How to Use DocStudio to Design Your Own Documents

Templates are built on a true-to-print canvas, measured in real paper sizes & dimensions, with live deal data placed wherever a real value belongs. Because the same drawing engine renders the editor, the preview & the final PDF, the document a rep generates from a deal always matches what was designed. 

Rather than building from a blank page, admins open Doc Studio and duplicate one of the Canibuild starters with Use starter, then customise it. Four starters are available today: Site plan (3 pages, A3), Quote (2 pages, A4) and Flyer (1 page, A4). Each starter also has a Preview option, and an account with no templates yet can begin from Start a template or Browse the starters. 

If someone in your team has already created a document then you home screen will change to show all active templates. This will now also give you access to the Importer function.

Open - Loads the template for editing. 

Preview - Opens a sample published version of the template.

Publish / UnPublish - Pushes the document live to the Generate tab in app.

Duplicate - Makes a copy of the template for editing.

Archive - Sends the document to the Archives folder.

Templates can only be Deleted from the Archive folder

If you have created any existing document wheather its just one page or a full detailed proposal it can be uploaded into the Importer. This will scan the document and apply various tokens to the existing elements on each page making it easier for you to edit. 

The Importer has analysed the document based on the layout & specific data points. It will then allocate specific tokens (reference points) to pull in the correct site information form the app. Some key examples are:

• Cover image
• Floor Plan
• Sales Persons (Name / Email / Phone)
• Clients Name
• Build Address

Review Create New Template below to understand the different tokens & Elements that can be added. Note how key details about the design are being pulled through as tokens.

Once you select an existing template it will make a copy of your selection allowing you to create a variation of the selected document. Useful if you are creating an almost identical document with just a few variations such as specific inclusions or branding logos or colours.

The selected document will open exactly as it was. Review Create New Template below to understand the different tokens & Elements that can be added.

The blank document allows the flexibility & customisation of each page with a variety of different elements. Each page will be numbered & highlight the page size & orientation.

• Live deal data – 114 fields across company, design, attributes, pool, salesperson, contact, site, site plan, land, package, inclusions, quote and document information. Authors preview a template against any real deal in the business, and a missing value never prints as a stray zero or an empty label.

• Rules and targeting – show or hide any element or page based on data conditions (is set, equals, greater than), build type, group or team, or number of storeys, so one template can cover cases that previously needed several.
• Widgets – 15 ready-made blocks including salesperson, attributes strip, floor plans at true relative scale, gallery, inclusions, site plan captures with a true scale rule, site calculations, title block, annotations, signature and a data table, plus 7 compliance blocks (status, rules table, pathway, overlays, facts, contours, references). Any group of elements can be saved as a reusable widget for the business.
• Quote elements – Items, Payment Schedule, Optional Items, Totals, Description and Initials pull from the deal's real quote and flow across as many pages as needed. A Prepare step at send time captures the deposit, payment schedule and job site. The quote's own arithmetic is always used, never the template's.
• Signing – each user captures a signature once and it is applied to every document they generate. An e-signature block can also send a document out for signing through DocuSeal.
• Print and regional settings – six paper sizes (A5, A4, A3, US Letter, Legal, Tabloid), headers and footers, margins and grid, and eight embedded fonts. Templates support AUD/USD/NZD/CAD currencies, imperial units for US accounts, local date formats, and "ADUs" in place of "Granny Flats" for US and Canadian accounts. Existing PDFs can also be imported as pages.

Document settings on the right of the screen allow the setup of each page & overall management of all elements.

Each page of the document can be adjust in a different way as necessary.

Visibility can also be set at the publishing level. It allows the document to adhere to specific criteria. 

Select from one of the 8 Typefaces available on the list. Other text can be added as images if specific fonts are required for key elements. Tokens can only be one of the 8 fonts listed below.

Choose from one of the preset colours or select the colour pallet to enter *RGB or Hex codes for a specific colour. Gradient will allow you to select multiple colours and apply a colour transition to the page.

Different elements can be dragged onto the screen to build out each document. The Search bar can be used to easily find a specific element that is needed.

The Text element is what you'll use most in your template, for anything from headings to body copy to captions. Each text box carries its own role and style, so you can set a consistent look once (e.g. a heading style vs. body copy) and reuse it across your template. Text elements can also hold tokens, so a text box can mix your own written copy with data pulled straight from the deal, like combining "Prepared for " with the client's name token in a single line. 

Media gives you two options you can add an image that will allow you to add any image to the page that you have stored on your computer it will upload at a 1:1 scale. It can then be resized & positioned. The other options are Token Images these are all images that are already stored within your account. Some key examples are your floorplan or facade/elevation images. 

Token images are grouped into specific categories that will make it easy to search for & identify what you are looking for.  Depending on the document you are creating you may need specific images. These Include:

• Company.
• Design.
• Salesperson.
• Site Plan.
• Land.

