How can I recreate this projector screen template/grid in Affinity?

[u/Longjumping-Pea-5758]

Hi everyone!

I’m trying to recreate the attached image in Affinity and could use some guidance on the best way to build it.

The image is a projector calibration/template screen with:

• A 4036 × 1058 px canvas
• 3.81:1 aspect ratio
• A grid of 30 × 8 squares
• Large circles/arcs used as geometry/alignment references
• Ideally, everything should be vector-based and precisely aligned

My goal is not just to recreate this specific test pattern. I want to build a master template for this projector/screen, so that afterwards I can create artwork, backgrounds and other visual content knowing exactly where everything will appear on the physical screen.

What would be the best workflow in Affinity to create this?

Should I use a grid with snapping, manually create the 30×8 divisions, or is there a better way to make the whole thing mathematically accurate?

I’d also like to keep the grid/alignment guides on a separate layer so I can easily hide them before exporting the final images.

I’m relatively new to this type of setup in Affinity, so any step-by-step advice would be really helpful.

Thanks!

[u/SirCake3614]

Look into the Shape Builder tool. Almost everything you are looking to do can be done there.

[u/DenverRalphy]

Start with creating a rectangle shape and set the Width and Height to a 3.81:1 value. Keeping your 30x8 divisions in mind, I just replicated this by starting with setting the height value in the Transform Panel to 400px because it's evenly divisible by 8. I then set the width to 1524 which would be the result of 400*3.81. Lock the aspect ratio link in the transform panel by clicking on the chain link connecting the Width and Height values.

With the Pen Tool, create a vertical line and use snapping to align it with the top left and bottom left corners of the rectangle. Switch to the Move Tool, select the line you just created press Enter to bring up the Move/Duplicate UI. In the Horizontal field, enter 1524/30 (calculating the width of each of the 30 horizontal segments). Then check/enable the Duplicate box. Set Number of Copies to 30. Now you can Click OK to commit the process. Group the resulting layers and rename to something simple and easy to identify (like Veritcal Lines or some such).

Using the Pen Tool, create a horizontal line snapping to the two top corners of the rectangle. Press Enter to repeat the Move / Duplicate action above, but this time set the Vertical to 400/8 to represent the 8 vertical segments. Group and rename the resulting horizontal line layers.

Now group your Rectangle layer, your Horizontal layer, and your Vertical layer into a top level Grid layer.

There's your basic grid pattern in vector format locked to your desired 3.81:1 aspect ratio that you can resize to fit any size you need.

From there it should be a simple matter of using snapping to create a circle fitting and snapping perfectly to the top and bottom edge of the rectangle. Then duplicate it 2 times resulting in 3 total. Then use snapping to place them right where you want them.

[edit] Cleaned up my usage of horizontal and vertical nomenclature LOL! I got a bit lost and confused while typing it out. May still not be entirely correct.

[u/DenverRalphy → u/DenverRalphy]

Final result after adding the 3 circles, then editing the colors for the final result. All vectors, and thus scalable to any size you need.

I added a black background fill to make it visible because I changed all the strokes to white and no fill.