How to create writing learning sheet?

[4485670]

I want to create a writing learning sheet for Japanese/Chinese characters.
The horizontal page would be divided into lines of squares with a little space in between.
At the top most line these squares would be 1cm by 1cm.
The bottom most line would have squares of 0.5cm by 0.5cm.
If possible the squares would decrease in size through the lines from top to bottom.
Squares have a helper cross inside that has a less strong line color and is dotted or a broken line pattern. Would be great if it can be controlled which lines of squares have the helpers.

Inside the squares are character shapes that are just the same character repeated which was typed into the topmost square.
They are repeated in all squares from top to bottom. But they slowly decrease in strength. Starting from a darker grey to almost invisible to not visible in the last few squares. It would be good to control the strength though so that you could print a sheet which has characters barely visible in the last squares and then again which are not visible. I also suspect this is really dependent on the printer as well.

So basically a mix of some of these:
https://img1.androidappsapk.co/py-ftlG3KmTbrBr_DlPPL2Num9QN3P3hELgUFJecl_ThfamBtarSX_Jkpb1u5nA73qw=h768

Make your own customised Hanzi (or Kanji, or Hanja) Worksheets

Kanji Practice Worksheet Free Download : JLPT N5 Kanji Unit 1 Numbers - PDF

I tried to fiddle around with either Writer and Calc but couldn’t even figure out which would be the best to make such a sheet with. Writer seems to be the better choice but configuring a table seems very limited. At least that’s what I tried with.
And how do I even make the repeated characters?
Unless I do everything manually, which would be a lot of work, I have no idea how.

Could you hint me to the concepts I need to look into to make such a sheet?
At best “programmatically” so it is easy to make new sheets for new characters.

Thank you!

[EarnestAl]

The sheet is intended to be printed so not a lot of work needed.

I would use Writer and create a table of one row and 17 columns to fit my 20mm margins. Add borders to entire table including between cells. Select entire table and click Table > Size > Row height untick Fit to size and enter 1 cm. You now have a row of cells of the size you want.

It is probably easier to use Draw for the next step, so open Draw. Select the Line tool, draw a vertical line (by holding down Shift) 1cm long. Open the sidebar and change colour to 30%grey, line style to Long Dot. Select the line again so you have the green rotation handles, copy the line and paste it. Without deselecting, hover the mouse over one end to get half circle rotation handle, hold down shift and drag round to horizontal, release mouse then release Shift. Paste again and rotate same way but to 45 degrees and again 45 degrees the other way. Drag select around all the lines and click Shape > Group > Group. Click elsewhere and select the group and copy.

Switch back the Writer and click in each cell and paste. Copy entire table And paste until the page is filled. Save a copy of the blank page. You could alter a copy to add computer characters (you might need to delete the cross or wrap it in the background and protect its size and position)

Here is a sample, it is quicker to do than to explain: ChineseHandwritingSheet.odt

[Edit 2021-03-07 21.39 UTC]

So you don’t want the guide marks. I think it would be a mistake to try and include guide marks and character to copy in same square, it creates confusion.

You still just need the single row table to paste down the page. In a blank table enter your character in the first square using black text. Copy and paste it into the next square then choose a grey shade, maybe 70%, repeat for the next squares but reduce text colour by 10% (or next envisioned step), then start the guidelines, deleting for the last three, you might consider reducing the darkness of the border around each cell until the last cell is effectively blank space.

You can have the guide as a bitmap and have it as background in some cells. The next sample document reduces the text colour. You would need to adjust for your expectations. Once you have the colours right you can delete text and save the document as a template. You can then use the template to create sheets of different characters. ChineseHandwritingSheet2.odt

[4485670]

Thank you a lot! I will look into it in detail later.
But to note, I’m actually less looking into representation than functionality.
E.g. most important would be the characters repeating and getting lighter in color so that you can write over them for practice.
I want to learn how to make repeating characters. I think it should be possible as I once had such a template. But unfortunately I am unable to find it again for reference.
Anyway! Again thanks a lot!

[LeroyG]

If all lines belong to one table, you can select a column and change characters color to the whole column text.

[EarnestAl]

Yes, but it is quicker and easier to create a single row table and paste the table several times rather than create alternating rows of exact sizes. Anyway it is a pointer to a solution rather than a finished work as I wouldn’t know what I was doing with Chinese or Japanese characters and three different examples were given.