Adobe InDesign CS3 Bible

Overview

No matter how skillful you become using InDesign's Pen and Pencil tools to create free-form paths, it's difficult to create exactly what you want on your first attempt. For example, after creating a path , you may want to add detail, smooth out a rough spot, or turn a straight segment into a curved one. No problem. InDesign lets you modify the paths you create in several ways. You can

• Add or delete anchor points.

• Move anchor points.

• Change corner points to smooth points and vice versa.

• Modify direction lines.

• Extend an open path.

• Change a closed path to an open path and vice versa.

  Note ‚

  The path-manipulation techniques explained in this chapter apply to all types of paths, including open and closed paths created with the Pen tool, the Pencil tool, and the object-creation tools; text and picture frames (which are simply paths that act as containers); clipping paths created with the Clipping Path command (Object ‚ Clipping Path, or Option+Shift+ z +K or Ctrl+Alt+Shift+K) or built into imported pictures; and text-wrap paths created with the Text Wrap pane (Object ‚ Text Wrap, or Option+ z +W or Ctrl+Alt+W).

Generally, when you want to manipulate a path, you'll use one of the three variations of the Pen tool, all of which are displayed in a single pop-up menu in the Tools palette (shown in Figure 27-1):

• Both the Add Anchor Point tool and the Delete Anchor Point tool let you add and delete anchor points.

• The Convert Direction Point tool lets you change smooth points to corner points and vice versa.

Figure 27-1: The four Pen tools in the Tools palette.

You can also use the Pen tool with keyboard shortcuts to perform all the functions of the Add Anchor Point, Delete Anchor Point, and Convert Direction Point tools.