Move tool

Pick layers, move them, drill into groups and symbols, and build non-destructive boolean groups.

The Move tool (V) is where most editing starts: click a shape to pick it, drag to move it, band-select several at once. It changes what is selected and where it sits. For scaling and rotating, switch to the Transform tool.

Picking things#

A click picks the shape under the cursor and, if that layer can be edited, immediately starts a move. Hold Ctrl or Shift while clicking to add a shape to the selection or take it out again. Clicking empty canvas clears the selection and starts a rubber-band marquee; hold Ctrl or Shift and the marquee adds to what you already had.

The marquee needs to be at least three pixels across before it counts, so a slightly shaky click still reads as a click. It picks up every editable Shape layer whose bounding box the band touches on screen.

Layers that are locked or hidden can still be selected, but they will not move.

Auto Select, Sub Layer and Lock Children#

Sub Layer only appears while Auto Select is on. If you are working on a rigged character where every click keeps grabbing an eyelash, turn Sub Layer off: clicks then pick the whole character, and you can still reach inside by double-clicking.

Moving#

Dragging the body of a selection moves everything in it, and the cursor changes to the move shape. Layers linked together move as a set even if only one of them was picked. With Lock Children on, children receive the opposite offset, so they hold their place on the canvas while their parent moves under them.

The arrow keys nudge the selection by one document unit, or ten units with Shift held. Nudging is ignored while the Timeline has focus or while a field is being edited.

Snapping applies to these moves when the magnet is on: see Snapping.

Double-click to go deeper#

Double-clicking a Symbol opens it for editing in place. On anything else, and only when Auto Select is on and Sub Layer is off, a double-click drills one level further down the hierarchy toward the shape under the cursor and starts dragging it straight away. Double-click again to keep going down.

The transform box on pixels#

Shape layers get no scale handles under the Move tool. When the selected layer is a Raster or Pixel layer, though, a free-transform box appears: four corner squares, plus a rotation knob a short way above the top edge.

• Drag a corner to scale about the opposite corner; hold Shift to keep the proportions
• Drag the knob to rotate about the centre of the box; hold Shift to snap to 15 degree steps
• Drag inside the box to move the floating pixels; hold Alt to leave the original behind and move a copy
• Click outside to commit, or press Escape to cancel the transform, which leaves the selection where it was rather than discarding it

The right-click menu#

Right-clicking picks the shape under the cursor (selecting it first if it was not already) and opens the canvas menu:

• Group (Ctrl+G) and Ungroup (Ctrl+Shift+G)
• Link Layers, for two or more selected layers, and Unlink Layers for a layer already in a link set
• Edit Symbol, on a symbol instance you can edit, and Convert to Symbol
• Convert to Raster, Add Mesh Parent and Convert to Mesh, on a single selected layer

The Transform tool has no canvas menu of its own. Right-click there does nothing.

Boolean groups#

Select two or more shapes and four buttons appear at the right of the Tool Options bar: Union, Subtract, Intersect and XOR. Each one wraps the shapes in a group whose boolean mode is set accordingly.

Nothing is destroyed. The original shapes stay inside the group as ordinary editable children, and you can change the mode later from the toolbar itself, which offers Union, Subtract, Intersect and XOR along with a Blend Radius, or clear it from the Properties panel. If you want a single flattened result instead, use the Pathfinder buttons on the main toolbar, which replace the shapes with the combined outline.

Below two selected shapes the four buttons are shown greyed out rather than hidden, so you can see that they exist and why they are not available yet.