How to draw Indian flag using CorelDraw X6?

If you cast an unintentional glance over Indian flag, you may think about it as one of the simplest flags in the world, with three different colored but equal sized rectangular stripes sewn together and a circular shaped symbol called Ashok Chakra printed on the center of the middle one.

Indian Flag

Well, that was my personal opinion about that flag before attempting to draw it in CorelDraw. When I made my first attempt to draw that flag, I realized that I was wrong. Of course, I drew the flag within 30 seconds but when it came to draw Ashok Chakra on it, it took more than 24 hours to contemplate over it's complicate design. But, at last, I managed to discover a quick but easy method to draw that beautiful but a bit complicated symbol on Indian flag within a few minutes.  When I explained that method in my CorelDraw class, my students picked all the points without any difficulty and I received great amount of appreciation form my senior colleagues.

In this post I have decided to explain the same method to illustrate of Indian flag with Ashok Chakra on it  by the use of some very important CorelDraw tools including Polygon tool, Rectangle tool, Ellipse Tool and a very important transformation option called Rotate given in the Arrange Menu.

 As there is nothing complicated or difficult in the design of Indian flag apart from Ashok Chakra, I will try to explain it first.

How to draw Ashok Chakras using CorelDraw X6?

First of all create a new document by following the method I have explained in my earlier  post Illustration of Pakistani flag in  CorelDraw X6 .Then in order to draw Ashok Chakra on it, first of all select the Polygon Tool out of the Tool Box. 

Polygon Tool in the menu

As soon as you will select that tool, the pointer of your mouse will assume the shape of a plus (+) sign with a small five cornered shape (pentagon) at the bottom-right of it and the properties of the tool will be appeared on the Property Bar. Out of those properties, set the Points or sides of the Polygon equal to 4.0 and set the Outline width of the polygon equal to 0.5 pt and hit Enter. 

Properties of Polygon Tool

 After that, put the pointer of your mouse anywhere on the page, keep the left button of your mouse pressed and drag it in any direction to draw a four sided shape ( that shape will neither be a rectangle nor a square but a diamond) on the page.Then, fill black color inside the shape by selecting the thumbnail representing black color in the Color Palette with left mouse click.

Diamond shaped object on the page

After that, make a duplicate of that recently made diamond shaped object by getting inside the Edit Menu and selecting the option Duplicate or by hitting CTRL +D.  As soon as you will do so, another black diamond shaped object will appeared on the page. Then with the help of Pick Tool put that duplicate object right beside the first shape.

Two identical objects side by side

 Then select both the shapes on the page either by hitting CTRL + A or by getting inside the Edit Menu and selecting the option Objects that is given in the Edit Menu’s option Select All’s side menu.

Objects in the Select All's side menu

Having selected both the objects, get inside the Arrange Menu and select the option Group given in it or hit CTRL + G to make a group of both the selected objects.

Option referred as Group in the Edit Menu

 After making a group of both the objects, select that group with the help of Pick Tool. As soon as that group will be selected, it’s properties will be appeared on the Property Bar. Properties of this group which are supposed to be set here are it’s width and height. Set the width and height of the group equals to 8.0 and 0.2 respectively and hit the Enter Key. As soon as, you will hit the Enter key, the selected group will assume the same width and height.

Selected group with width and height equals to 8.0 and 0.2 respectively

After that, get inside the Arrange Menu again and select the option called Transformations. As soon as, that option will be selected, it’s side menu will be appeared containing five more options including Position, Rotate, Scale and mirror, Size, and Skew. Out of those options the option that is supposed to be selected here is none other than Rotate (Alt + F8).

Position, Rotate, Scale and mirror, Size, and Skew in the side menu of Transformations

As soon as you will select that option by clicking on it, a vertical shaped widow called Transformations will be appeared on the right side of the CorelDraw window. On the top of the window called Transformations, there will be seen five tabs representing the same five options ( Position, Rotate, Scale and mirror, Size and Skew) given in the side menu of the option called Transformations.

Five tabs in the Transformation window.

