Winding rule?

[theinonen]

Is there a way to change the winding rule for the paths in Xara?

I have been testing the trial version but can not see that option anywhere. Currently if I import something that was not specifically set to draw linetype before export is not fillable in Xara. Not a big deal but would be one step less to remember.

Edit: Correction, it seems I need to export filled shape or the shape can not be filled in Xara.

[gwpriester]

Not sure if what you are referring to is Reverse Paths.

[mwenz]

No, OP is not referring to reversing the path.

There is no winding direction in Xara products that I am aware of.

[gwpriester]

What is a winding direction? I have not heard this term before.

[mwenz]

What is a winding direction? I have not heard this term before.

Non-zero and even-odd winding rules dictate how overlapping paths get filled.

In the screen shot below I am using Illustrator. The graphic on the left is an even-odd winding rule and is how Xara products fill overlapping paths. The one on the right is an alternative filling method available in many/most vector graphic applications. I quickly redrew an example I saw on the web and it illustrates it well.

Take care, Mike

[zaphodeist]

I think it's this Gary - http://help.adobe.com/en_US/as3/dev/...34D7D1CBE.html - but I'm none the wiser

Mwenz beat me to it :-)

[mwenz]

I think Xara could add the non-zero winding rule. Why?

I exported the AI file out as a CS2 copy and imported it into XDPX9. While the fills and outlines are separated in the imported file, it seems to me that XDP is respecting the non-zero winding. I moved the fills away from the outlines a little and added back an outline. The result is in the screen shot. The one on the right is the one of interest. The outline and fill are editable and do not have the overlap "holes" as the one on the right does.

Mike



Added another screen shot. I moved the outline around. It still demonstrates a non-zero winding.

[gwpriester]

Got it. Thanks.

[PhilM]

All versions of Designer going all the way back to the very beginning have supported winding rules. This allows it to correctly render files imported from Ai, PDF, Postscript, etc. all of which may contain shapes with different winding rules. However Designer doesn't provide any UI to control winding rules because it's an arcane and technical feature that 99.99% of the time you don't need to know about or change.

The default winding rule, "even-odd", is used for all normal shapes but text characters are usually rendered with the "non-zero" winding rule.

You can see it by doing this interesting test:
* Draw a shape that has a hole in it, like the ones in Mike's posts above or simply freehand like this:

* Go to the text tool and type any character
* Convert it to editable shapes
* Copy
* Select the original shape and Paste Attributes

Result: The hole in the shape fills in because Paste Attributes has applied the non-zero winding rule from the text character.

(BTW: The OP used the term "winding rule" but he may simply have been asking about filling closed and/or unclosed shapes.)

Phil

[theinonen]

(BTW: The OP used the term "winding rule" but he may simply have been asking about filling closed and/or unclosed shapes.)
Phil

Actually no.

Here is an example with 2 circles, one you can not fill and one you can. Both were exported as Acorn draw file and then imported to Xara.