Working with Text and Paths in Java

Painting Code 128 Code Set C in Java Working with Text and Paths

You can flow text inside an object Create an object, such as an ellipse or polygon, and then create a block of text Select the text and object, and then choose Text Flow Inside Path Whoosh! The text appears inside the shape

After you attach text to a path, you can modify where the text aligns to the path You can modify which side of the path text appears on, as well as move the text to a different point along the path To modify the alignment of text along a path, follow these steps:

following: None: Select this option if the text is attached to a path that is not visible Baseline: Aligns the baseline of the text to the path Ascent: Aligns the text to the bottom of the path Descent: Aligns the text to the top of the path

options: Rotate around path: Orients the text with the rotation of the path Vertical: Orients the text vertically to the path Skew Horizontal: Skews the text horizontally along the path Skew Vertical: Skews the text vertically along the path

Enter to move the text to a different position along the path This is the distance you want the text offset to the right along the path If the text is attached to an ellipse, enter a negative value to move the text to the left When you enter a value in the Left field, the value in the Right field is automatically updated For example, if you enter a value of 10 in the Left field, this value is added to the Right field The value in the Right field is where the text ends If you re a math whiz, you can enter a value in the Right field, however, it s easier to enter a value in the Left field

If you prefer, you can change the text alignment along a path by manually moving it To manually align text along a path, follow these steps:

whose alignment to a path you want to modify The text is selected and a small triangle appears to the left of the text, as shown in Figure 3-13

As you drag the triangle, FreeHand creates a gray shape the size of the text that gives you a preview of the current location of the text along the path

Creating shapes Selecting objects Modifying shapes Creating groups Arranging and aligning objects Slicing objects

hen you create an illustration in FreeHand MX, you have a multitude of options to work with With a bit of practice, you can create some interesting shapes for your illustrations and modify them to suit your artistic muse or your client s vision The results you can achieve are only limited by your imagination and sense of experimentation The FreeHand tools, although many, are relatively simple to use, which gives you the freedom to concentrate on your creation without having to worry about an overly complicated tool In this chapter, we show you how to create an illustration using the marvelous array of tools in FreeHand We explain how to use the available tools to create shapes, and then use panels or other tools to modify those shapes In Book IV, 5, we show you how to transform the shapes you create to put your own unique touch on an illustration

In Book IV, 2, we introduce the shape tools The shape tools look kind of ho-hum when you see them in the Tools panel; but when you click one of them and use it to add a shape to your illustration, things start looking up And if you double-click an innocuous little tool button, you may get a dialog box with tool options that allow you to modify the base shape into something truly cool, or modify the way the tool draws In this section, we show you how to use the shape tools to create shapely shapes We also point out which tools have additional options Figure 4-1 shows the shape tools and the shapes you can create with them