Styling in the Inspector

The Inspector on the right side of the window has four tabs: Style, Text, Arrange, and Document. This page covers the styling controls on the Style tab. For a tab-by-tab reference of every section, see Inspector Panel.

Which sections appear depends on what's selected:

Element Color Components

For notation symbols and images.

• Style Variants — shown when a custom style with variants is active. Click a variant to apply it to the selection; the × button clears the autostyle from the selected shapes
• Colour scheme grid — a 5-column grid of the notation's colour schemes. Click one to recolour the symbol
• Opacity — overall transparency of the element (0–100%)

For images, this section also offers a custom colour swatch that tints SVG artwork. See Color Schemes & Document Colors.

Style (Vector Shapes)

A vector shape's look is built from a stack of style components, listed under Style Components. Each component has a checkbox to turn it on or off; click a component to show its controls below the list.

Stroke

• Colour — the outline colour (with opacity)
• Shadow — toggle a drop shadow on the stroke
• Width — 0.5 to 20 points
• Gradient — paint the stroke with a gradient: Start Color, End Color, and an angle dial
• Cap and Join — icon buttons for line ends (butt, round, square) and corners (miter, round, bevel)
• Dash Pattern — Solid Line, Dashed, Dotted, Dash-Dot, Dash-Dot-Dot, or Long Dash

See Stroke Styles.

Colour Fill

• Solid / Gradient / Pattern tabs
  • Solid — a colour well (with opacity)
  • Gradient — a linear gradient: drag and recolour the stops on the gradient bar, set the Angle with the dial or field, or click Edit on Canvas to drag the gradient's handles on the shape
  • Pattern — Paste Pattern Image or Image from File...
• Shadow — angle dial, distance, blur, and colour
• Inner Shadow — angle dial, distance, blur, spread, and colour

See Fill Styles and Shadows & Effects.

Adding Style Components

Click + (Add Style Component) and choose from:

Shape

For shapes drawn with the Rounded Rectangle tool, a Shape group offers a Corner Radius slider.

Opacity

At the bottom of the section, Opacity sets the transparency of the whole shape (0–100%).

Outlines of Notation Symbols

Notation symbols don't have a Style section. Their outline is set from the floating toolbar: double-click the symbol and click Shape Style. The popover offers Draw only contour, Contour Color, Contour Type, Contour Width, Contour Opacity, Shadow, and Inner Shadow.

Connector

Appears when connectors are selected.

Arrowheads

• Start Arrowhead / End Arrowhead — click to open the arrowhead picker, with Built-in Arrowheads and the active notation's Notation Arrowheads
• Start Arrow Length / End Arrow Length — 0 to 150 px
• Apply Length To Both Arrows — keep both arrowheads the same length
• Apply Color To Both Arrows and Shaft — colour the arrowheads and the line together

See the Arrowheads Reference for every type.

Shaft

• Routing mode — Straight, Polyline, Orthogonal, Smooth, Smart Orthogonal, or Smart Polyline
• Line type — Solid Line, Dotted, Dashed, Dash-Dot, Dash-Dot-Dot, or Long Dash
• Colour — pick a colour scheme for the line
• Width — line thickness
• Corner Radius — 0 to 60 px, rounds the bends

To save the current connector look as the default for new connectors, use the gear menu in the floating Connector Style toolbar — see Reusing Styles.

Related Tabs

• Text tab — font, size, colour, alignment, padding, connector text position, and extra connector Labels
• Arrange tab — geometry, tables, UML, and auto-layout
• Document tab — layers and artboards, smart connectors, theme style, document colours, and the canvas background

See Inspector Panel for details.

Related Topics

• Fill Styles
• Stroke Styles
• Shadows & Effects
• Autostyles (Canvas Themes)
• Color Schemes & Document Colors