Discover the process of adding buttons to a website wireframe, an essential skill in the world of web development and design. From creating a new layer for buttons to manipulating the rectangle tool, aligning text, and duplicating buttons, this guide provides a detailed walkthrough.
Key Insights
- The process of adding buttons to a website wireframe begins with the creation of a new layer, which is then titled 'buttons'.
- Utilizing the rectangle tool allows for the addition of buttons, which can be customized in size, shape, and color. Text is added via the type tool and can be changed from black to white for visibility on a dark button background.
- Additional steps include aligning the text within the button and duplicating the button for use elsewhere on the wireframe. Customization options also include changing the button's background and text colors, as well as adjusting the spacing of elements on the wireframe for aesthetic appeal.
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In this video we'll begin adding buttons to our website wireframe. Let's begin by creating a new layer.
We'll then retitle this layer buttons and hit ENTER. We're ready to begin adding our buttons. To do this we'll be utilizing the rectangle tool.
We'll select it and let's add our first button right below the text. Starting from the center guide and dragging down and to the right. When you're happy with the size and shape of your button, release and we currently have a black button.
Let's now line it up with the right-hand side of our text. To do this, I'll hit V on the keyboard and holding shift to move only horizontally, I'll drag to the right until I see that it intersects with the text above. Next, I'm ready to add text.
I'll zoom in just to get a better view and we'll add the text below. We'll use the type tool shortcut T on the keyboard and we can simply click and in this case, we'll type the words button text and hit escape on the keyboard to exit type mode. We now want to add this text onto our button and to do so we'll click and drag it onto the button releasing but as we notice with the black text as well as the black button, we can see that it doesn't show up.
Therefore, let's change the color of our text from black to white. To do this, we can double click the fill or if we go into our color panel, we'll see that we have easy access colors including none or no fill, black and white. In this case, let's select white and as we can see, we now have white text on top of a black button.
If we click outside, we can see the result. Looking at this now, we need to align our button text to our rectangle. To do so, let's select the button text and while we have it selected, let's make one additional change.
Rather than having Chivo light, let's change it so that it's italicized. We'll click the font style options and select light italic. We're now ready to center it within the button.
If we hold shift, we can select the button and with both selected, we now want to go to our alignment options. We'll select align and align to key object making sure that we select the outer rectangle which now is a thick highlighted line making sure that it's the key. We'll then go to align and select horizontal aligned as well as vertical aligned and we know for certain that our button text is now centered within our button.
Next, we want to duplicate this button. To do so, I'll select both the text and holding shift, I'll select the button behind. We'll then hold ALT and drag our button to the left-hand side until we see that it intersects both with the left-hand side of our text as well as there's a horizontal line aligning with the button on the right.
We'll then release and we have duplicate buttons. Let's make one more change now. Changing this button so it has a white background with black text.
We'll select the button and rather than having a black fill, we'll swap the fill and stroke so it has no fill with a black stroke. Next, we need to change our white text to black. We'll select the text and for our fill we'll go to our color panel and select black.
Let's zoom out and view our wireframe. If we want to make a couple changes to this in the spacing, we can. For instance, I'd like to move my title up.
So I'll simply click and drag it holding shift and move it up. Additionally, I'll move my center text up holding shift and release and finally, I want to select all of the button elements to move them down slightly. I'll hold shift as I select each of them and move them down holding shift.
This gives us a little bit more space within our wireframe and I think it makes it look a little more appealing. Feel free to make spacing changes as you see fit and let's hit CTRL S on our keyboard to save our work and in the next video, we'll begin working on our background. See you there!