Tutorial: How to draw abnormal filled-in shapes in Visio

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This week I learnt how to draw abnormal filled-in shapes in Visio, and it is actually easy to do.  I’m using Visio 2003 so other versions may differ slightly.

For my example I start with 6 boxes and want to draw a shape around the 4 orange ones.

1start

I start by using the Line Tool, which is part of the Drawing toolbar.

2Line tool

I then draw my first line segment and then continue it with a new line segment where the other one stopped, and continue until I get back to where I started.

3inprogress

Changing back to the normal pointer once the shape is complete allows you to then tinker with it a bit.

4shapedone

The first task I do at this point is to send the Shape to the Back.

5sendtoback

I then change the colour using a transparency of 80%.

6fill

and finish by rounding off the line corners.

 

7complete

You can actually also use the same technique with the freehand drawing tool too.  Thanks to http://help.lockergnome.com/office2/Irregular-Shapes-Visio--ftopict803521.html for the tutorial steps.

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