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Guides

Four measuring guides live under the ring's Measurement slot, and trace paper has a slot of its own. The guides sit on the screen like drawing instruments: they measure, and your strokes snap to them.

The ring with the Measurement menu open beside it: Ruler, Angle, Perspective and Proportion.

Showing a guide

On the Measurement slot What it does
Click Show or hide the guide. It appears on the screen under the pointer.
Hold Choose which guide: Ruler, Angle, Perspective or Proportion.
Right-click Open the measurement properties.

The guide is independent of the drawing tool: switch to the Brush, the Highlight or the Text tool and it stays where it is, until you click the Measurement slot again.

Working with a guide

  • Handles — the blue dots, with an amber one at a corner or centre — are dragged directly, whatever tool you are using.
  • Move the whole guide: hold Alt and drag its body, or drag it with the middle mouse button.
  • Right-click the guide's body to change its units: Pixels, Millimeters or Centimeters for the ruler, Degrees or Radians for angles.

Strokes snap to it

With Snap brush to guides on (it is, at first), a brush stroke that comes within about 18 pixels of a guide follows it exactly:

Guide Strokes snap to
Ruler either edge, or the centre line
Angle the nearer arm
Perspective the nearest ray
Proportion the edges of the box

Snapping applies to the Brush, not to the eraser.

Measurement properties

Right-click the Measurement slot:

Setting For Options
Mode all Ruler, Angle, Perspective, Proportion
Live value all The current reading, large
Distance unit Ruler, Proportion Pixels, Millimeters, Centimeters
Angle unit Angle Degrees, Radians
Rays Perspective 3 – 48 (12 at first)
Guide Proportion None, Rule of thirds, Golden section, Diagonals
Infinite ruler Ruler Extend the ruler across the whole screen
Snap brush to guides all Called Snap brush to rays for Perspective

Changing the mode puts a fresh guide on the current screen; a guide's position is not kept after Am_sketch closes.

Millimetres and centimetres are approximate

They are worked out from the main screen's reported resolution, not from a calibrated measurement of your monitor, so treat them as a guide rather than a ruler you could cut paper with.

  • Ruler — a straight edge that measures.
  • Angle — a protractor with two arms.
  • Perspective — a vanishing point and its rays.
  • Proportion — a box that names its ratio.
  • Trace paper — a sheet over the screen.