Overview

Design View is the second of five different views within the ChordWizard workspace. You can enter it by clicking on the Design tab at the bottom of the screen or with either of the following:

Menu: View-Design

Keyboard: Ctrl+2

You also enter Design View when you edit a chordshape, or request a new chordshape in Library View.

In Design View, the Chordshape menu appears in the middle of the menu bar, and contains a set of commands specifically for use with this view.

Summary

Design View allows you to design and find new chordshapes for storing in the current library. With the powerful search facility, it gives you easy access to every possible chordshape which can be made on the Fretboard.

Entering Chordshape Designs

You can enter chordshape designs in one of two ways.

Perhaps the most direct way is to type the chordshape tablature notation into the chordshape edit area of the Design Panel. As you type, the Fretboard is updated too.

There are some special keystrokes you can use for editing chordshape tablature. In particular you need to hold down the Shift key while typing to get the positions above fret 9 (these will appear as underlined digits).

The other way is simply to click on the Fretboard where you want the fingers to be. Finger blocks will appear at these spots. As you change the fretboard, the chordshape tablature in the Design Panel is updated too.

If your chordshape design already exists in the library, this will be indicated by the Status Bar and by the Add to Library button being disabled.

Analyzing Chordshape Designs

Whichever way you enter chordshapes, ChordWizard automatically analyzes what matching chords apply to a chordshape as it changes. Depending on your Indexing settings, there may be more than one matching chord.

The matching chords appear in the Matching Chord List, with the best matches ranked at the top.

It can be useful to compare the sound of the chordshape with the sound of the matching chord(s) in standard inversion, to check how close it sounds. You can play the current chordshape design with any of:

Design Bar:

Keyboard: F5

Menu: Chordshape-Play

You can play the currently selected matching chord with either of:

Keyboard: F6

Menu: Chordshape-Matching Chord-Play

You can view the notes of the chordshape design on staff lines in the View Staff window with either of:

Keyboard: Ctrl+F5

Menu: Chordshape-View Staff

And for comparison, you can view the notes of the currently selected matching chord on staff lines with either of:

Keyboard: Ctrl+F6

Menu: Chordshape-Matching Chord-View Staff

Searching Options

To help you design and find new chordshapes, ChordWizard maintains a set of Searching options for each library. These allow you to specify what level of chordshape difficulty you are interested in, and include settings such as the number of fingers required, the maximum fret stretch, and what level of string bridging is required to make the chordshape with your hand.

ChordWizard uses these restrictions when searching for chordshapes, but they can also be used as a guide when you are entering new designs manually.

If any part of your chordshape causes it to contravene the searching options, that part will be indicated in red, for example a finger block, or a mute or open string. At the same time, a short message will appear at the bottom of the Design Panel to indicate exactly what is wrong with the chordshape.

Using Overlay Labels

You can set a filter to specify what sort of chordshape you want. There are several filter criteria you can use, but for designing chordshapes, the most common is a chord filter. You can specify, for example, that you want a chordshape for playing an Am7 chord.

This immediately activates overlay labels to indicate every location where the notes of this chord appear on the Fretboard. For Am7, these would appear as A C E G, or as 1 b3 5 b7, depending whether you are using note or degree labels.

You can use these overlay labels as a guide to help you design a complete chordshape. Generally, you need to have each note represented at least once in the chordshape. If you are using full color overlays, each note is a different color, so this makes it an easy "design by colors" exercise.

Searching for Chordshapes

Instead of manually designing chordshapes, you can have ChordWizard automatically scan the fretboard for chordshapes which meet both your Searching options and the current filter setting.

Searching considers every possible chordshape which can be made on the fretboard, and returns the results in the default sort order.

If you want to view the search results one by one, you can use these two commands to update the chordshape in the Design Panel:

Design Bar:

Menu: Chordshape-Search Prior

Design Bar:

Menu: Chordshape-Search Next

Alternatively you can browse a whole list of search results at once by using the Search List window.

Using Power Match

Sometimes, you may enter a chordshape you have discovered which sounds good to you, and yet ChordWizard will not find any matching chords. This might happen for two reasons:

1. You may be using a library at Beginner or Intermediate level which has some of the more advanced chord types deactivated.

2. You may have discovered an unusual chord which is not among the standard chord types supplied with ChordWizard.

The Power Match window will help you in both of these situations. It is opened by:

Design Panel:

Menu: Chordshape-Power Match

It has two steps. First it attempts to identify the chordshape using all of the chord types that ChordWizard knows about, regardless of whether they are activated or not.

If this is not successful, it constructs a new chord type to suit the chordshape. You can add this chord type to your library and it will be seamlessly integrated into all future operations.

Adding to the Library

When you have finished designing your new chordshape, you will probably want to add it to the current library, so you can find it again easily in future.

If the chordshape you have designed does not already exist in the library, you can add it with any of:

Design Panel:

Keyboard: Enter

Menu: Chordshape-Add to Library

If it is a movable chordshape, you have option of adding the whole series of shifted chordshapes at once with the Movable Series window.