Forum Discussion
Allow shapes outline to be inside or outside, not only middle?
Hi!
Everyone using programs like Photoshop or Illustrator are similiar with shapes' outline. We have shapes' outline in Storyline too, but these comes with predefined setting as "draw outline on the middle of the shape path". That's why when you do a shape and give it an 6px outline, it exceeds the selection box - 3px inside the selection and 3 pixels outside. It makes aligning things difficult (because you align to path, not to the outline) and forces to do additional work. Also, when you do odd outline value, like 5px, we get the baaaad thing - half pixels for rendered courses, which honestly storyline doesn't handle well. Then the overall look of the course dimnishes. Things starts to get blurry, things that you aligned so they are sticking - starts to move apart etc. etc.
I've managed to live with it for past 10 years :D But maybe it's time to change? Inside or outside approaches are way more versatile and designing-friendly. The best option would be option to select how the outline should be drawed. For designing and aligning purposes - the inside seems the best way. I guess like 99% of webdesigners first line of CSS is "* {box-sizing: border-box}" so they can have inside-drawn borders from the start.
What can you say staff? I know it's feature request, but I guess it's more than a feature - it's going with the actual trends in design and making a better workflow for everyone and seems relatively easy to do.
Did some projects a few years ago for gsa.gov ( in fact they still use the courses :-) https://training.section508.gov/508-training/courses/new/page314476.html
Ofcourse needed to be fully 508 compliant. Lectora was preferred by them at that time. Have to point out that in Lectora you also need to check, test and fix accessibility issues...but its fully accessible in the end, and at that time it was easier to get done in Lectora then in Storyline.Adding another vote for this feature in this thread, since feature requests seem to be ignored.
If the developers need a use case, here's mine. I have a course that uses snip corner shapes as callouts, dialog boxes, you name it. Due to the inability of Storyline to align strokes to the inside, not the outside, I can't line up my boxes properly and there's always a blurry edge sticking out from under the top shape - so I have a bottom shape that's dark, and a smaller white shape on top to create the illusion of an inside-aligned stroke.
I just got a note to reduce all box edge strokes by 50%. Because this is not possible in Storyline, I have to:
1. Make a square that's 50% smaller (5px by 5px instead of 10px by 10px)2. Align that to the outside of the bottom layer.
3. Drag the white shape to be flush to the side of the 5px box.
4. Repeat on all sides as needed. For multiple items on every slide.
If Storyline had this functionality, it would be as easy as clicking through everything with the format painter, then making a few tweaks. Please add this functionality.
Hi Erin!
Thanks for the detailed feedback on the type of functionality you'd like to see in Storyline 360!
Our development team is tracking a feature request to allow authors More editing options for Freeform shapes in Storyline. I've linked this discussion to the feature report so we can update you as soon as we have news to share!
Have a great start to your week!
