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If you are planning on modifying our templates yourself, this section is for you. This page provides fundamental instructions for using the basic tools within CorelDraw! By following the steps below, you will be able to alter/customize any of our templates into thousands of different looks!
The following screen
captures and instructions will provide you a good, fundamental understanding of
the ease in which our CorelDraw! templates can be modified. Keep in mind,
that we offer a full customization service so if you don't have or don't want
to purchase CorelDraw!, you may request customization upon checkout from your
shopping cart. |
Please forgive the size of this page, but to provide you with the clarity of images and comprehensive tutorial, we felt this was a must. Directly below is the T-shirt design we will use for this tutorial. We felt it offered the best all-around features to provide a comprehensive lesson on the fundamentals of altering our CorelDraw templates. CorelDraw! has powerful, built-in tools that allow us to incorporate preset variables in all our stock templates. This gives you, our customer, an easy-to-modify design! |
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The first element we are going to change is the text. Right now, the template displays the word 'Rival' across the middle. The team we are altering this design for is named 'Cardinals'. Use the CorelDraw! 'Pick Tool', (shown to left) and select directly on top of the word 'Rival' in the template. You will notice eight, black squares appear around the object you selected. In this case, it it the word 'Rival' (see right). |
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| Now select the 'Text' menu item from the top of the page. It is a main navigation tool at the very top of your CorelDraw! work area. Once selected, you will see a fly-out menu (see right) that will have several text editing tools. You will select 'Edit Text', (see right). |
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| Once selected, a pop-up
text editor will appear. The word you are editing will be visible within
the editor and it will be shown in the font that it was originally created with
- in this case, BrushScript BT. (see right) Simply drag your mouse over the text and highlight it. Once highlighted, you may type any custom text you wish. Since the school we are creating this design for is has a mascot name of 'Cardinals', that's what we're going type. Now select 'OK' at the bottom of your text editor window. |
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| BAM! The word
'Cardinals' appeared in the exact same position and format as the previous word
'Rival'! (see right) This is the incredible advantage CorelDraw! has over most all vector draw packages on the market. It allows us to preset your template text and you can simply retype and a different word and keep all of the original formatting and position! Cool huh? Now, this doesn't mean you can't alter the text further. Not at all! You can move it, resize it, change the font, recolor it, change the outline thickness or completely delete it altogether! All our presets do is give you an excellent starting point for a professional design! NOTE: In most of our templates, we stack fonts directly on top of each other to create nice effects. In this design, we stacked the word 'Cardinals'. Notice there is a red and gold 'Cardinals' on top, and a black one behind it. That is why you see a black outline around the red and gold. Simply change the black text in the back like you did the one in the front. It's that easy! You might have noticed that the 's' at the end of the word Cardinals didn't line up to the tail as accurately as you might want. No problem, just select the word again with your 'Pick Tool' and nudge it where you want it. |
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| In this case, we nudged the
word 'Cardinal' up a tad (see right) and decided that's where we would leave
it. Then, we selected the word 'Cardinal' and the tail by holding down
the shift key on our keyboard. That allowed both elements to be selected
together, at the same time. (see right) Once both elements were selected,
new tools appeared on our tool bar at the top of the page (see below). We
will now click on the 'Weld' tool (see below) and the two objects we have
selected together, will become one. They will weld together. Notice in the next
image down on right, that the 's' at the end of the word 'Cardinals' and the
tail are now welded together. Compare the image to the right and the
image directly below. You will see how they have now become one object which
makes the design flow better.
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| Now we will change the text that has been 'Fit-To-Path' around the circle, across the top of the design. So we select it with our 'Pick Tool' (see right) and the eight, black bounding boxes appear once again. This can be a little tricky since the text is fit around an invisible circle so make sure you've selected JUST the text and not the circle too. Once the text is selected, we will again click on the 'Text' menu item at the top of the page and open the 'Text Editor'. |
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| Once the 'Text Editor' is open, we can change the text we originally had entered to our custom text to fit this job. Previously we had entered 'RIVALART.COM TEMPLATES & TEMPLATE PARTS', (see previous image to right). Now we will change it to 'BIRCHWOOD HIGH SCHOOL' and select 'OK' from the bottom of the 'Text Editor' window. |
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| Our changes instantly
appear once again! (see right) With the font still selected, we can edit
the text further if needed. It will continue to wrap around the invisible
circle that we had preset into the template, allowing you to get the
look-and-feel you need. Notice how we enlarged the 'BIRCHWOOD HIGH SCHOOL' font to balance the design. (see below) Let's change the word template on the banner (see right) to display the year instead. |
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| Follow the same sequence we
stepped through earlier on the word 'Rival' and your banner text will change
instantly! (see right)
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Since the school we are creating this design for is the Cardinals, we certainly don't want to leave the tiger head. So select the existing tiger head with your "Pick Tool' (left) and press 'Delete' on your keyboard. It will disappear. (see right) |
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| Now we will import the
cardinal head we got from Rival art's 'Template Parts' store ;-) and import it
it into our design. Accomplishing this is very easy. From the main,
upper menu of CorelDraw!, select >FILE>IMPORT and a pop-window of your
directories and files will appear. So chose the cardinal head and clicked
'OK'. The head appeared on our work area and we moved it to the middle of
the design. Unfortunately, several things were wrong. The head is
too small and it covered the word 'Cardinals'. (see right)
Time for some changin'. |
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| Select the cardinal head with your pick tool and the black bounding boxes will appear around it. From the top main menu of CorelDraw we will select >ARRANGE>ORDER and a fly-out menu appears where we will select ' In Front Of ' (see right) Once this selection is made, our 'Pick Tool' cursor gets FAT. It wants us to tell it what we want the cardinal head to go in front of. So we select the black background circle behind the cardinal head. |
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| This moves the cardinal head in front of the black background circle and most importantly, BEHIND the word Cardinal. (see right) Sometimes you will need to play around with this tool until you get the right placement of the object you're bringing forward or sending back. In this case, it worked perfectly the first time. |
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| Now we start playing with
the size and position of the head. Notice to the right, how we moved and
enlarged the head a bit. That's about as big as it will go due to the
text across the top. We wouldn't want to completely block it out.
