Pages

Monday, March 5, 2012

Making a Chevron pattern with Microsoft Word and Paint

Hello all, today I thought I'd show you a quick way to create a customized chevron pattern using Microsoft Word and Paint.

Step 1: Open up Microsoft Word (I used 2010, these steps should also apply to 2007). Go to the insert tab and select the rectangle option.
Step 2: After you have drawn a rectangle on the page, go back to the insert tab and select the line option.


Step 3: Draw a line at a downward angle, starting in the top left corner of the rectangle.


Step 4: Selecting the line option once again, draw a line slanting up and to the right starting at the bottom point of the first line.


Step 5: Repeat steps 3 and 4 until you reach the far right line of the rectangle.

Step 6: Copy and paste the row completed in step 5 and position directly above the above row until you have completely filled the rectangle.

Step 7: After you have completely filled the rectangle, select each row as well as the bordering rectangle. Once you have selected the contents of the screen, hit CTRL + C to copy the pattern and open up paint. Once paint is open you want to hit CTL + P to paste into Paint.

Step 8: Go to the first tab and select Save As. When the Save As dialogue box appears save as chevron. (The default file type is PNG).


Step 9: To customize the colors of the chevron pattern, choose the paint bucket icon in the tools section of the Home tab.


Step 10: Then select your desire color and click on the lines that you wish to color. To change colors, choose another color from the options and then click in the space you want that color to appear.


Step 11: When you have achieved your desired look, you can save the picture, and then open the graphic back up in Word to adjust size and print.




11 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. You're welcome! Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment!

      Delete
  2. This is great! My question is how to get this to print to the edge of the paper? I could be wrong, but even with setting the margins to 0 everywhere, a small margin is still printed, no?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, even with the margins set at 0, you end up with about a .5 edge around if you print from many desktop printers. http://desktoppub.about.com/od/desktopprinting/a/Full-Bleed-Printing-From-a-Desktop-Printer.htm - This link lists several printers that allow you to print to the edge of the paper.

      Delete
  3. Hello, Thank you for the helpful info, the only thing is, I can not seem to change the colors in paint. it only lets me do one color. Could you help ?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi, The first thing I would check is to make sure all of your rows of chevron touch the box surrounding the chevron patterns. Paint recognizes those connections as an end to where the color should fill. Also make sure when you select a color and click on an area of the chevron, make sure your cursor is in the center of the area you want to fill. Sometimes, when I am not super careful I click too close to the next line and fill the wrong lines with color. I hope that helps.

      Delete
  4. Thank you for this tutorial :) I am interested in making monograms for my computer and this helped me a lot! Take care!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Thanks but how do I get rid of the lines between the rows of chevroms

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. When you click on the spaces in between the lines to fill with color, you could also click on the lines themselves with the same colors - this will make the lines look invisible because they will now blend in to the colors you used for in between the lines.

      Delete
  6. I can't seem to copy and paste all the lines together. I can copy one line at a time only. Please advise

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Frank, you will probably need to try holding the shift key down while selecting each row. If that doesn't work often if you start in the top left corner of the image, click down on your mouse and drag to the end of the images you want to select, and then once everything is selected, right click and there should be a "Grouping" option in the drop down menu appears - Go to that option and select "Group" - Then you should be able to copy and paste each line without any further issues. Hope that helps!

      Delete