 As that window would have been opened by the selection of the option called Rotate, the tab representing the option Rotate will be selected here. In that window, set the Angle of rotation equal to 15.0, number of Copies equal to 12.0 and hit the button named Apply that can be seen on the bottom-right of that window.  As soon as you will hit that button, 12 copies of the selected shape will be appeared  on the page with 15^o Angle of rotation.

Copies of the selected shape

 After  that, select all the shapes on the page by hitting CTRL + A  and then either  hit CTRL + G or get inside the Arrange Menu and select the option Group again to make a group of all the selected shapes. After that, select the Ellipse Tool out of the Tool Box by clicking on it.

Ellipse Tool in the menu

Having done so, draw a circular shape on the page by dragging your mouse in any direction and keeping it’s left button pressed. Then set the width and height of that recently made circle equals to 8.0 in the Property Bar and hit Enter. As soon as you will hit the Enter key, the newly made circle will assume the same width and height (diameter).

Newly made circle on the document

 After that, select once again all the objects on the document including you newly made circle by hitting CTRL + A  and  in order to place all the selected objects on the right place, get inside the  Arrange Menu and select the option Align and Distribute.  As soon as you will select that option another menu will be appeared containing a good number of options. Out of those options select Align Centers Vertically or hit C on the keyboard.

Align Centers Vertically in the menu of the option named Align and Distribute

 As soon as you will select that option all the shapes (including group ) on the page will be aligned vertically or the vertical center of both the shapes will become the same one.

shapes on the page with same vertical center

After that, get inside the Arrange Menu again, and again select the option called Align and Distribute. Then out of the side menu of Align and Distribute, select the option Align Centers Horizontally or hit E on the keyboard.

Align Centers Horizontally in the menu of the option called Align and Distribute

As soon as you will do so, all the shape on the document will be aligned horizontally or horizontal center of both the shapes will become the same one.

shapes with same central point

After that, select the Ellipse tool again out of the Tool Box and draw a small circle anywhere on the document, set it’s width and height equals to 0.4 and fill black color inside it by following the method I have explained earlier.

Width, Height and Color of the selected shape

 Then, with the help of Pick Tool put that circle between the two petals of the flower shaped object inside the bigger circle on the page.

Small black circle on it's right place

 After that, put the pointer of your mouse on that small black circle and hit the left button of your mouse twice. As soon as you will do so, the small black circle will be encircled by a few black double sided arrows and the central point of that circle will be highlighted by the presence of a small white outlined transparent circle inside our tiny black circle.

Small circle with highlighted central point

Then, put that central point with the help of Pick Tool on the center of the flower shaped object by dragging your mouse and keeping it’s left button pressed.

Central point of the smaller circle placed on the center of flower shaped object

 Then, once again, get inside the Arrange Menu, select the option Transformations and out of the side menu of the option called Transformations, select Rotate as I have explained earlier. Then in the window that will be opened when you will select the option Rotate given in the side menu of the option Transformations, set the Angle or Rotation again equal of 15^o, number of Copies equal to 24 and hit the button named Apply on the bottom-right of the Transformations window. As soon as you will do so, 24 copies of the selected small black circle will be emerged on the page inside the bigger circle each between the two petals of the flower shaped object.

Copies of black circle between the petals of the flower shaped object

Then, select the bigger circle by clicking on it with the help of Pick Tool. As soon as you will select the bigger circle, it’s properties will be appeared on the Property Bar. Only thing which is supposed to done here is the setting of the Outline width of the selected circle, so set the width of the outline equal to 12.0. As soon as you will select 12.0 out of the drop-down menu, outline of the selected circle will assume the same width.

Drop-down menu referred as Outline width

 After that, select the Ellipse Tool again and draw another circle anywhere on the document, fill black color inside that newly made circle by selecting the thumbnail representing black color in the Color Palette with left mouse click. Then after selecting that circle with the help of Pick Tool set it’s width and height (diameter) equals to 1.5 and hit Enter. As soon as you will hit Enter, the selected circle will assume the same width and height.

