affinity publisher Chinese Character Practice Grid: My Very First Creation

[pagelayoutt]

Chinese Character Practice Grid: My Very First Creation with Affinity Publisher

Disclaimer: I’m a total newbie. I couldn’t find any tutorials relevant to the task, so I decided to just “wing” it. However, I am quite pleased with the results, simple as they are.

(1) I don’t know if it’s possible to draw different types of lines in Affinity Publisher, so I designed the grid itself in Microsoft Word, a variation on the traditional jeougongger 九宮格 “nine square grid” approach.

(2) I imported a smaller grid into Affinity Publisher, copied it once using Ctrl-C, then pasted multiple copies into place using Ctrl-V to create an A4 sheet (keyboard shortcuts I have been using in Microsoft Word for over 20 years). The individual squares did not quite line up, so I had to fiddle with the positions for quite a while (less than ideal).

(3) I then used the Slender Gold font (based on the calligraphic style of the last emperor of the Song Dynasty) to type in the three characters of a Chinese name I chose for a foreign friend. I was quite pleased to discover that Affinity Publisher automatically snaps the characters exactly into the center of each box. I typed in an English title using GR Tonal Spelling, AKA Gwoyeu Romatzyh 國語羅馬字 (guan is 1st tone, guann is 4th tone).

(4) I exported the resulting file as a PNG file. The menu item was exactly where I expected it to be.

(5) Finally, I cropped the first three boxes using Photoscape. Maybe Affinity Publisher has cropping tools built in?

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Initial verdict: I was very pleased that a total newbie like myself could create a usable. I created an attractive design without even reading the instructions (the tutorials I found were not helpful). I still have a lot to learn, but so far I feel that my money was well spent.

Problem: Although I bought the software directly from Serif, it cost me about US $65 (not sure why it costs more in Taiwan: my income is very limited). I hope I can pick up the Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer at Black Friday discounts.

[Patrick Connor]

Welcome to the Serif Affinity forums   (ยินดีต้อนรับสู่ฟอรัม Serif Affinity )

14 minutes ago, pagelayoutt said:

I hope I can pick up the Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer at Black Friday discounts

No sale has been announced, but we have had a sale in late November for the last few years, so if you can wait there will be no harm in seeing what happens.

 

[pagelayoutt]

Thank you for the encouraging news! I'll be patient and hope for this pans out.