Vector and SF Symbols

Delacroix draws vector shapes alongside its pixels. In the Vector persona (⌃2) the tools and layers work like Affinity Designer's: vector layers hold shapes, the Pen draws curve objects, one Move tool picks everything, shapes stay live until you convert them, and booleans can stay editable. Shapes stay sharp at any size, and GIMP opens them as its own vector layers.

1. Vector Layers and Shapes

A vector layer is a container: a group at the top level of the Layers pane that holds shapes. Each shape inside it is an object of its own, with its own fill, stroke, opacity and mode, and shapes can be grouped inside it.

Where new shapes go

When you draw with the Pen, the Shape tool or another vector tool:

• Nothing selected: a new vector layer called "Vector Layer" is made at the top of the stack, and the shape goes in it.
• A vector layer selected: the shape goes on top inside it.
• A shape selected: the new shape goes directly above it, in the same vector layer.
• Any other layer selected: a new vector layer is made above it.

Curves from the Pen are named "Curve"; shapes are named after their kind, such as "Rectangle" or "Star".

Rules the vector layer keeps

• A shape is always inside a vector layer. Drag a shape out to the top level of the Layers pane and it gets a new vector layer of its own.
• Only shapes can be dragged into a vector layer from outside.
• Layer ▸ Group Layers (⌘G) and Ungroup (⇧⌘G) work inside a vector layer. A vector layer itself can't be ungrouped.

Kinds in the Layers pane

A small symbol next to each layer's name tells you what it is: a vector layer, a shape, a live shape, a compound, a symbol instance, a fill layer, a placed image, a reference layer, a clip group, or a layer with a vector mask.

Fill and stroke

With the Move, Pen or Node tool, the context toolbar has a fill well and a stroke well. Each can be a solid colour, a gradient or none, and the swap button exchanges them. Next to them are the stroke width (with a slider) and a menu with the cap, join, mitre limit, dashes, and where the stroke sits: inside, centred on, or outside the outline. A change applies to the selected shapes, and to the next shapes you draw.

Layer ▸ Vector ▸ Vector Layer Options… opens all of a shape's fill and stroke settings in one sheet.

2. The Pen (B)

The Pen is the Path tool. Its Target in Tool Options is Vector Shape (the default), which draws curve objects like Affinity Designer's Pen; Plain Path draws GIMP paths instead (see below).

The context toolbar has three modes:

• Pen: curves and corners.
• Polygon: clicks only, joined by straight lines.
• Line: two clicks make a straight line, and the next click starts a new one.

Drawing with the Pen

• Click to place a sharp node.
• Click and drag to place a smooth node; its two handles stay symmetric.
• Hold ⌥ while dragging to break the handle, so the next segment can leave at a different angle.
• Hold ⇧ to keep the node at 45° steps from the last one, and the handle at 45° steps.
• Click the first node to close the curve.
• Return or Escape ends an open curve. The next click on empty canvas starts a new curve object.
• Hold ⇧ when you start, to add the new curve to the selected shape as a subpath instead.
• Click an end node of a selected open curve to carry on drawing from it.
• Backspace removes the node you just placed. The arrow keys nudge it.
• Hold ⌘ to use the Node tool while you draw: drag a node or handle, then let go of ⌘ and carry on.

A new curve takes the fill and stroke from the context toolbar's wells. An open curve shows its fill too, as in Affinity Designer. The rubber band shows the next segment before you click. Snapping to guides, the grid and other nodes works as you draw.

Plain Path: GIMP paths

With the target Plain Path (Raster persona), the Pen draws GIMP paths, with GIMP's Design, Edit and Move modes and a Polygonal option. They appear in the Paths pane, where you can stroke or fill them, turn them into selections, or put text along them.

3. The Node Tool (A) and the Corner Tool

The Node tool edits the nodes and handles of curves and shapes.

