Sketchpad Guide

Sketchpad

Open Sketchpad →

What it’s for

Sketchpad is where the chords you find in the other GMI apps come together and become something you can print, play from and keep. Every chord you send arrives exactly as you found it: the same frets, the same strings, its notation and TAB, and, from Structure Lab, both layers of a polychord. Lay them out on a page with your own text, shapes, pictures, web links and videos, then print it, or build a whole chord book with a cover and up to 32 pages.

It works like a page-layout program made for guitarists. A lesson handout, a practice sheet for one tune, a reference page of every voicing you use for one chord, a book of a term’s work: you design it, and Sketchpad prints it at 300 DPI.

Who it’s for

Anyone who wants their chords on paper, or on screen in a form they can share: students building their own reference pages, and teachers making handouts.

Free and Pro

Free Free — with a free account:

• The whole canvas: text, shapes, lines, arrows, brackets, links, videos and images
• Chords sent from Chord Lab and Diatonic Key Builder
• Up to three chord cards on the canvas at a time; the Pasteboard holds as many as you send
• Nothing is saved: the canvas clears when you leave or refresh the page, and a notice at the top says so

Pro Pro:

• As many chord cards as you like
• Chords sent from Chord Architect, Progression Lab and Structure Lab as well
• Save and Open: named canvases kept in your library
• Export PNG
• Chord Book: print PDF, A5 booklet, and square and story images for social media

Visitors who aren’t signed in see a short description of Sketchpad and the pathways strip.

Compare Free and Pro

Getting around

The Pasteboard on the left holds every chord sent from another app. The page in the middle is your canvas. The Inspector on the right shows the settings for whatever you’ve selected, or for the page itself when nothing is. The toolbar sits above the canvas, and the page strip below it.

Above the app, the pathways strip offers four guided routes: Make a book, Lay out a lesson or practice sheet, Bring your chords and music images in and Share it.

The top bar

• Clear canvas — removes everything from the canvas, after asking first.
• Save and Open (Pro) — keep this canvas in your library under a name, or open one you saved. Opening a saved canvas replaces the one in front of you, so Sketchpad asks first. Beside them, Saved or Unsaved changes tells you where you stand.
• Export PNG (Pro) — the page you’re looking at, as an image.
• Chord Book (Pro) — opens the Chord Book Builder. It’s ready as soon as there’s anything on the canvas.

Free members see Save & export with Pro in place of these buttons.

The Pasteboard

Chords you send with the Sketch button in Chord Lab and Diatonic Key Builder arrive here, and, on Pro, chords sent from Chord Architect, Progression Lab and Structure Lab. The number beside the title is how many are waiting.

Each chord shows its diagram and name, with three buttons below:

• → — put it on the page. You can also drag it on.
• ▶ — hear it.
• ✕ — remove it from the Pasteboard.

The arrow at the top of the Pasteboard folds it away to give the canvas more room.

The toolbar

Tool	Key	What it does
Select	V	Pick up, move and resize anything on the page.
Text	T	Click to type. Bold, italic, size, colour and alignment are in the Inspector.
Rect, Ellipse, Line, Arrow, Bracket	R for Rect	Draw shapes to box, group and point at things.
Link	L	A card that opens a web address. Links still work in the PDF.
Video		Paste a YouTube or Vimeo address. It plays on the page, and in the PDF it becomes a link with a “Watch on YouTube / Vimeo” line.
Image		Add a picture: JPG, PNG, GIF, WebP or SVG. The first time in a session, Sketchpad reminds you to use only images you have the right to use.
Crop		Trim the selected object.
Guides		Show the page margin and rulers, with a Margin box to set its width.
Grid, Snap		A grid to line things up against; Snap cycles Off, Grid and Guides.
Add Page, Remove		Add a page, or remove the last one.
Master	M	Edit the master page.

The keys are listed at the right of the toolbar as a reminder. As well as those: Delete or Backspace removes what’s selected, the arrow keys nudge it (hold Shift for bigger steps), Esc drops back to Select, and Ctrl+Z / Ctrl+Y (⌘Z / ⌘⇧Z on a Mac) undo and redo.

The canvas

The white page is what prints. Select anything on it to move it, drag a corner to resize it, or press the red × on a chord card to take it off the page.

Below the page is the Scratch area: somewhere to park things you’re not ready to place. Nothing there prints.

