it over to the art board and the first click with the pen tool will specify the start point of the given path. Then with each click, I will just create the point to my path. If I click and drag, you will see that I create a Bézier path instead of just a straight path. So I can use the click and drag to create the path I am interested in. If you want to have a closed path, you can just click or click and drag on the end point to close the path.

Now, once the path has been created just like I did on the other page, I can use the direct selection tool to move the point around and I can even use the pen tool to add or delete additional points. We will talk more about using the pen in direct selection tools and so on for more detailed edits of your pads later on. But, the pen tool allows you to crate your paths in the style. Now if you notice next in the pen, you will see this little white triangle. That indicates that the pen is the currently selected tool of its group. I am going to move the mouse over to it, I am going to right click and you will see the other tools in its root. In this case, there is only one other tool with a pen that is the pencil tool. When we click on that - and the pencil tool is more of a free hand just click and drag.

The next tool we are going to look at is the rectangle tool. The rectangle tool is probably pretty similar to what you are already used to. You click, you drag and it creates a rectangle. Blend shows you immediately what the height and width of the rectangle are going to be so as you drag it out, you can get a little more fine control on what you want the size to be. If you hold down the shift key, Blend will constrain your rectangle to have the same height and width. There are other places where the shift key will help you maintain an aspect ratio so that if you are working with an image, holding down the shift key while resizing will maintain the ratio between the height and the width. I will let go of the shift key and now, I am holding down the alt key. The alt key changes it so that the rectangle is being drawn with the center of the rectangle at where you initially clicked. So instead of clicking at the top, left and dragging to the bottom right, you are now effectively clicking at the center in radius. You can hold down both shift and alt to have it constrained rectangle at the given size.

Now, just like the pen tool, the rectangle tool also has an ellipse tool and a line tool that pretty well work in the same way. Now, below the rectangle, we have the layout containers. I am going to right click and you will see all the different layout containers that you have access to. There are nine of them right now. We are not going to go into too much depth on how those work for the moment so just bare with me. But all of these tools work pretty much the same way as the rectangle. And in fact, most of your access works using the same set of rules. Choose which access you want, click it a point to start the object and drag it out. These same tools that work for the rectangle work here so all of your access are going to be created in the same way.

Now, a canvass is invisible so once I deselect it, you are not going to see it anymore but it is still there. Watch, even though you do not see it in the art board, you can click on it over here in the object three and it will still select it. In fact, the object is still selectable even if you do not have it selected. And in fact, even if you cannot see the canvass but you happen to know where it is, you can still click on it and it will select that canvass. Only the object actually has no fill whatsoever is inaccessible and in most cases, you will not have that happen unless you made a conscious decision to do so. Underneath the layout controls are your text controls. You got a handful of different text controls here. Those commonly used ones are the te
Now that I got a nice, fresh window to work with, let us go ahead and take a look at what we can do with it. The first one under the brush transform is the pen tool. Let me go ahead and select it, move it over to the art... click to read more


How to Build a Shoe Storage Bench

sponsored articles of the day

diy centers

Research and explore a wealth of wisdom on these topics