Shapes and Colour

This group turns a worksheet into a visual status diagram: name the blocks on a site layout, read colour codes out as numbers, then recolour every shape at once from a progress formula. It is for the site engineer who has to republish a colour-coded progress map every week without clicking each object.

Everything lives on tab DVD Addin → group Graphics: the main button Color Shapes, and the rest under Shape Menu; the cloud commands are the Revision Cloud button and the commands under its arrow.

Commands in this group

Command	What it does
Color Shapes	Recolour many shapes from a two-column map: shape name → RGB code
Color Rects	Read the RGB code in each cell and draw a matching rectangle on top of it
List Shapes	Write every shape name on the active sheet down a column from the selected cell
Rename Shapes	Batch rename from a two-column map: old name → new name
Number Shapes	Rename the selected shapes 1, 2, 3… left → right, top → bottom; with a preview and an option to write the number inside each shape
Get Position	Look coordinates up by shape name and paste them as Top;Left (points)
Linked Labels	From a name + content table, place a white linked picture of each cell above, below, left or right of (or on) the same-named Shape — updates with the cell
Make Labels Static	One click: every linked label on the sheet (and linked pictures in hidden backups) becomes static — no more slow typing
Footing shapes from DWG 🔒	Read footings from the original DWG/DXF, match them onto the plan picture and draw exact-outline shapes numbered in reading order; with a preview and 2-point manual alignment
Pile shapes from DWG 🔒	Read round and square piles from the original DWG/DXF, match them onto the pile-plan picture and draw true-size circle / square shapes (turned with rotated piles) named by pile mark (P1, P2…) for progress colouring; legend symbols and pile-cap outlines skipped, test piles flagged
Column/wall shapes from DWG 🔒	Read concrete columns (rectangular, round, L/T) and walls from the plan DWG/DXF, match them onto the picture and draw true-section shapes — columns C1, C2…, walls V1, V2… for pour-progress colouring; with several plans in the drawing the plan that best matches the picture is ticked, marks (W400, CW…) come from the nearest text or along leaders
Plan progress	Status table per shape (names taken straight from the plan, shapes inside groups included) with a drop-down; colours from the legend cell fill; the legend on the plan counts Completed: 132/225 (58.7%); one-page PDF export
Get Color Code	Read a cell's fill colour and write the numeric RGB code into that cell
Auto Click	Record and replay a mouse-click sequence — see Auto Click
Revision Cloud	Drag to draw a revision cloud straight onto the sheet — like the Read PDF cloud tool; click a cell to cloud that cell
Polygon Cloud	Click corners to draw a polygon cloud; scallops always bulge outwards, even on L-shapes
Cloud Around Selection	One cloud per selected block of cells or per selected shape, no drawing needed
Convert to Cloud	Replace freeforms, diamonds, triangles (along their corners) or other built-in shapes (around their frame) with clouds — name, line colour and stacking order kept
Arrow	Drag to draw an arrow on the sheet — Excel arrowhead in three sizes
Text Note	Click and type in place — a text box with a coloured border, font and size of your choice
Sticky Note	Like Text Note but yellow with black text, like a sticky note
Callout	Press at the point, drag to where the text goes — text box and arrow leader grouped
Cloud Options…	Colour, line weight, scallop size, margin, resize with cells; font, text size, arrowhead size of notes

🔒 = PRO feature. Color Shapes, Linked Labels and Auto Click need a valid DVDAddin account (Standard or PRO, fully available during the Trial); the rest without 🔒 work out of the box.

The picture commands share the Graphics group but are covered separately in Insert Pictures.

Building a colour-coded progress layout

The quicker way

Plan progress wraps the whole workflow below in one dialog: it collects the names, offers statuses from a drop-down, takes colours from cell fills and counts on the legend. The manual workflow below is still useful when you need your own colour formulas.

The first four commands chain together: list the names → standardise the names → capture the colours → repaint.

1. Prepare the drawing. Paste the zone layout into the sheet as shapes — one shape per slab bay or zone.
2. Get the names out. Select an empty starting cell (say K5) and run List Shapes. The add-in writes one name per row and reports "Listed N shapes". It overwrites whatever sits below the starting cell, so pick clear space.
3. Standardise the names. Excel's own names (Rectangle 27) are useless. Add a new-name column beside them, run Rename Shapes, and drag over the two columns when the picker asks for "2-col range: old shape name (left), new shape name (right)".
4. Capture the approved colours. Copy the legend cells into a scratch column and run Get Color Code there to turn fills into numbers. Never run it on the master table — it overwrites the cells it reads.
5. Build the colour formula column immediately to the right of the shape-name column.
6. Repaint. Run Color Shapes and drag over the two columns when the picker asks for "shape names left, RGB codes right". The toast reads "Coloured N shapes (errors X)" — the number in brackets is the rows skipped because the colour cell was not numeric.
7. Check the layout (optional). Select the shape-name column, run Get Position, and pick a target column for the Top;Left strings — shapes sharing a Top are aligned horizontally.

Next week you only edit the status column and repeat step 6.

Example

A level-3 slab-pouring layout, one shape per bay named BAY_A1, BAY_A2… The status column sits in F, and the mapping table is the two adjacent columns G (shape name) and H (RGB code):

F — Status	G — Shape name	H — RGB code
Poured	BAY_A1	5296274
Poured	BAY_A2	5296274
In progress	BAY_B1	65535
Not started	BAY_B2	12632256

Formula in H5: =IF(F5="Poured",5296274,IF(F5="In progress",65535,12632256)).

Run Color Shapes, drag over exactly G5:H40, click OK. The whole layout repaints in one click: green for poured, yellow for the bay under way, grey for not yet started. Next week, edit column F and click again.

For a grid-style heat map instead of a layout drawing, use Color Rects: point it straight at the cells holding RGB codes and it draws one colour block per cell, sized to the cell.

Tips and caveats

• Colour codes must be numbers, packed the Excel way: Red + Green×256 + Blue×65536. Text, blanks and #RRGGBB hex strings count as errors and are skipped.
• Shape names must match exactly. One wrong character silently skips the row. Names should also be unique per sheet — duplicates mean the command only ever finds the first shape.
• Everything Color Shapes and Color Rects paint gets a fixed 50% transparency; there is no option to change it.
• Color Rects sets the cell number format to ;;; to hide the code, and re-running it over the same range stacks another layer of shapes — to clean up, use Home → Find & Select → Go To Special → Objects, then delete.
• Get Color Code overwrites the cell contents and cannot read colours produced by conditional formatting; a No Fill cell returns 16777215 (white), not a blank.
• Every command here works on the active sheet only and cannot be undone with Ctrl+Z. Hold ESC to stop midway; whatever was already processed stays.
• Get Position returns the single text string Top;Left, not two numbers — split it with Text to Columns using the ; delimiter.

See also

• Insert Pictures — the image commands in the same Graphics group.
• Auto Click — the last entry in Shape Menu, recording and replaying mouse clicks.
• Gantt Chart — the schedule that feeds the status column behind the colour formula.
• Move/Resize — snap a single shape or picture into its cell once the layout is set.