• Click a node to select it, ⇧-click to add one, or drag a marquee round several.
• Drag a node or handle to move it. Drag a segment to bend it.
• Click a segment to insert a node there. ⌘-click a node to delete it.
• ⌥-click a node to cycle its type. The keys C (or I) make the selected nodes Corner, S Smooth, and E Equal (smooth with handles of equal length).
• The context toolbar has Delete, Split (break the curve at the node), Join (join two end nodes), Close, Reverse, Transform (a box round two or more selected nodes, to scale or rotate them together) and Fillet (round the corner), and X and Y fields for the selected node.

Layer ▸ Vector has more: Reverse Path Direction, Close Path, Offset Path…, Simplify Path…, rounding corners, aligning to the pixel grid, and aligning and distributing nodes.

The Corner tool shares the Node tool's slot. It gives each corner its own treatment: None, Round, Chamfer, Invert Round or Straight Cut.

4. Moving and Selecting (V)

There is one Move tool, the same in every persona. In the Vector persona it is the tool you start with.

• Click a shape to select it. A vector layer is transparent to clicks: you pick what is inside it. A group is picked as a whole.
• ⌘-click picks the layer inside a group. Double-click a group to enter it; Escape leaves.
• ⇧-click adds or removes from the selection; drag on empty canvas for a marquee.
• ⌥-drag moves a copy.
• Use the box to scale and rotate; ⌘-drag a side to skew, and hold ⇧ to rotate in 15° steps.

The context toolbar shows the selection's fill and stroke and the boolean buttons. The Transform pane has the position, size and rotation as numbers.

5. Live Shapes and Convert to Curves

The Shape tool (⇧M) draws 22 kinds of shape, chosen from the picker in the context toolbar: Rectangle, Rounded Rect, Ellipse, Polygon, Star, Line, Arrow, Arc, Pie / Wedge, Donut / Ring, Triangle, Diamond, Trapezoid, Heart, Crescent, Tear, Cloud, Cog / Gear, Square Star, Segment, and two callouts.

• Hold ⇧ for a square or circle, and ⌘ or ⌥ to draw from the centre.
• Shapes drawn in a box stay live: they keep their parameters, and the round gold handles on the canvas change them. That is the corner radius of a rectangle, the number of sides of a polygon, the points and inner radius of a star, the start and sweep of an arc or pie, and the thickness of a donut. Select the shape with the Shape tool later and the handles come back.
• Lines, arrows and isometric shapes are ordinary curves as soon as they are drawn.

Layer ▸ Convert to Curves (⌘↩) turns a live shape into an ordinary curve whose nodes you can edit. Editing a live shape's nodes with the Node tool converts it too.

6. Booleans and Compounds

Booleans combine the selected shapes into one. With the Move, Pen or Node tool, the context toolbar has five buttons:

• Click a button and the shapes are replaced by the result.
• ⌥-click it to make a compound instead: the shapes are kept, hidden, inside a group called "Compound (Add)" or similar, with the result shown above them. Edit, move or reshape a part and the result follows. Divide has no compound.

The same operations are in the menus: Layer ▸ Vector ▸ Combine Paths (Union, Difference, Intersection, Exclusion (XOR), Divide) replaces the shapes, and Layer ▸ Compound (Add, Subtract, Intersect, Exclude) makes a compound. Layer ▸ Compound ▸ Release Compound gives the parts back as shapes; Expand Compound keeps only the result. The Pathfinder pane has the same shape modes as buttons, and the path operations Offset Path, Stroke to Path and Simplify Path.

GIMP draws a compound's result, and Delacroix keeps the parts to edit.

7. Masking and Clipping by Dragging

In the Layers pane, where you drop a layer decides what it does:

• Drop it on another layer's thumbnail and it becomes that layer's mask. A shape gives a vector mask, which keeps the shape's outline; any other layer gives a pixel mask made from its transparency. The layer you dropped goes away. It is one undo step, and a layer that already has a mask refuses the drop.
• Drop it on another layer's name and it is clipped to that layer: it shows only where that layer has pixels. The two become a clip group named after the layer you dropped on. That layer is at the bottom of the group and the clipped layers sit above it, and the group takes over its mode and opacity. Drop more layers on the name to clip them as well. To unclip, drag a layer out of the clip group, or undo.
• Drop it between rows to move it, or onto a group to put it inside.

