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Rulers and Guides

Intro​

Rulers and Guides can be used to align artwork precisely.

Rulers​

Rulers appear at the top and left hand side of the Viewport and can be used to measure the pixel or percentage values of a Composition as well as displaying the position of the cursor.

Show/Hide Rulers​

To show/hide the Rulers, choose View > Show Rulers or use the use the shortcut Cmd/Ctrl + R.

Ruler Options​

Determine how the values of Rulers are displayed by using the View > Ruler Options menu:

  • Origin in Centre - Values are 0,0 in the centre of the Composition.
  • Origin In Bottom Left - Values are 0,0 in the bottom left corner of the Composition.
  • Use Pixels - Display values as pixels.
  • Use Percentage - Display values as a percentage of the Composition's width/height.

Guides​

Guides are horizontal and vertical non-rendering lines that can be placed in the Viewport and used to position Shapes.

Create a Guide​

To create a Guide, hover the cursor over a Ruler and click + drag into the Viewport. When dragging, a thin red line will appear along with a number indicating its X or Y position. Release the mouse to place the Guide.

Move a Guide​

To move a Guide, either:

  • Hover the cursor over a Guide, click + drag and then release to reposition the Guide or;
  • Hover the cursor over a Guide, double click and then enter a new value in the popover input.
Nearest Pixel

When creating or repositioning Guides they are always snapped to the nearest pixel. While it's possible to manually enter decimal values, they will be rounded to the nearest integer when the Rulers are in Use Pixels mode or repositioned to the nearest pixel when in Use Percentage mode. Note that the nearest pixel is unlikely to result in an integer value when in Use Percentage mode.

Remove a Guide​

To remove a Guide, click + drag one back over a Ruler and then release the mouse.

Show/Hide Guides​

Use the View > Show Guides menu option or Cmd/Ctrl + ; to show/hide Guides.

Snapping

Guides can be snapped to by enabling Ruler Guide Snapping in the Viewport Snapping options.