The Shapes panel lets you add basic drawing elements to your template alongside your bound content. Rectangle and Ellipse are click-and-drag shapes you can use as backgrounds, dividers, or containers. Line draws a straight line between two points, while Freeform shape and Multi-point shape let you draw custom, irregular outlines by clicking to place each point on the page. Unlike widgets and tokens, shapes aren't bound to deal data, they're purely visual elements for styling and structuring your layout. 

Depending on what is to be included in your document you may need to add specific elements for layout. A flow group lets you group elements (like icons and labels) so if one has no data, it disappears and the others slide over, keeping your layout clean instead of leaving a gap. An example could be a garage icon for design attributes. The table option lets you build out your data in a grid format so it displays clean.

The Quote section allows you to build out a custom quote layout. You can use the prebuilt template as a starting point or build your own. The items option does come with the totals. If things need to be spaced out then the sum option can be added. E-Signatures can be added & initials as well as design descriptions.

Here is what each of the Quote Widgets do:

• Items — Drops the quote's line-item table onto the document, pulled straight from the deal's quote. 
• Payment — Drops the payment-schedule table, built from the tenant's configured payment schedule (deposit/balance split, amounts). If the payment schedule toggle is off when the quote is generated, this widget prints nothing and takes up no space, rather than leaving a blank table. 
• Optional — Drops the optional-items table — extras or upgrades on the quote that aren't part of the base price. 
• Totals — Drops the price summary: subtotal, deposit line, and balance, computed server-side from either the tenant payment schedule or a manually entered deposit.
• Description — A text block pre-bound to, the free-text note entered in the Prepare Quote modal when generating. Renders nothing if left empty.
• Initials — Places a DocuSeal signing anchor (client, secondary client, or builder) sized for a footer, so each party can initial the quote. It only appears in the output if "Request initials" was switched on when the document was generated; otherwise it renders nothing. 

The Compliance widgets pull directly from the deal's zoning and compliance assessment, so each one fills in automatically once you drag it onto the document. Status shows the overall compliance verdict, while Rules table and Pathway break down the specific rules and assessment pathway applied to the site. Overlays lists any zoning layers affecting the property, and Facts and Contours capture the parcel's key details and lot contours. The Site plan widgets (House or ADU, ground floor or first floor) drop in the matching floor's site plan automatically, and References lists the sources behind the assessment. 

Here is what each of the Compliance Widgets do:

• Status — The overall compliance verdict element for the assessment (e.g. Compliant / Conditional / Action Required), pulled straight from the deal's assessment result.
• Rules table — Lists the pathway and rule-group bands with pass/fail status badges for each rule checked. Flows across multiple pages automatically if the rule list is long.
• Pathway — Shows which assessment pathway(s) applied to this site and whether each one applies, based on the deal's assessment.
• Overlays — Lists the zoning/planning overlay layers affecting the property (e.g. flood, bushfire, heritage), shown as a table or as cards.
• Facts — A summary of parcel and site information (e.g. lot size, dimensions, zoning), shown as rows or tiles.
• Contours — Captures the parcel's lot and contour lines from the site plan data.
• Site plan — House — ground floor — Drops in the ground-floor site plan for a house design, only printing when that build type/floor applies.
• Site plan — House — first floor — Same as above, for the house's first floor. 
• Site plan — ADU — ground floor — The ground-floor site plan for an ADU/granny flat design.
• Site plan — ADU — first floor — The first-floor site plan for an ADU/granny flat design.
• References — Lists the sources and references behind the assessment findings, grouped by section, with links back to the original data.

Note: the four Site plan widgets are conditional — each only appears in the generated document when that specific build type and floor combination is relevant to the deal; otherwise it renders nothing rather than leaving a blank page. 

The Signature options let you collect a signature directly on your document. The E-signature widget adds a signing block that the client completes digitally through DocuSeal, right within the document itself, so there's no separate signing step outside the flow. If you use a different e-signing provider, the E-sign anchor widget lets you place an invisible marker in the document telling that provider's system exactly where to add its signing field. For a printed copy instead, the Signature line widget adds a blank line with the client's name underneath for a physical, handwritten signature. 

A Widget is a reusable, pre-built group of elements (like a flow group with its icons and labels) that you save once and drop into any template, so you don't have to rebuild the same layout from scratch each time. Canibuild provides a list of Widgets as a starting point with the ability to create custom ones as well. Some good ones to use are Sales person or floor plan.

A Token is a placeholder you drop into a text element (like a client's name, site address, or design price) that automatically pulls in the real value from the deal when the document is generated, instead of you typing it in by hand. 

If you do thing of a possible Token that should be on the list but is not. Please reach out to our support team so it can be added.

From DocStudio, admins can publish a template into an existing document slot or as a new entry in the Generate menu, unpublish it, revert to the previously published version, and archive or restore templates. A Media tab shows every location where an uploaded logo or image is currently used. 

The minimum information to publish is to select the document Type.

Available to will only work if alternate groups have been created in User Management.

To Generate a document return to any property address & place a design if not done already.

All documents will be stored under CRM & the Orders tab in MyHub for re access when necessary.