PhotoPaint 9 Tutorial - Using the Recorder for Scripts

Photo-Paint 9 Using the Recorder for Scripts by Jed Clampett August 1, 2000 It is so easy to record your actions or commands and re-use them, you'll wonder why you never did it before. I love this feature. Once I get an effect tweaked just the way I like, I go back and record it for future use. For example, the Patina for the metal text took a very long time to get the way I liked, I hate to have to do it over every time I need it. I used this effect for a logo on a Kids Horse site and then used the action on the headers of the inside pages.   1 The Recorder is a Docker window, and it works similar to your VCR. Just click the Record button and it records each action you take until you click stop. 2 Let's take a look at the recorder- Windows|Dockers|Recorder     3 New Script - New Script will erase the current recording and start a new one. Open Script - Open Script will open the open script dialog and you locate and open a previously recorded script. Save Recording - Name and save your recording Insert New Command - This is where you can insert a new recording. You enable the Insert New Command button, click the record button and your new recording will appear below the command you have selected, click stop. Enable/Disable Selected Command - When a command is disabled it is grayed out. This is a toggle switch, works for enable and disable. Hold the CTRL key to select more than one command, if they are all in a row then SHIFT click to select.   4 The triangle arrow to the right of Enable/Disable opens an Option Popup menu.   Show Commands toggles the display of the commands in the Docker on and Off. Use Frame Range applies only to when you are working with animations. It allows the recorder actions to be restricted to a range of frames in a movie. Scale on Playback when enabled will produce the same final image size each time it is played. This is pretty cool because it doesn't matter what size the original image is in perhaps a batch of images, they will all be generated at the same size.   5 OK, now that you are familiar with the recorder, let's record our steps in Metal Patina Part 1 and 2. Open up the Recorder if you still don't have it open - Windows|Dockers|Recorder   6 Because you'll change the text, font, etc. I start with my text ready and selected before I begin using the recorder. So select the Text tool and type your word and make it an object by clicking on the object picker tool.   7 Click the record button and do all the steps in the tutorials. *Note* when you get to the fill, the Patina may be already selected if you haven't used the texture fill since making it. If it is then just click OK. If not you can load it by going to Samples 7 and locating you saved version and clicking OK. You do not need to select colors over again. 8 When you finish, click the Stop button on the recorder   9 Now we need to save our newly made script. Go to the Save button in the RECORDER DOCKER. This is saved as a Corel script with a .csc extension. 10 To test your new script, Open a new document, type some text, select it go to Tools|CorelScript|Run Script and you'll see your new script, select it and click OK   Mine worked, did yours? Here it is in case you need it. Patina Script After you download, just unzip it and drop patina.csc into Photo-Paint's script folder.