The Inspector

With nothing selected, the Inspector shows the page:

• Margin — the safe area your printer won’t cut into, in millimetres. Back to the paper default resets it.
• Working aids — Margin guides, Grid and Snap. These are on screen only; none of them print.
• Chord card defaults — what every chord card shows: Full, Both, Notation or TAB; whether Chord names show; and, for polychords from Structure Lab, how they’re written: Both, Stacked (A over G7) or Resolved (G13♭5).
• Every page — Edit master page, for headings, footers and page numbers that repeat through a printed book.

Select a chord card and the Inspector shows that card. What this card shows sets it on its own; Follow the page again hands it back to the defaults; Apply this card’s settings to every card does the reverse. Where it came from names the chord and, where it has one, the app that sent it.

Every object also has Transparency, Stacking (Front, Forward, Back, Bottom) and Delete this object. Text and shapes add their own settings: fill, outline, thickness, colour and size.

Pages and the master page

The strip under the canvas shows each page. Click one to go to it, or + PAGE to add one; the counter on the right shows where you are. A canvas holds up to 32 pages.

The Master page holds anything you want on every page: a book title, a footer line, your name, a logo. Put it on the master once and it appears on every page of the canvas and of the printed book, so you never retype it or line it up page by page. Choose Single for one master, or Spread for left and right pages.

Three ways in: Edit master page in the Inspector (under Every page, with nothing selected), the Master tool in the toolbar (or press M), or the Master thumbnail at the left of the page strip.

Making a chord book, step by step

A chord book of your own is the kind of thing players used to make by hand with a ruler and a pencil. In Sketchpad it takes minutes, and every shape in it is exactly the one you chose:

1. Collect your chords. In Chord Lab, press Sketch on each chord you want, or send voicings from Chord Architect (Pro). They wait in the Pasteboard.
2. Set up the master page. Click Edit master page and add the book’s title and a footer line. They’ll appear on every page.
3. One idea per page. Give each page one subject, such as every inversion of Cmaj7 on strings 2–5, and keep the chords in the same order from page to page, so the eye knows where to look and you compare like with like.
4. Add what helps you play it. A Text note on fingering, an Arrow from one shape to the next, a Link or Video to a performance. Links stay clickable in the PDF.
5. Print it. Click Chord Book (top right), give it a cover, check Print Preview, and choose Print PDF, or A5 Booklet for a copy you can fold.

Player Projects Unit 5, Build a short chord book, takes you through this as a project, with a check and a quiz at the end. See the Player Projects Guide.

Chord Book Builder (Pro)

Chord Book opens the builder.

• Cover — Book title, Subtitle, Author / Artist, a Cover image (upload one or paste an address), or a Cover colour when there’s no image.
• Layout — Chords per page (1, 2, 4 or 6), Paper size (A4, A5, US Letter, Square) and Paper texture (Plain, Parchment, Manuscript, Dark, Blueprint, Kraft).
• Master Page — Show page number, and Notation on print: Both, Notation, TAB or Full.
• Export — Print Preview first, then:
  • Print PDF — A4, high resolution.
  • A5 Booklet — a foldable PDF.
  • Social Square — 1080 × 1080 PNG.
  • Story — 1080 × 1920 PNG.

Print PDF and A5 Booklet include everything on your pages, at 300 DPI, plus a cover, and you choose This page only or All pages each time. Social Square and Story use the first four chord cards on the page, reading top to bottom, left to right; text, images and video are left out. Exports carry no GMI branding, and are for your own study, not for resale.

Works with

• Chord Lab and Diatonic Key Builder — the Sketch button sends a chord with its exact shape.
• Chord Architect and Progression Lab (Pro) — send a voicing to the Pasteboard.
• Structure Lab (Pro) — sends a polychord as two cards, one per grip, titled with the whole stack, or a single grip from its card.
• My Library (Pro) — your saved canvases, each with an Open button.

Related concepts

• Tablature
• Chord voicing
• String set
• Polychord

Try it

1. In Chord Lab, press Sketch on two or three chords.
2. Open Sketchpad and press → on each one in the Pasteboard.
3. Add a Text heading, then draw an Arrow from one chord to the next.
4. With nothing selected, set Chord card defaults to TAB and watch every card change.
5. Pro: press Chord Book, give it a title, and look at it in Print Preview.