Draw pencil lines

Sculpting

Sculpting allows you to modify the pencil stroke when the stroke is still being drawn or if it is reselected again for further editing. Two techniques are possible:

• Redraw between any two points along the stroke to redefine its path.
• Continue the pencil stroke by drawing from either end node. An Add (+) cursor appears when hovering over an end node to help guide you.

You can also perform advanced editing of the pencil stroke with the Node Tool. For example, node and control handles can be repositioned.

Stroke stabilisation

Affinity Designer's stroke stabiliser smooths pencil lines as you draw, helping you to produce a more aesthetically pleasing stroke.

A Rope stabiliser or Window stabiliser mode can be used; the former drags the stroke end by a 'rope' to smooth the stroke, but lets you introduce sharp corners at increasing rope Length (radius) values by redirecting the slackened rope; the latter will smooth the stroke by averaging sampled input positions within a Window whose size is configurable.

Auto closing

The context toolbar's Auto close options let you create a closed curve from your stroke when enabled. While drawing, if the pencil cursor nears the same curve's starting node, a 'dog bone' visual aid temporarily appears to indicate that closure will occur on mouse release.

Auto close can be set with the following options on the context toolbar:

• Off—when enabled, you can continue applying strokes without closing the curve when the cursor approaches close to the same curve's start node; opposite to the "Close always" option.
• Near—when enabled, you can close the curve when the cursor approaches close to the curve's start node.
• Far—when enabled, you can close the curve when the cursor's position is further from the curve's start node.
• Always—when enabled, the curve is always closed, irrespective of the distance between the end points.