Tools: Overview

Ensign Windows has an impressive arsenal of Lines and Draw Tools. The tools are versatile and easy to use. Lines and Draw Tools can be used to indicate support and resistance levels, channel lines, circles, shapes, PyraPoint, Elliott, Gann, Fibonacci, Moon Phases, and a variety of Price and Time forecasts. The drawing toolbar is located on the main toolbar, or you can select Drawing Toolbar from the pop-up menu to bring up the drawing toolbar:

The links below document and show several different technical Draw Tools available in Ensign Windows.

Alan Square
Alarmed trend lines
Alerts on studies and trading systems
Andrews Pitchfork and Schiff Lines
Automatic trend lines
Arrows, Bullets and other marker shapes
Area Highlighting
Butterfly, Gartley, Triangle Formations
Circles, Ellipses, Rectangles, Pentagons
Cycles, Fibonacci Cycles, Gann Cycles
Daily Price Lines, Square of Nine
Elliot Wave ABC and 12345 Projections
Fibonacci Levels, Extensions, Retracement, Ruler

Formations
Gann Fan, including automatic 1x1 logic
Gann Square and full chart grid
Harmonic Octaves
Labels, Markers, and Notes
Linear Regression Lines
Moon Phases
Parallel Lines, Parallelogram
Percent Scale Lines
Pyrapoint
Speed Lines
Support and Resistance Levels
Trend Lines, Standard Deviation Channels
User defined draw tools

How to draw a Line or Draw Tool on a chart

Open a Chart.
Click on the desired Line or Draw Tool button on the Drawing Toolbar. The mouse cursor will change to a 'Pencil' shape as you move the mouse back over the chart. Each Line or Draw Tool requires you to select either 1, 2, or 3 draw points on the chart. The Lines will be drawn from your selected price points on the chart.
Move the mouse to a desired starting point (1st draw point). If the Tool only requires 1 point, then simply click the left mouse button once at your selected point. If the Tool requires 2 points (a start and end point), then hold down the left mouse button and drag between the desired start and end points on the chart. If the Tool requires 3 draw points, then lift up the left mouse button (after dragging between points 1 and 2), and then move the mouse to point 3 and click the left mouse button once (to mark point 3).
After selecting the required draw points for the Line or Tool, the Tool will be in a 'Selected' state, and the mouse cursor will still be a 'Pencil'. Small square markers will appear at the selected draw points. To move a selected draw point to a different location on the chart, point the 'Pencil' cursor at one of the square markers and then hold down the left mouse button. Drag the marker to a new location. To move the entire Line or Tool, point the 'Pencil' cursor at the line segment between the 1st and 2nd draw point, hold down the left mouse button and drag the Line to a new location.

Pencil Draw Line
Lines can be drawn on a chart to mark chart formations, connect highs and lows, display channel line trends, and to project price movements. A start and end point are necessary to draw a Line on a chart. To draw a Line on a chart, click the Draw Line button from the Drawing Toolbar. The cursor will change to a pencil while in the draw mode. Move the chart cursor to a starting point. Hold the left mouse button down and drag the mouse to the end point and then release the mouse button. Square bullets will mark the start and end points while a Line is selected. If the SHIFT key on the keyboard is held down when the line is deselected, then a horizontal line will be plotted regardless of the end point. If the Price Magnet button is activated, then the Line will snap to the nearest Open, High, Low, or Close price.

Marker
The red arrow is a marker tool that allows you to mark specific points on a chart. Several markers can be placed on one chart. read more » Markers

Price Magnet
Click on the Price Magnet button on the Drawing Toolbar to activate the Price Magnet feature. When this button is activated (in a depressed state), then the mouse cursor will snap to the closest High, Low, Close, or Open price while applying or adjusting Lines and Tools on a chart. For example, this feature enables you to apply lines and tools exactly on the High or Low price of a bar. If the mouse cursor is near a chart bar, then the cursor will jump (like a Magnetic attraction) to the nearest High, Low, Open, or Close price on the bar. Click the button again to disable the Price Magnet mode.

Adjusting a Line
A Line must be selected before adjusting the location or properties of the line. To select a Line, move the chart cursor and point at the Line and then click the mouse. When the Line is selected, the chart cursor will change to a pencil, and square bullets will mark the start and end points. To adjust the Line angle, drag the square bullets to a new location. To move a Line, while maintaining its angle and length, drag the center of the Line (not the bullets) to a new location.

Changing the Line Color, Style, Markers, and Defaults
Right-click the mouse while a Line is selected to open the 'Draw Line' properties window.

