Selecting objects

You can select single or multiple objects using a variety of methods. If you already have an object selected, you can quickly select the next or previous object in the z-order (stack).

Edit All Layers and selection behaviour

The selection behaviour depends on the current Edit All Layers setting on the Layers panel's Panel Preferences menu:

When Edit All Layers is enabled (the default), the command will select objects across all layers and sub-layers.
When Edit All Layers is disabled, only objects on the current layer are selected. Objects within sub-layers are not selected.

Selection box types

For some shapes (e.g. star shapes), a Base box type will be established on shape creation to accommodate the range of different potential shape sizes when creating variants of that shape. However, you can temporarily swap to a 'tighter' bounding box called Regular bounds if needed. The latter is useful for accurately resizing a shape by its corner/edge handles to another object or page element.

Base box and regular bounds — Selection box types: Base box (A) and Regular bounds (B)

For rotated multiple selections of objects or pixel layers, you can temporarily reorient the selection's selection box to vertical using the same Regular bounds type. Otherwise, the selection box will stay transformed with the transformed items (using the Base Box type).

Rotated multiple selection with reoriented selection box — Rotated multiple selection before (A) and after (B) reorienting the selection box to Regular bounds

It's possible to permanently set the object's selection box to orient to the page's horizontal and vertical edges. The object is unaffected. When reselecting the items again, the selection box will remain unrotated.

If you're using axonometric grids, the additional selection box type Planar bounds, which matches the current grid, can also be swapped to and be made permanent if needed.

Select Same and Select Object

The Select Same command selects all objects in your document that match an attribute on your currently selected object. You can match by Fill Colour, Stroke Colour, Fill & Stroke Colour, Stroke Weight, Transparency, Blend Mode, Shape, Name, or Tag Colour. This powerful selection method can assist in making bulk changes to your design all at once (e.g., conversion of objects that share a non-global colour to ones that use a global one).

Select same fill — Selecting the same fill colour across objects.

The Select Object command selects all objects of a matching type within your document. For example, you can select all groups, symbols, artistic text, pixel objects, unfilled objects, transparent objects, unstroked objects, etc.

Select object stroked — Selecting objects with strokes applied.

Both commands also work well in conjunction with each other, allowing you to first group all layers of each fill colour (using Select Same) and then select all of the grouped layers (using Select Object), for example, effectively organising the layers in your image.

To toggle Edit All Layers:

On the Layers panel's Panel Preferences menu, tap Edit All Layers.

To select an object:

Do one of the following:

With the Move Tool selected, tap on an object or group on the page to select it.
With the Move Tool selected, drag a selection marquee so it encompasses the object.
On the Layers panel, tap (or swipe right) an object's entry.

To select multiple objects:

Do one of the following:

With the Move Tool selected, tap an object on the document to select it. Hold a second finger elsewhere on the document view, then tap additional objects to select them in turn.
On the Layers panel, swipe right on objects to select them.
To select a span of objects using the Layers panel, tap an object to select it, then two-finger tap another object to select it and all objects in between as well.
With the Move Tool selected, drag from an empty area of your document and draw a marquee around the object(s).

To select all objects:

Do one of the following:

On the Edit menu's Operations section, tap Select All.
On the Layers panel's Panel Preferences menu, tap Select All.

To deselect an object:

Tap Deselect at the bottom left of the workspace.

To delete an object:

Select the object and do one of the following:

On the Quick Menu, tap Delete.
On the Layers panel, tap Remove.

To select all objects sharing a chosen attribute with the currently selected object:

Select the Move Tool.
On the context toolbar, tap Select Same and then tap the required attribute.

To select all objects of a certain type:

Select the Move Tool.
On the context toolbar, tap Select Object and then tap the required object type.

To control automatic selection behaviour:

On the Move Tool's context toolbar, enable Auto-select, then choose one of the following options. These let you optionally select only objects or groups on the page, or just from the Layers panel (on-page selection is prevented).
- Default—objects and groups can be selected on the page or Layers panel.
- Objects—only objects can be selected on the page, while grouped objects will be selected as if ungrouped; both objects and groups can be selected from the Layers panel.
- Groups—only groups can be selected on the page; both objects and groups can be selected from the Layers panel.
- Under—when enabled, tapping on an area where two or more objects overlap initially selects the frontmost object, and with each subsequent double-tap the next overlapped object behind the selected object is selected.

To cycle between selection box types:

On the Move Options Menu, choose Cycle Selection Box.

To set the selection box permanently:

Cycle to the selection box you want using Cycle Selection Box on the Move Options Menu.
On the same menu, choose Set Selection Box.

Gestures

The following gesture(s) can be used:

On the Layers panel, swipe right on a layer entry to select or deselect it.
On the Layers panel, with a layer entry selected, two-finger tap another layer entry to select those objects and all in between them.

Modifier(s)

The following modifiers (gesture-based, Command Controller or a hardware keyboard) can be used:

With the Auto-select option disabled (on the context toolbar):
- -tap objects on the page to enable the option back on the fly.
With the Auto-select option enabled:
- On the Layers panel, holding and tapping selects multiple layers. The same is achieved by tapping objects on the page whilst holding the modifier.
- In the document view, hold down a finger or the modifier and tap multiple layers to select them.
- While using the above modifier for multi-selection, additionally hold the modifer and tap on a target object to remove it from the selection.
- Pressing the modifier whilst tapping on a layer in the panel temporarily disables the whole composition preview leaving only the one (tapped on) selected—helpful in confirming selection of layers in complex compositions.
- As you drag a selection marquee, pressing the modifier selects objects which are only partially covered by the selection marquee. This behaviour can be made the default in Settings (Preferences)^*.

Auto-select

Edit All Layers and selection behaviour

Selection box types

Select Same and Select Object

SEE ALSO: