clock face

[bobbiescap]

Greetings to all, I am creating a clock face and need to align and distribute numerals between two contrenic circles, any tips for doing this easily as I may need to do it regularly? Sincere thanks in advance for reading this, and any advice. May 2017 be kind to you all.

[brynn]

There are at least a couple of ways to do this.....3 I can think of, but none easy to explain.  I know I've seen a tutorial recently, but don't remember enough to be able to find it. 

The easiest way might be to use Object menu > Arrange > Polar Coordinates tab.  I have not had good luck with that feature.  When I was trying it just now, I couldn't get it to work.  And then all of a sudden, it was working.  So no guarantees.  But here are the steps:

Draw a 3rd circle which is precisely between the 2 original circles.  Do not convert this circle to path.  Hold the Ctrl key, and rotate the circle counterclockwise by 4 steps.  There's no visual clue, so you have to look at the status bar while you rotate.  When the status bar indicates 60 degrees, stop rotating. 

Type the numbers, one at a time, starting with 12 and ending with 1.  It doesn't matter where you type them, but it is important to start with 12 and end with 1.  I mean,  make 12 separate text objects.  Not one long string of numbers.  (With Text tool, click, type 12, move over, click, type 11, move over, click, type 10, etc.)

I had to move my circle, to make it work (and I'll report it on the mailing list later, in case it might be a bug).  So if the result puts the numbers all at 3 o'clock, you could try selecting all 3 circles, and move them together.

In the Polar Coordinates tab, choose "Object's rotational center" and "First circle"  (works just as well with 2nd circle).  Select all the numbers and the newly rotated 3rd circle, then click the Arrange button. 

If you want the numbers to be rotated according to their position around the circle, so that 6 is upside-down (I've seen some clocks like that), be sure to tick the Rotate option in the dialog before you click Arrange.

Now to deal with the 3rd circle, which you probably don't want to see.  If you don't think you'll ever need the circle again, you could just delete it.  Or if you might need to use it again, you can either note what size it is, so you can make another later, or you could keep the circle and give it either zero width or make it transparent, so it's still in the file.  Or you could move it to a hidden layer.

Let us know if you run into any problems, and we'll try to help 

[Lazur]

Hi.

In this topic we discussed two completely different methods to create a similar drawing. -At the time polar arrange option wasn't available.-

[bobbiescap]

Thank you both,

In haven't tried your suggestions yet, but will after I have replied, Brynn I am so grateful to you for the time and caring you put into your post. I issued the numerals already, and I think they are in order, though I have already rotated them as you suggested was sometimes done, and am wondering if that will affect the outcome. If things don't work I will start again as you suggested, they are all single numerals so it's easy. It is actually a masonic symbol that I am doing a design around, but it is exactly like a clock face except for the number or numerals, and that description saved me much explanation.

For your reference Brynn, and I guess you know this already, but the easiest way to rotate an object when you know the angle is to use the rotate tab on the transform menu, (Object-->Transform). As an aside I migrated from Corel Draw, as a casual graphics person, certainly no professional, but useful in  a limited way, is my best description, anyway, I think Corel used angles in the same direction as a compass, where Inkscape calculates them counterclockwise, no big deal, just something for me to remember.

Big thanks also for not referring me to Google as happens on some other groups. I am an artisan and my mind has issues with converting an idea into a search engine effective term, I would imagine that a lot of artists have the same. Cheers folks, let's make this day one to long remember for all the happy reasons.

Love and best wishes to all,
Roger Barnes

[bobbiescap]

Brynn your tutorial forced me to check my version because I had no "Arrange" menu, My current one is 0.48 on Debian Jessie, the current stable version is 0.92, I am in shock that it is so far out, I will be fixing it immediately and thanks for bringing it to my attention.

[bobbiescap]

All good, I installed the latest Inkscape from the Jessie backports and it worked a treat thanks. I am concerned about the version being so old in Debian stable. Many thanks for the help.

[brynn]

I don't know about other versions, but at least in 0.92, you can rotate either way.  There are 2 little icons in the Rotate dialog, to change the direction.

Yes, now that I think about it, I think you had to use a negative number (or subract 360) to rotate in the other direction, in previous versions.  So that's a nice little improvement!

I'm glad it worked well for you.  And bonus, there are loads of new features in 0.92, compared to 0.48.