Boxes behind boxes

[Virginia Blakelock 0]

 

In a discussion on the tmg mailing list, Robin mentioned that he sometimes emphasizes a particular box by placing a slightly larger rectangle behind it.

 

This screenshot includes some simple examples of that technique. There is a box behind the focus persons' box, another box (cream-colored) behind the entire chart, and yet another box behind the excerpt (screenshot) from Help.

 

The Structure Toolbar is used to bring into focus the box or object you wish to edit. You can use the Structure Toolbar (preferred) or the rightclick menu when the box/object is selected. On the Toolbar and on the rightclick Order menu are 4 options:

 

Bring to front - brings the selected box/object to the front

Send to back - sends the selected box/object to the back

Bring forward - brings the selected box/object forward one position (say there are more than 2 objects layered)

Send backward - sends the selected box/object backward one position

 

The first two icons on the Structure Toolbar are Group and Ungroup - so you can save or move the grouped objects as one.

 

The chart was hand-colored with the VCF palette. This let me easily experiment with different colors to get the overall look I wanted.

 

Virginia

[RobinL 0]

Thanks for putting up the example.

 

My preference has been not to fill that rectangle but to thicken its border and colour it mid-grey - it really depends on what level of emphasis you require.

 

It can be possible to achieve a simular effect by using a flag and accents. But not always if you already have a large number of accenting setups in use.

 

BTW: Did you know that you can also use any of the TMG supplied frames as fancy ways of adding this emphasis. These are in your Frames folder - see the TMG file storage help for the path navigate to.

 

In VCF, click on the "Add Picture from File" toolbar button and navigate to that Frames folder, select the frame that you want. (Selection is easiest if you put the file selector view mode into Thumbnails first.) The frame will be pasted at a large size which you will need to resize to your needs, then place then "send to back".

 

This frame technique also can be used to creating a border for the whole chart.

[RobinL 0]

Just thought that would put up another use of a rectangle behind the chart.

 

 

I prune various branches off the top chart by creating a flag and then using the "Include persons with flag value" option.

 

The sub-chart is produced by starting a second chart at the marked couple.

 

For family reunions, I then produce a series of charts of smaller size that are easy to display.

 

The top chart provides the linkage between the top charts.

 

I hope that this gives others ideas of how versitle VCF can be in getting the family story over to the audience.