Circle with width and height equals to 1.5

 After that, select all the objects on the document by hitting CTRL + A and in order to set that new made black circle with 1.5 diameter on the dead center of all the objects,hit the keys C and E one by one on the keyboard or get inside the Arrange Menu and select the option Align and Distribute again, and out of the side menu of the option Align and Distribute , select Align Centers vertically (C) and Align Centers Horizontally (E) one by one as I have explained earlier. As soon as you will do so, the black circle will be placed on the dead center of all the objects on the page.

Circle placed on the center of all the object

Then, make a group of all the objects on the document by hitting CTRL + G or by getting inside the Arrange Menu and selecting the option Group as I have explained earlier.  After that select that  group again either by hitting CTRL + A or simply by clicking on it with the help of Pick Tool and set its width and height in the Property Bar equal to 2.0 and hit the Enter key on the keyboard. As soon  as you will hit the Enter key , your image of Ashok Chakra will assume the same width and height and will get ready to be used on the image of Indian flag.

Image of Ashok Chakra with diameter 2.0

Rectangular stripes on Indian Flag

In order to draw three rectangular stripes, select the Rectangle Tool out of the Tool Box by clicking on it or by hitting F6 on the keyboard.

Rectangle Tool in the menu

 As soon as you will select that tool, pointer of your mouse will assume the shape of a plus ( + ) sign with a small rectangular shape at the bottom-right of it. Then, put that plus sign shaped pointer of your mouse any where on the document and draw a rectangular shape by dragging your mouse in any direction and keeping it’s  left button pressed. Then set the width and height of that selected rectangular shape equals to 9.0 and 2.0 respectively and hit Enter to apply the same width and height on the selected rectangle.

Rectangle on the page

Having applied the required width and height on the rectangle, make the two duplicates of it either by hitting CTRL + D twice or by getting inside the Edit Menu and selecting the option Duplicate twice as I have explained earlier. Having made the duplicates of the rectangular shape, set each shape right over the other with the help of Pick Tool .

Three rectangular shapes placed over each other

 After that, select the top most shape with the help of Pick Tool and fill orange color in it by selecting the thumbnail representing orange color in the Color Palette with left mouse click. In order to fill the same orange color in the shape’s outlines too, select the same thumbnail with right mouse click.Then, select the shape that is placed in the middle to fill white color inside it by selecting the thumbnail representing white color in the color palette with left mouse click and in order to fill white color in the selected shape’s outline too, select the same thumbnail with right mouse click. And finally, select the bottom-most shape and fill green color in it by selecting the thumbnail representing green color in the Color Palette with left mouse click and in order to fill the same green color in the shape’s outlines, select the same thumbnail again with right mouse click.

Three different colored stripes on Indian flag

 After that, select these three different colored stripes by holding down Shift key and clicking the left button of your mouse on each stripe separately (don’t hit CTRL + A here because we don’t want to select Ashok Chakra here along with the stripes). Having all these stripes selected, hit CTRL + G or get inside the Arrange Menu and select the option Group to make a group of these three selected stripes.Then,  with the help of Pick Tool, place the previously made shape of Ashok Chakra on the center of the white shape. As the shape of Ashok Chakra would have been made before the rest of the flag, it will get hidden behind the stripes of the flag.

Selected but invisible image of Ashok Chakra behind the stripes of the flag

 In order to bring that shape forward, get inside the Arrange Menu and select the option Order. As soon as you will select that option, it’s side menu will be appeared containing a few more options. Out of those options, select the option named To Front Of Layer or hit SHIFT + pg dn on the keyboard. As soon as you will do so, image of Ashok Chakra will come forward on the white stripe.

Image of Indian flag read to be saved and exported

Then again select all the shapes on the document by hitting CTRL + A and group them together  either by getting inside the Arrange Menu and selecting the option Group or by hitting CTRL + G on the keyboard. After that , save or export that image by getting inside the File Menu and selecting the option Save (to save the image in CDR format) or Export (to save image in any format other than CDR) as I have explained in my earlier posts.

So that was our method of perfect illustration of Indian flag with complicated symbol referred as Ashok Chakra on it. I am certain., you will fine this post helpful, if so, kindly don't forget to subscribe your comments.