drawing squiggly lines in a score

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jonuline
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Post by jonuline » Tue Jun 28, 2022 11:29 am

Is there any way to draw a squiggly line into a score with shape and contour in order to indicate an “avant-gard” (?) or aleatoric gesture with a voice part in a piece of choral music? Thanks for any tips or whether it’s even possible.


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wessmusic
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Post by wessmusic » Tue Jun 28, 2022 1:11 pm

There are three most commonly used methods through:
A. the built-in Graphic Editor in Expression Tool;
B. a font that contains similar types of lines and shapes (Expression tool again);
C. in case the score is quite complex and the above two are not able to do a satisfactory job - print in PDF and then edit the file in an external graphic editor (Illustrator, Affinity Designer, etc.).
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jonuline
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Post by jonuline » Wed Jun 29, 2022 8:34 pm

Thanks for responding to my query and now...I feel at a disadvantage, I cannot find anything indicating a “Graphic Editor” in the Expression tool. I would very much like to find out more about this and how to use it. I spent some time scrolling through various fonts in the “create” box of the expression tool...there are hundreds of them and I did not find anything I could use. That would have been an easy solution. So I guess I may try what you suggest by printing a PDF and hand-drawing what I want into it capturing the final product in a PDF. That sound reasonable. But if I’m missing something obvious with “Graphic Editor” in the expression tool, I’d love to know about it. I am grateful for your assistance and for responding to my query. Best....

mmike
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Post by mmike » Wed Jun 29, 2022 9:21 pm

jonuline wrote:
Tue Jun 28, 2022 11:29 am
the built-in Graphic Editor in Expression Tool
I think he probably means this: in the Expression Selection screen select Create Misc. Expression on the bottom, then you get to the Expression "Designer", select Shape > Create, where you, as it says, can create a graphic expression. It's not particularly easy to use, though ... (you have to experiment, I have always found it to be extremly awkward).

It's not really clear what kind of line you want, but I have often used graphics like this (two curves put together) as expressions:
wiggles.jpg
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dtoub
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Post by dtoub » Thu Jun 30, 2022 12:49 am

I’ve done exactly that with the shape designer tool in Expressions. It’s cludgy as hell (I doubt it’s been updated since the early 90’s) and is really a pain to use. But it does work. I really wish MM would bring it into the 21st century. It feels like the days of Word 5 or earlier. I’ve only used it in my works from the 70’s when I wrote music that needed it.
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