Teach and consult on the Teaching Studio
Every option of the Studio in one place: boards, live charts and cards, blank charts and labels, the drawing tools, the Design and Layers panels, full screen, touch screens and every keyboard shortcut.
9 min · 12 steps
- 1
Open the Studio and make a board
Choose Teaching Studio in the sidebar. A board is a large canvas for one consultation or one lesson. Choose New board, give it a name, and it opens.
The list of boards has a search and a sort (last edited, newest, or by name). Each board's menu renames, duplicates or deletes it. A deleted board waits in Trash, where you can restore it before it is removed for good.
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Find your way round the editor
The top bar has Boards (back to the list), the board's name, whether your changes are saved, Undo and Redo, the Layers panel, Versions, Full screen and the More menu (⋯).
The tools are on the left of the board. On the right, the panel has two tabs: Insert, for charts, cards and labels, and Design, for whatever you have selected. The zoom buttons are under the board; the last of them fits everything on the board into view.
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Put a saved chart on the board
Insert → Add a saved chart. Choose the chart first: everything on the board is made from one of your saved charts. Then tick the vargas you want (each becomes its own live chart), and choose the style (North, South, East or Circular), the ayanamsa, the node, the notation, and whether to show degrees, nakshatras and the outer planets.
A chart on the board is calculated live. Select it to change any of these later in the Design panel, or choose Make editable to turn a North or South chart into a blank chart with its planets as labels you can move.
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Add an astrology card
Insert → Add an astrology card puts a table for a saved chart on the board: the Vimshottari dasha timeline, KP cusps or significators, the Jaimini chara karakas, Ashtakavarga (SAV), Shadbala, Yogas or the birth Panchang. Choose the chart, then the card. If you press Add before choosing a chart, the chart list opens, and the card goes on the board as soon as you pick one.
On the dasha timeline, click a period to see the linked chart's transits at its start. Charts and cards always keep their proportions: resize them from a corner.
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Teach with blank charts and labels
Blank North and Blank South draw an empty chart (keys C and Shift+C): drag on the board for the size you want, or click for the standard size.
Under Labels you have the planets, signs, houses, lagnas and arudhas, upagrahas and nakshatras. Drag a label into a house of a blank chart and it is laid out there; drag it to another house to move it. A click puts a label in the middle of the view. Select a label and drag a corner to make it bigger or smaller.
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Draw, write and point
The tools, with their keys: Select (V or 1), Move the board (H, or hold Space and drag), Rectangle (R), Ellipse (O), Diamond (D), Triangle (G), Line (L), Arrow (A or Shift+L), Pen (P), Highlighter (I), Text (T), Sticky note (N), Eraser (E), Laser pointer (K) and Add an image. After a shape, a line, a text or a note the tool goes back to Select.
With Text or Sticky note, click where it should go and type. Click outside, or press Esc or Ctrl+Enter, to finish; double-click it later to change the words. A text's corners make the letters bigger or smaller; its left and right sides set where the words wrap. The Laser pointer leaves a short red trail that fades, for pointing during a class without changing the board.
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Select, move and resize
Click an item to select it; Shift or Ctrl + click adds or removes items; drag on an empty part of the board to select everything inside the box. Ctrl+A selects everything, Esc clears the selection.
Drag an item to move it. Items snap to each other and to the middle of the view, with pink guides: hold Ctrl while dragging to stop the snapping, Shift to keep to one direction, Alt to leave a copy behind. The arrow keys nudge the selection by 1, with Shift by 10. Drag a handle to resize; the round handle above rotates (with Shift, in steps of 15°).
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Change the look in the Design panel
With something selected, the Design panel shows its position, rotation, size and opacity, its colours and line, and for texts and labels the font, weight, size, line height, letter spacing and alignment. Type a value, or drag over a field's label to change it smoothly. For a text, W sets the width it wraps at and H makes the letters bigger or smaller.
With several items selected, the alignment buttons line them up: Alt+A left, Alt+D right, Alt+W top, Alt+S bottom, Alt+H and Alt+V the centres; with three or more you can also spread them out evenly. The buttons at the top lock, duplicate (Ctrl+D), bring to the front or send to the back, and delete (Delete).
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Layers, groups, lock and hide
The Layers panel (Alt+1 or Ctrl+\) lists everything on the board, top first. Drag a row to change the order, or use Ctrl+] and Ctrl+[ to move the selection up or down one step, with Shift to the very top or bottom.
Ctrl+G groups the selected items, so they move and resize together; Ctrl+Shift+G (or Ungroup in the right-click menu) takes a group apart again, also when you have gone into it. Double-click an item in a group, or press Enter, to go into the group; Shift+Enter goes back out. Ctrl+Shift+L locks an item so it can't be moved by mistake, and Ctrl+Shift+H hides it.
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Zoom, move round and use full screen
Scroll to move round the board and hold Ctrl while scrolling to zoom, or use Ctrl+= and Ctrl+-. Shift+1 fits everything into view, Shift+2 zooms to the selection and Shift+0 goes back to 100%.
Full screen (F) hides everything except the board and its tools, for classes and screen recordings. Press F or Exit full screen to leave it; Boards also leaves full screen and goes back to your list of boards.
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Use it on a touch screen or a smart board
With one finger or a pen, every tool works as with a mouse: draw, write, select and move. Put two fingers on the board to zoom in and out by pinching, and move both fingers together to move round the board. Lift both fingers before you start the next stroke.
When you use a finger or a pen, the resize handles grow to fingertip size and the planet and sign labels are easier to pick. Press and hold an item for its menu, and double-tap a text or note to type in it. The page itself doesn't zoom or scroll while you work on the board.
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Save, versions and export
The board saves itself as you work; the top bar says when your changes are saved. Ctrl+S saves a version with a name of your choice (the name is optional), and Versions lists them so you can go back to any one.
From the More menu (⋯): Export as image (Ctrl+Shift+E) saves the board or the selection as a PNG; Download board file keeps a copy of the board as a file, and Open a board file brings one back; Background changes the board's colour and its plain, dotted or squared pattern; Clear the board removes everything (Undo brings it back). Press ? or Ctrl+/ at any time for the full list of keyboard shortcuts. On a Mac, use Cmd for Ctrl and Option for Alt.
Try it on your own chart
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