Align and distribute nodes

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CorelDRAW lets you quickly align and distribute nodes in one or more curves.

First, you need to choose a reference point. The reference point can be the bounding box of the selection, the page edge or center, the closest grid line, or a specified point.

The nodes in a curve (1) are left-aligned relative to the bounding box of all active nodes (2), the page edge (3) or center (4), the closest grid line (5), or a specified point (6).

After you set a reference point, you can choose an alignment option. You can align nodes to the left, right, top, or bottom, or along a horizontal or vertical axis.

The active nodes in a curve (top left) are aligned to the left (1), right (3), top (4), bottom (6), and along a vertical (2) and horizontal (5) axis relative to the bounding box of the selection.

You can align nodes from different curves.

The selected nodes from the two curves are aligned relative to a specified point.

When you align nodes in a selection, the alignment is based on the average of the bounding area of the active nodes. CorelDRAW aligns nodes based on the order in which they appear along a curve rather than on the order in which you select them because it can be time-consuming to select nodes one at a time in complex objects with hundreds of nodes. You can change the order of the nodes by reversing the direction of the curve object.

Distributing nodes adds equal spacing between them horizontally or vertically. You can distribute nodes within the bounding box that contains them or over the drawing page.

Nodes are distributed horizontally (1 and 3) and vertically (2 and 4) within the bounding box that surrounds them (1 and 2) and over the entire page (3 and 4).

CorelDRAW distributes nodes based on the order in which they appear along a curve.

From top to bottom: The nodes in a curve (top left and top right) are distributed horizontally (middle) or vertically (bottom) based on the order in which the nodes appear along the curve.

To prevent blurry edges in curve objects designed for web use, you can align the object nodes with the pixel grid. This feature realigns object nodes to position them correctly on the pixel grid.

Align nodes with the pixel grid to prevent blurry edges.

To align nodes

 

To	Do the following
Align nodes relative to the bounding box of the active nodes	Click the Active nodes button in the Align nodes to area. Note: When you select nodes along a curve, the nodes are aligned based on the order in which they appear along the curve. To change the direction of a curve, click the Reverse direction button on the Shape tool property bar.
Align nodes with the page edge	Click the Page edge button in the Align nodes to area.
Align nodes with the page center	Click the Page center button in the Align nodes to area. Tip: To align nodes with the page center, make sure that the Align horizontally button and Align vertically button in the Align area are enabled.

 

You can also
Align a node with the closest grid line	Click the Grid button in the Align nodes to area.
Align a node with a specified point	Click the Specified point button in the Align nodes to area, and type values in the Specify coordinates boxes. Tip: You can also specify a point interactively by clicking the Specify point button , and clicking in the document window.
Set an alignment option for text nodes	In the Text area, choose one of the following options: • First line baseline — aligns text by the baseline of the first line • Last line baseline — aligns text by the baseline of the last line • Bounding box — aligns text by its bounding box

You can also align nodes within the active selection, vertically and horizontally, by clicking the Align nodes button on the property bar, and enabling one or more alignment options in the Node align dialog box.

To distribute nodes

Since nodes have no real width or height, clicking any horizontal or vertical distribution button places equal space between the nodes along a horizontal or vertical axis, respectively.

To distribute nodes by a specified distance

To align nodes with the pixel grid

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