Offshoot of the Xara Xone creating a Casino poster.

[Egg Bramhill]

I didn't want to distract from Gary's tutorial in his thread so I thought I'd start another to compliment his. Basically this comes about due to Riks idea in post #5 of an alternative method of creating the roulette wheel shape rather than use Gary's blend technique.



Watch in HD

Egg

[pauland]

That's interesting Egg, though I think Gary's method is probably easier to get to grip with.

I don't have access to my Xara software at the moment, or I would give it a go. I can't help but think there has to be an easier way!

In the past I used to make quite a few projects that required circle segments and I used to do it by segmenting circles with a rotated line - quite close to Gary's method and I used to slice them then subtract a circle from the centre to get the shape I wanted.

It's always interesting to see different approaches. Thanks to you and Gary for the videos.

[Albacore]

Yey I would do it your way as well Egg although still slightly different. I would set up in Page Options, General tab, under "angle constraint" the rotation angle. Then I would follow your instructions making the two lines into the double segments using the Shape Editor tool in the correct position with the segment centred at 12 o'clock. Then just rotate holding down Ctrl to constrain the rotation and to copy the segments by "right clicking". I would then just follow your video instructions to make both chequered panels.

Mind you Gary's blend method was refreshing to see and I will try and store in the old grey matter.

[mikeymopar]

...In the past I used to make quite a few projects that required circle segments and I used to do it by segmenting circles with a rotated line - quite close to Gary's method and I used to slice them then subtract a circle from the centre to get the shape I wanted...

that's how i've done it many times in the past too. i did try the roulette wheel both ways and Gary's way will be quicker, at least for me, the SECOND time around
man does Gary ever fly through with those keyboard shortcuts. i'm so used to the top menus or right-clicking on an item(s) that i spend more time writing down all of his keyboard shortcut references in his videos to refer back to for the times that he'll explain how to accomplish something using the shortcut only and i'll have no idea what he did

(i'm trying to get out of "minimum post count " so please be patient with my next few (possibly lame) posts )

[pauland]

You can't help but think that it should be far easier to create a segmented circle (which is really the core of the wheel creation).

[stygg2003]

You can't help but think that it should be far easier to create a segmented circle (which is really the core of the wheel creation).

I've done both Gary's and Egg's vid. tuts. of the Casino poster and found both just as good as each other but I agree you would think there would be an easier way. With that in mind, I've set my grandkids a challenge to see if they can come up with something on the school computers, call it part of their IT education Some really smart kids in that class, put me to shame

Stygg

[theinonen]

There is easier way outside of Xara and it is called polar array.

I have never been big fan of boolean operations or compound shapes and much prefer breaking and joining things manually for more direct control of things. Much of the same simple math like in Garys video still apply but with this approach need only focus on small part.

Personally I would draw circle and then use parallel tool to duplicate the shape 2 times. Then I would draw small line to connect the circles and move the reference point of line into centre of circles. After that copy line 40 times around the reference point, use those copied lines and circles to break each other to get segments from the circles and then join 4 segments that form the checker pattern. Then would only need group those together and once again move reference point into centre of circles.

If you copy that group 20 times around the reference point, you get full circle. If not want full circle, you can just do 360/20=18 and then you have the angle and If want half circle, you use that angle and change quantity to 10. Very easy and fast.

I can then just export to Draw or PDF and import to ArtWorks, Xara or whatever.

[mikeymopar]

i played a bit more with different ways to achieve "segments" easily and came up with creating a triangle brush as the starting point. (a little long winded but really not much to it)

1. make a triangle with the short side oriented to the top and the approximate size of the segment that you want.
2. create a brush using this triangle.
3. make a circle with a large line thickness to start with and while the circle is selected click on "freehand and brush tool" and then select your newly created triangle brush to replace the regular edge with a triangle segmented edge.
4. change the line thickness (i went to 300px) to get the overall approximate diameter and then back in "brush tool" select "edit brush" and in the "spacing" tab increase the spacing to get the effect you desire. (for a roulette wheel you need 19 segments as evenly spaced as possible)
5. once satisfied "convert to editable shapes" and then "convert line to shape" (must be in this order)
now you can do whatever manipulation you want to this shape (including "ungroup" to get completely individual slices)
in the roulette wheel case - use a smaller circle to slice the outer edge of the segments into squares. color them all at once or ungroup and color individually, etc....

done in a few minutes with no math involved (and i actually like math and minored in it )

[theinonen]

How about make gear shape from reference picture without using any booleans/compound shapes, or any support for holes in shape?


Same still applies, trace single teeth and then divide Inner sections of the gear to 6 sectors. Put reference points at the centre of the circle and then copy teeth 72 times and sectors 6 times around the reference point. Finally just group everything together and gear is ready.

[mikeymopar]

How about make gear shape from reference picture without using any booleans/compound shapes, or any support for holes in shape?...

Xara P&G 10 can do it too .....done without tracing a reference pic tho using the method i described above in about 10 minutes (admittedly the "tooth" could be a little more refined but not bad for first design) with the only copy/pasting being the 6 holes. created a "gear tooth" brush which can be applied to any shape you can draw