How do I create personal icons for overheads and floor plans?

Using Scriptation's advanced Annotation Tools, it's easy to combine Shapes and Text Boxes to create custom icons.

Once built, you can then use the Saved Annotations clipboard to create a library of icons for use across all of your overheads, diagrams, floor plans, shot designs, and blocking charts.

Looking for icon ideas? All of these were built within Scriptation!




TIP: You can also build icons in other graphics programs, and import them into Scriptation as a custom stamp. You can read more about that here.

Learning the Tools

As you explore the Annotation Toolbar, here's a few tips to building icons towards creating your shot design.

Order

In the example below, we're combining a yellow circle with a text box. However, it's important to adjust the order to ensure the text box sits on top of the circle.

To adjust the order, tap the annotation that you want to be on top. Then tap Inspector.



Within the Order heading, select the leftmost icon for Top, circled in red.

Then select the other annotation that you want on the bottom. Tap Inspector, and select the icon on the far right, circled in blue.



Group

Using the Group feature allows you to combine multiple annotations into one.

After the Order is established, tap + move your annotations together. Then use the Selection Tool to select all of your annotations.

On the pop-up bar that appears, tap Group.



Rotate

Rotate is limited to Text Boxes, Arrows and Lines.

Rectangles and Ellipses can not be rotated. However, if you use the Inspector to give a Text Box a background - it can be just like a rotated rectangle!



Unicode Keyboard Characters



On iOS devices, you can download any Unicode keyboard (i.e. Unichar) for a huge range of symbols which can be copied / pasted into a Text Box.

Unicode characters work well as icons, as their size and color can be adjusted from the Inspector.



Emojis

Many of the standard emoji icons, which come preloaded to your Apple device, can be used as custom icons.



Check out Actor/Director Giacomo Gianniotti show off his hack for using Emojis!



Line Styles

Many useful icons can be created by adjusting the Line Style, Line Start, and Line End within the Line and Arrow tools.

By creating a small line, you can create icons that are essentially just the start and end selections, customized within the line style.

Saving Icons

After making your icon, tap it. Then tap Save to create a Saved Annotation.



After being saved, your Saved Annotations can be found by tapping the Clipboard icon.



TIP: Can't find the Clipboard? Tap and hold the Stamp icon (when it's not selected) to display the Clipboard.

What's Next

Adding custom PDF Facing Pages (i.e. Floor Plan)
How do I insert a graphic as a custom stamp?
How to Add and Move pages

Updated on: 01/09/2021