The pane highlights the thumbnail or the name while you drag, so you can see which you will get. Layer ▸ Mask has the commands for masks, including editing, applying and deleting a vector mask and its options (feather, invert and density).

GIMP renders a clip group exactly, because each clipped layer uses GIMP's own Clip to Backdrop mode.

8. More Vector Tools and Commands

• Vector Pencil: draw freehand; the curve is smoothed as you go.
• Vector Brush: strokes whose width follows the pen's pressure or a taper; the centre line stays editable.
• Knife / Scissors (⇧K): cut shapes along a line, at a point, or freehand.
• Contour (J): drag on a shape to grow or shrink an offset outline that stays adjustable.
• Shape Builder (⇧J): drag across overlapping shapes to merge the regions you cross; ⌥-drag to remove them.
• Transparency (⇧Y): drag an opacity gradient onto a shape.
• Place Image (⇧I): draw a box to place an image at that size, embedded in the document or linked to its file.
• Table: draw a box to make a table of editable vector cells.
• Artboard: drag on empty canvas to make an artboard; drag one to move it and its handles to resize it. Layer ▸ New Artboard, File ▸ Export Artboards… and Image ▸ Fit Canvas to Artboards go with it.
• Expand Stroke (Layer menu): turns a stroke into a filled outline. If the shape has a fill, the outline is added above it as "name Stroke"; if not, the shape itself is converted.
• Image Trace… (Layer menu): turns a pixel layer into shapes. Choose Black and White with a threshold, or Colours (2 to 32), and set the detail, the corners and how small a speck to ignore. The result is a group called "layer Traced", and the original layer is hidden.
• Layer ▸ Warp: bend shapes with an envelope (Warp…), bake the bend into the shapes (Expand Warp), or take it off (Remove Warp).

Symbols

The Symbols pane (Window ▸ Panes ▸ Symbols) keeps shapes you reuse. Select layers and click + to make a symbol. Place an instance of it in the document, and every instance changes when you edit the symbol. Detach turns an instance back into an ordinary group. Deleting a symbol can keep its instances as groups.

9. SF Symbols

Delacroix can make custom symbols for Apple's SF Symbols app and Xcode.

Starting a symbol

• File ▸ New SF Symbol opens a blank symbol template: the Notes, Guides and Symbols groups that Apple's template has, with masters at the Ultralight, Regular and Black weights in the Small, Medium and Large scales, and their baselines, cap heights and margins.
• Or open an SVG template exported from the SF Symbols app. Delacroix recognises the template and its masters, at any of the nine weights from Ultralight to Black and the three scales.

The Notes and Guides are locked, and the guides are drawn on the canvas. A symbol template is an SVG document and stays in the Vector persona; switching persona offers to convert it to XCF.

The Symbol Masters pane

Window ▸ Panes ▸ Symbol Masters, in the Vector persona's layout, lists the masters by scale. Click a master to select it and zoom to it; the eye button shows that master alone.

• Validate runs the checks the SF Symbols app makes when it imports a symbol: a Regular-Small master must be there, subpaths must be closed, no master may be empty or cross its margins, and the masters must have matching paths and nodes. Click a problem to select its layer. When all is well it says Ready for the SF Symbols app.
• Interpolation compares each master with Regular and offers Fix for what doesn't match, and can make missing masters from Regular. A slider previews the weights from Ultralight to Black.
• Export Symbol Set… writes a .symbolset folder (the SVG and its Contents.json) into a folder you choose, such as an Xcode asset catalogue.

View ▸ Pixel Preview ▸ Real-Size Preview shows the selected master (or Regular-Medium) at its real size.