The design could be finished, ready to deliver to the customer at this point.
For tutorial purposes, we're going to pretend that the customer requested the head to be much larger and that we get rid of the text at the top. |
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| So that's what we
did. You can enlarge the head by simply clicking on one of the corner
bounding boxes and pulling it out. Notice how we grabbed the top right
bounding box. (see right)
The customer requested one last modification. |
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They asked that we make the word 'Baseball' located in the banner, more pronounced. The following instructions will show you how to manipulate outlines and fills. Once you read these instructions, you will be able to alter any object in CorelDraw! the exact same way. In other words, the outline and fill tool works exactly the same on art elements as it does text. To begin with, we select the white word 'Baseball' within the banner and then go to our Outline Tool (see left) |
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| A fly-out menu appears. (right) This allows us to either make a quick outline choice or by selecting the pen tip within the fly-out, we can open an outline dialogue box. (next image down on right) |
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| We decided to go to the dialogue box and make several changes at one time. A thick outline is needed for a drop shadow effect. We chose an 8.0pt outline (right) and directly below the point selection dropdown, we chose to round the corners of the font since the outline would be so thick. The next selection was to select a color for the outline - we chose black. You can see the result in the previous design image. (two pictures up on right) The last selection we made within the dialogue box was to select 'Scale with image'. This is a very important selection since the final design will be reduced and enlarged to go on several different items. By selecting this option, we can make sure the outline of the font will automatically reduce and enlarge with the design as we manipulate the complete design size within CorelDraw! |
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Now to the fill option. To begin with, we select the now, black word 'Baseball' within the banner and then choose our Fill Tool (see left) A fly-out menu appears. (right) This allows us to either make a quick outline choice or by selecting the colorful square on the far left of the fly-out, we can open a fill dialogue box. (next image down on right) |
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| Again, we decided to go to
the dialogue box. Once in the box we chose Pantone Process Black just as
we did with the outline. Simply select on the color of your choice and
click 'OK'. Now we have the font filled with black and we have a thick black outline as well. We're ready to create a white font to sit on top of it. |
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| To accomplish this, we simply select >EDIT from the main top menu and once the sub-menus drop down, select 'Duplicate'. (see right) The object, in this case the word baseball, will be duplicated one on top of the other. |
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Let's go back to our Fill Menu Dialogue box by choosing the fill tool (left) and then the colored square within the fly-out. (immediate bottom). Once selected the Fill Dialogue pops up. (far right)
With the top/duplicate font selected, choose white for the fill. (right) The font fills white. |
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Now we select the 'Outline Tool' (left) and when the fly-out menu appears, simply choose the 'X' within the fly-out. This gets rid of the outline altogether. Since the font had been duplicated off of the thick black one, (we created) the outline had to be removed so not to interfere with the white. That's it! We have a complete, ready-to-deliver design for the customer! |
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How'd you do? This tutorial covered all the basic manipulation processes our templates require when using CorelDraw! We know the level of expertise our customer's posess are quite varied, so we've tried to make this tutorial as informative and descriptive as possible by utilizing both text, and images. PLEASE NOTE: We cannot offer telephone or e-mail support on how to use CorelDraw! If you need further assistance with learning CorelDraw!, you will need to contact their support or your owner's manual. Our pricing model does not afford us the option of providing training for third-party software. We hope you understand. If you don't have the time, or will, to learn CorelDraw! Or if you cannot understand the tutorial above, we can step in and customize your design for you. The pricing for this service is located on our customization page (linked from each product detail page).
Thank you for your understanding, |
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