I'm very confused with Inkscape. Probably because I am usually to raster editing software like Photoshop and GiMP. But then again raster editing doesn't make text around a circle easy either.

Here's what I did so far. I drew a white circle using CTRL. I made up some black text. Selected both and Put on Path.

1 - What is the easiest way for me to get my text centered on top like this graphic?



What I did was bring down a guide, then I used rotate until I got it perfect.

2 - Now, how do I make a second thing of text similar to the bottom of that picture above? If I do it the same way as above my text is upside down.

Path menu >reverse.

For your item 1, using a Guide and rotating the circle is a clever way to do it. Sometimes I've typed in a certain number of spaces to move the text around in just the right way. But the best way I've found, is when you type the text, make sure it's centered, and not left aligned. You can do that either on the Text control bar or Text and Font dialog. Usually centering it will eliminate the need for spaces.

For your item 2, I agree with druban, reverse the path direction. Also I just wanted to note that you'll need a different sized diameter circular path, if you want the text to look like it's all in one circle. You'll probably see why, if you haven't already

Thanks for the quick replies (and sorry to whoever moderated my first post.. I posted it twice by mistake).

So, is it possible to get rid of my circles and still keep the curved text? I'm using a white background right now, so easy enough to just make the circle white, but am asking for the future.

yuppicide wrote:I'm using a white background right now, so easy enough to just make the circle white, but am asking for the future.

Usually the best option is to make the circles transparent. You can still select them if you switch to Outline View mode.

Just to add to the above comments, I use kerning to get my text spaced how I want it (double click the text so you can edit it, then use the ctrl key + your space bar), once you're done with it all, (get out of the edit mode), and click on the text to select it (this actually selects the text and the circle), then click on Path, Object to Path, which will make the text and circle two separate objects, so then you can delete the circle entirely. (actually I sometimes just move it to a new layer and hide it in case I want to come back and make new text).
dee

Once you do an object to path, you lose your text's editability. Better to do this on a copy, so if you need to edit the text you can delete the copy and go back to the original.

flamingolady wrote:... I use kerning ... double click the text so you can edit it, then use the ctrl key + your space bar

FL (Flamingolady), what version of Inkscape are you running?? Ctrl+space with the text AFAIK does nothing different than space. You might want to position your cursor between letters or select several letters and use the Alt+arrows to get a much finer control over manual kerns.

Using .48 for Windows. I tried the reverse path, text just sat there.. didn't do anything.

I think I originally came here with the intent to just do my text, but I'm having fun fooling around even though it's frustrating. Plus I have some jpg to vector software that's very nice.

yuppicide wrote:I tried the reverse path, text just sat there.. didn't do anything.

That's odd!
Possibly: Did you duplicate or cut and paste the text on path before trying to reverse the path?
Try this: select the (upside down) text on path that you are trying to flip, and press shift-D. This should select the path it is on, and that you need to reverse. if it says (at the bottom of the window) something like, "invisible path, in defs," then you have lost the link.
But not the battle! Select the unlinked text, and from the text menu choose 'remove from path'. Now this might shoot the text off somewhere else in your canvas but don't let that bother you. Just shift-select the path, adding it to the text that was already selected, or if you deselected it, reselect the text and the path you took it off, and do 'text on path' again. Immediately (why wait?) do 'path > reverse' (doesn't matter if the text is also selected).
Hope this works!

yuppicide wrote:I tried the reverse path, text just sat there.. didn't do anything.

Are you sure it's a path, not a circle (ellipse)? Check the status bar at the bottom when it's selected. If it's an ellipse, use Path > Object to Path, and then you should find that Path > Reverse works.

Thanks. I got it to work. I was drawing my circle, adding text, then put on path. After that nothing worked as stated above.

What I needed to do was draw the circle, did object to path, add text, put on path, then reverse worked.

Needed to have the path before I laid the text and put on path.

Very very happy to have figured that out. Now I can duplicate the circle and have text up top and bottom.

One more question.. when I reverse my path the text is on the inside of the circle.. I'm guessing for it to be on the "outside" that's why someone above suggested I make another circle and do it?

yuppicide wrote:when I reverse my path the text is on the inside of the circle.. I'm guessing for it to be on the "outside" that's why someone above suggested I make another circle and do it?

Yes, duplicate the path and put your text on it without moving it. Now select the text and with shift-D you can then select the path. Scale using the > key and the texts will be aligned.

whoops -I meant to write use the Ctrl + Arrow keys, not the space bar, for kerning your text. thx Druban for pointing that out (good catch).
And it's always a good idea to keep a copy of your objects, text,objects, etc before finagling them, (even with filters sometimes).
Orig poster - we should have mentioned that your object (circle, square, rect, etc) does have to be converted to a path before you can apply the text to it. Tips: I usually duplicate the circle before putting the text on it, in case I ever want to use it again; not sure why, but I've noticed that once I use say a circle once for text, that sometimes it won't let me re-use it, not sure why (maybe that's just me?). also try to keep a duplicate of my end product on a separate closed layer that I call 'extras', and recently I like to dup the text before converting to a path, and edit it to be the name of the font. Example is 'timesnewroman'. or I call the layer 'timesnewroman'. makes it so much easier to deal with later.
Text on Path is a useful tool. When you finish playing with it, also try the LPE where you put objects on a path. You can do some cool things with text that way too. have fun!
dee

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flamingolady wrote:Orig poster - we should have mentioned that your object (circle, square, rect, etc) does have to be converted to a path before you can apply the text to it.

Not quite so:
'Text put on Path' works ok with circles/ellipses and other shapes without converting them to paths first (the only exception being the rectangle).

Take a look at the example at the bottom of the related manual section "Text on a Path"

(hints: align-center the text before putting it on the circle (text formatting), 'Flip' the circle to change the path direction (wrt text being inside/outside of the circle), rotate the circle (not the text) by ±90° to have the centered text at the top or bottom side of the circle).