Computer Scrapbooking: Using Draw's Slice Command for Scrapbooking

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Windows Draw 6 or CompletePublisher'99

Pattern Backgrounds for Pages

Adding a background pattern to a scrapbook page is easy to do in Micrografx Draw!

Pattern Sources:
Draw comes with a variety of background patterns, but before you try this, you might want to download some of the special patterns here in the Fun Stuff section. These are patterns that have been designed especially with scrapbooking and computer crafts in mind!

After you download a pattern set, create a special folder on you hard disk to store the patterns, then decompress the pattern set into that folder.

OK, ready to make some fun scrapbook pages with pattern backgrounds? Here's how:

1. Start Draw and create a new page.

2. From the "Format" menu, select "Page Background".

3. A window called "Background" will open. In the left part of the window, click the circle next to "Texture" and then click the "Next" button.

4. In the "Texture" window that opens you will see some tabs and a left and a right arrow to the right of the tabs. Click on the right arrow until you see the tab that says "Custom" and then click on the "Custom" tab.

5. When you click on the "Custom" tab, you'll see a white rectangle and a "Browse..." button below it.

6. Click on the "Browse" button and then go to the folder on your hard disk that has the patterns you downloaded. When you go inside the folder, you will see the file names for the patterns.

7. When you click on a file name, you will see a preview of that pattern. Select a pattern that you want to use and then click the "Open" button. This will take you back to the "Texture" window and you will see a preview of the pattern you selected.

8. Click the "Next" button. In the next "Texture" window that appears, you will see several options for how the pattern should be displayed. Click the "Tile" option.

9. Below those options is a slider bar you can use to adjust the overall size of the pattern. You may want to experiment with this latter, but for now, leave it set at it's default which is almost, but not quite all the way to the left.

10. There is a color adjustment slider also. If you're using patterns you've downloaded from Computer Scrapbooking, this option will be grayed out. With certain formats of graphics, you can use this option, but with our JPG format patterns, this option is not available.

11. OK, ready to make the pattern appear on your layout? Click the "Finish" button and you have a background pattern on your page!