Hi Dorico developers! I absolutely love everything you’re doing to pack Dorico full of awesome features and abilities. I’m sure you all have considered adding the ability to generate timpani diagrams, similar to what you’ve done for the harp. I’m guess because a diagram would take up too much room? (big circle or semi circle etc)? Or does this feature exist and I just can’t find it in the manual?
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If the symbols are in the SMuFL standard, then it should be easy enough to create playing techniques for them.
Can you give an example of what you are trying to create?
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Im not trying to create playing techniques. I just want a graphic that represents five timpani, like five circles with the tuning letters centered in them, and the circles in a semicircle, but flattened height wise.
Like this:
or, better yet:
IIRC Dorico can import graphics.
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Yes, I just got done doing this…
But, it’s a lot of work… I don’t have a decent graphics program and actually used Microsoft Word of all things… Can someone recommend a decent, inexpensive graphics application? You can see, the graphic is kind of rough and not acceptable for publishing.
I used to have Deneba Canvas 5, but I doubt that version would even work on Windows 11. It’s now called Canvas X Suite and a subscription is $110 per year or $399 to buy outright. Anyone know another graphics software similar to Canvas X Suite? Canvas is probably overkill, but it can do basically anything, and I mean anything.
Affinity Designer is an excellent choice:
But Inkscape is free and open source, so maybe you’d like to try it:
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For quick graphics work I like Paint.Net (getpaint.net) which is free.
For the best quality, you need to use vector graphics, not bitmap. Dorico can import SVG graphics, which vector (e.g. they scale to any size without loss, and don’t look jagged).
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With what little research I’ve done, it doesn’t sound like paint.net can create svg files. I think they have a plugin that will let you load them.
Inkscape apparently will create svg files but I’m more familiar with Canvas, so I will probably save my pennies to buy it. I’ve been wanting to get it again anyway. I had version 5 years ago, but after several iterations of Windows, some features quit working.
Roger
Please also note that not all timpanists place their timpani that way - e. g. in Germany, it’s customary to have the lowest timpani at the right and the highest at the left. Maybe it’s enough to just indicate the pitches (G c d e g would also convey octave information).
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After considering free (Inkscape) vs Canvas (minimum of $119/year subscription, I went with Inkscape. There are several good books, tons of YouTube videos etc. And it does vector graphics.
I was tempted to go with Canvas because I already know how to use a lot of its features, but it’s way overkill for just wanting to create some vector graphics. Fyi, if anyone is into technical drawing, Canvas is your tool… even NASA uses Canvas.
Affinity Designer does sound very tempting since it’s not a subscription and only $69. I might end up buying Designer since I’ve read it’s much more user friendly than Inkscape, but I will still use Inkscape since there are a few features it has that Designer doesn’t have.
One thing is for sure… there is no shortage of options with graphics software.
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Daniel, thanks for the info about Affinity Designer. That’s one graphics app of which I wasn’t aware.