Books > Vol. 2 - Mastering Macintosh Notebook 10 > Chapter 7 info > Digital Ink layer

Digital Ink Layer

In prior Notebook versions, the Ink Layer or the “Digital Ink Layer” was called the “Transparency Mode.”  When you use software other than Notebook or (in Windows, the Ink Aware applications), and you pick up a stylus from the pen tray, a copy of the screen is captured and layered over your actual display.  This works like a transparency laid on top your working image.  You can write with electronic ink over this layer and use Screen Capture to capture images.

Notebook 10 software has some new “Ink Layer” features.  If you want the ink layer in Notebook 10 software to work the same way as in prior versions’ transparency layer, uncheck choice 3 and 5 above.  However, keeping these new features lets you more easily capture individual screens and save them into Notebook software.  Our preference is to just uncheck “Always Save Digital Ink.”

This screen allows for additional “Digital Ink” customization.  If, for example, you are on the faculty in a teaching hospital, using Notebook software with CT scanning software, and wanted to annotate over brain scan images as seamlessly as possible, you might turn off options 1-3.

The Digital Ink border lets you know you are in software other than SMART Notebook or Ink Aware software.  You can annotate over ANY software, using either the SMART Board™ pen tray stylus or the Floating Tools.

When you have finished annotating, replace the stylus in the pen tray and press your finger on the SMART Board interactive whiteboard.  If you are using the Floating Toolbar, touch the Floating Tools’ Select Tool.  A pop-up menu (see next page) will appear, giving you options for saving your annotations.

The upper right corner of the Digital Ink border has three icons: Clear, Screen Capture and Close.  As you have read on page 172, these buttons can be turned off, if you want a Notebook 9 “Transparency Layer” look.

The middle picture, above, is a close up of the Digital Ink layer pop-up, allowing you to save your annotations into Notebook 10 software.  If Notebook 10 software is not open on your computer, when you save your annotations, the software will automatically open on your computer, and the annotations will be pasted into a new page in this Notebook file.

Finally, if you don’t save your ink, and bump the board surface, the ink will disappear.  The Click here to restore writing undo button then appears in the lower right corner of your screen for about three seconds.  Touch it and your annotations reappear. 

If this happens, and you don’t get there in time, click on the Undo icon at the bottom of the Floating Toolbar to retrieve your annotations.