Hi all,

Clueless newbie here...sorry if this is an obvious answer. I'm trying to modify some pathified text so that I can replace the middle line in the "e" with clock hands, but I can't seem to figure out any way to "fill in", so to speak, the missing area of the outside curve where the line would normally intersect. This is as far as I've gotten...



And this is an incredibly crude sketch of what I'm shooting for. (Please pardon the terrible drawing skills...)



Does anyone have any pointers?

Thanks in advance!

One way...
1. draw two rectangles for your clock hands, such that they overlap with your "e"
2. select all 3 objects
3. Menubar | Path | Union
Done!

Hey,

Thanks for the quick response, and sorry about my slow one!

That sounds perfect, but for one thing...I need the left side of the e to sort of "extrapolate" the curve that would be there without the intersecting line. If only there were a way to specify the bezier's values manually, instead of by dragging...

There are ways to enter values for some aspects of curves. But I don't understand what you mean about extrapolating. If you mean that you want the curve to be the same on the left and right sides of the "e", you might have to draw the whole e object yourself. I mean the "e" for whatever font you chose might not be made that way (edit - the same curve on both sides).

If the e object really needs to look like a clock, it might be more effective if it didn't look exactly the the font "e". I'm thinking it might be more effective if you left a space for the "e" and drew your own object, based on a circle.

I was going to write out steps for you. But instead, I'm going to try to make a video. I'm not very good at it yet. And someone else might post a video before I finish. But anyway, for the video, since there won't be any audio, and I haven't learned how to make captions yet, I will circle the mouse around items which you need to notice. The mouse will be highlighted with a yellow circle. I'll try to go slow.

Ok, you can try this. I should say that there are probably several different ways to accomplish this. This is only one way. Let me know if you have any questions.

Video

Edit
Looks like it somehow was cut off before I finished. Ok, I'll make a 2nd video that picks up where that one leaves off, and also it will show a way to put the gap in there, as if it were an "e".

If you don't want the gap, then just don't duplicate to create the blue piece. If you like the gap in there, but it doesn't match the font very well, then maybe someone else will tell you how to do it exactly like you've explained, by starting with the original "e" character. (If no one else answers, I'll explain. It just takes more steps, which are less simple.)

2nd Video

Sorry, @Metacity, I don't understand what you mean with

Metacity wrote:sort of "extrapolate" the curve that would be there without the intersecting line

The outline and the inner border of your "e" are not circles but close to some ellipses, as indicated below by the red approximated ellipses. But these two ellipses do not even have the same aspect ratio. Well, that's how the "e" of this font was made.
I just can guess that you probably want to have the inner border in a "similar" curvature like the outer, i.e. deleting the straight vertical parts? Is it that what you meant with "mirroring"?
One way to achieve that could be:
1. draw and fit an "inner" ellipse
2. select your "e" and the ellipse
3. Menubar | Path | Difference
Done!

As Theoz alludes, type characters are irregular shapes, and rarely symmetric.

One way to visualize, is to create a duplicate character with contrasting color and flip it.

Metacity wrote:I need the left side of the e to sort of "extrapolate" the curve that would be there without the intersecting line. If only there were a way to specify the bezier's values manually, instead of by dragging...

I think I might understand what you're asking now -- maybe. Is it that you don't want the vertical segment to touch the top of the e object, but instead of the top of that segment being straight across the top, you want it to have a curve, which exactly matches the upper curve?

I'm not going to make another video, or write steps until I'm sure. And unfortunately, I'm about to log off, and I might not be around to night or tomorrow. But if still unanswered when I get back, I'll try to explain.

Hi...sorry about my slowness, been crazy here.

Thanks so much for all your help, everyone. In the end, theozh's difference trick worked perfectly, and I managed to cobble it together! I'm not sure, given what brynn suggested, that I really explained myself very well, so here's the final result...



I'm slowly working my way through everything...will be sure to ask any more questions I have here. Thank you again.