Creating Bézier boxes
The Bézier Pen tool lets you draw multi-sided Bézier boxes and lines that can have straight and curved line segments (see “Understanding Bézier shapes“).
To draw a Bézier box:
- Select the Bézier Pen tool from the Tools palette. Move the Crosshair pointer to any position on the page and click to establish the first point.
- Move the pointer to where you want the next point positioned. To constrain pointer movement to a 45-degree angle relative to the page, press Shift.
- Click to create points and line segments.
- Clicking a point without dragging creates a straight line and corner point. To create a curved line segment and smooth point, click and drag wherever you want the next point positioned. A point with two curve handles displays. You can control the curve’s size and shape by dragging a curve handle. Press Option/Alt while dragging a smooth point to create a curved segment and corner point.
- If desired, edit the Bézier shape while you are still drawing it.
- To close the box, close the path by positioning the mouse pointer over the beginning of the line and then click when the Close Box pointer displays.
Note: When any of the drawing tools are active, you can press Command/Ctrl to temporarily switch to the Select Point tool. When the Select Point tool is active, you can press Command+Option/Ctrl+Alt to temporarily switch to the Item tool.
Parent topic: Creating text and picture boxes