Drawing Tools of PageMaker are used to draw various basic or custom shapes.  But there is no tool available to create a curve.

Two types of basic drawing shapes:

1. Open shape: shape having two or more end points. Eg: Line
2. Closed shape: shape that don’t have any end point.  Closed shape can have two parts, one is its outline and other is fill area. Eg: Circle

Properties of Open Shape:

1. Outline color
2. Outline stroke (width and style)

Properties of Closed shape:

1. Outline color
2. Outline stroke (width and style)
3. Fill Color (Solid, Pattern or Transparent)

The only open shape we can create in PageMaker is the line.  The line can be drawn at any angle. 

Pointer tool and Drawing Objects:

All the drawing tools are useful to draw their respective shape first time only.  Later they cannot be used to modify the shapes.  A drawn shape can be selected, resized or moved with the help of pointer tool only. 

Default Properties or Settings:

Default setting or properties are the values that were set initially at the time of PageMaker Installation.  Any setting in PageMaker becomes default when nothing has been selected on the screen.

To change any properties for a particular shape, we have to first select it then change any property.  Otherwise, the property becomes default.

Change Outline Stroke (Width&Style):

Element menuàStroke

Applying color to outline or fill:

Element menuàFillàSolid/Paper/None/Pattern

Fill and Stroke Dialog box can be used to apply Fill and Stroke for both open or closed shapes. 

Element menuàFill and Stroke (Ctrl+U)