Each of the draw tools has a properties window that allows the user to customize the tool. The properties window can be viewed by clicking on the Chart Object button, selecting the tool, and clicking Properties. The following options appear in each properties window:

Video Button -Click the video button to view a training video on the selected tool.
Cancel Button - Click the 'Cancel' button to abort any changes that have been made to the properties screen, and close the window. No changes will appear on the draw line or study tool.
Delete Button - Click the 'Delete' button to remove this study or draw tool from the chart.
Delete All - Click the 'All' button to delete all instances of this study or draw tool from the chart.
Use as Default - Click the 'Use as Default' button to save the current settings as the default for all subsequent uses of the tool.
Privatize - Place a check mark in the 'Privatize' box to hide a draw tools name and parameter settings. A chart will then display the name of the draw tool as 'Custom'. This allows users to develop proprietary settings, systems, and workspaces without disclosing the exact studies.

Show - Place a checkmark in the Show checkbox to display a particular Line feature. The Lines can be extended Ahead or Back. Custom Labels, Standard Deviation Channels, Percentage Channels, and Mirror lines can also be plotted. The Channel Lines are drawn at either fixed Percentage amount above and below the original Line, or a multiple of the Standard Deviation above and below the original line. Specify the Percentage value in the 'Parameters' panel. Enter a value in the '%' entry box. For example, an entry of 4 would draw channel lines on both sides of the Line (4 percent above and 4 percent below the Line). Place a check mark in the 'Std. Dev. Channel' box to display parallel lines based on the Standard Deviation. An entry of 2 in the 'Mult' parameter will draw parallel lines at 2 Standard Deviations from the original line. Each line can have an optional custom label. Enter some text in the 'Custom Label' entry box. The label can be up to 8 characters.

Color - Click on the square Color boxes to select a color for the Line.
Style - Select a Line Style from the Style drop-down lists.
Left Side - Markers can be plotted on the Left Side of the Line.
Right Side - Markers can be placed on the Right Side of the Line.

Horizontal - Place a check mark in the 'Horizontal' box to force a horizontal line to be plotted.
Alarmed - Check the 'Alarmed' box to activate an Alert for the selected line. The alert will trigger each time the market price crosses above or below the line in either direction. The line alert sound will use the alert sound settings from the 'Price Alerts' window. Click the Alerts button on the main toolbar to change the alert sounds and settings. The alert banner will use the chart background color, and the chart text color.
Lock Length - Place a check mark in the 'Lock Length' check box to prevent a line from being adjusted in length (after its initial placement on the chart). This allows you to re-select a line and move the line around a chart, while always maintaining a constant line length.

Price - If desired, you can manually enter the Price of the line starting point.
Extend Multiplier - The Extend Multiplier is used to lengthen or shorten the line extensions.
Slope - If desired, you can manually enter the Slope of the line.

Tabs
There are 15 Tabs at the bottom of the Draw Line Properties window. These Tabs allow you to save 15 different Line options. Select a Tab to load a previously save Line setting. If your mouse has a Mouse-Wheel, you can spin the Mouse-Wheel up or down while a Line is selected to switch between the TAB settings. To copy a Tab setting to a different Tab, display the Tab setting that you want to copy. Then, click the Copy Tab button. Then, click the Tab that you want to copy to. This will copy the original Tab to the new Tab.

Removing a Line
Click the Delete button in the 'Draw Line' properties window to remove the selected Line. Click the All button to remove all Lines from the chart. You can also press the DELETE key while the line is selected.

Slope of a Line
Slope is defined as the Rise over the Run (Rise divided by Run). Two points on a line are necessary to calculate the slope. Ensign Windows uses the slope formula to draw lines on charts. You can manually set the slope of a Line, in the ‘Draw Line’ properties window. The value of the slope is equal to the amount of vertical change (Price) divided by the horizontal change (Bars).

Slope Example:
Rise: Given a Line starting price of 120 and an ending price of 150, the Rise equals 30 price units.
Run: If the Line’s starting bar count is 2000 and the ending bar is 2060, the Run equals 60 bar units.
Slope: The Rise divided by the Run is equal to 30 / 60 = 0.5 price units per bar units.
The Line would slope to the upside at a rate of 0.5 price units per bar.

Slope Note: A computerized chart is not a grid paper. The chart can be stretched both vertically and horizontally without changing a Line’s reference points of price and bars. The bars can be spread-out wide, or compressed closely together. So, don’t try to equate SLOPE with the ANGLE of the Line on the computer screen. The chart is a dynamic rescaling measurement of price and time. Therefore, the idea that a 45 degree Line must have a slope of 1, does not compute. In the example formula above, the slope was equal to 0.5 on the chart. The ANGLE of the line has no relation to the SLOPE. You can stretch and compress the chart and the SLOPE of the line will remain at 0.5 (the Line’s price and bar ratio does not change, even though you resized the chart). However the visual ANGLE of the line, as you stretch the chart, will change a lot. Therefore, don’t be surprised if you enter a slope of 1, and the line is not a 45 degree line on your computer screen. Use the ‘Circle’ draw tool to view constant 45 degree lines.

Note: The 'Draw Line' properties window can also be accessed by clicking the Chart Objects button from the chart Toolbar. The Chart Objects window displays all the studies, lines, and draw tools that are currently drawn on a chart. To access the properties window for a line, select Draw Line from the Chart Objects list, and then click the Properties button.