Expression 3 Coffee Tute Page 1

3: Tools for the Job: Here are just a few of the tools that control the look of your paths (strokes, lines, whatever you want to call them) Once a path is drawn, you can choose the attributes you wish to apply to it; style, width, colour, gradient and whether or not it has a fill. The toolbox (top right) has the selection tool for paths or groups of paths, the node tool for reshaping the path etc. The gradient tool controls the nature and direction of any gradients applied to your path, fill or shapes. For the curtains in my image, I simply used long rectangles with gradients. The table has a green gradient. The B-Spline tool is for making smooth paths with the "nodes" on them. This a just a few of the tools available here.
4: Back To the Coffee: With the background in place, it was time for the coffee-cup, and other foreground elements. I could have created these elements on the same layer, and arranged them using the arrange front/back menu, but it is better to use separate layers for distinct elements in your work. These shapes were drawn using the B-spline tool to give nice smooth curves. A gradient was applied to the cup and mouse to give shading.	5: The Paths View: With the background layer hidden, if paths view is chosen, you will see this. Look how few paths you need to lay down to get an image, and how easy it is to get smooth curves with B-Spline! I will explain a bit about the B-Spline tool in the next section...

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