Object Alignment

Talk about Pixelmator Pro, share tips & tricks, tutorials, and other resources.
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2019-12-19 13:40:50

Hello,

When aligning two objects, is there a way to select which object aligns to which one?

https://dsc.cloud/bcee1e/2019-12-19-16.26.47.gif

For example, in the above gif, I would like the rectangle to align to the vertical center of the square.


i.e. the square will be fixed in its position, and the rectangle will move down but in this case both objects are moving.

In adobe illustrator, you select the two objects and then click on the object you would like to be used as the reference object to which the 2nd object will align to, is there a way to do that in pixelmator.
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2019-12-20 10:43:12

Erm, in this case, you could just drag the layer while holding the Shift key and once the vertical centers align, the layer will snap into place automatically.

A kind of hack/workaround, if you don't want to use the layer dragging method, would be to Command-click the square layer to load it as a selection, which would make it an immovable reference object. Then simply click the rectangle and click the align vertical centers button. Hope that helps!
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2019-12-21 11:00:08

Thanks for the suggestions.

The layer dragging works but in a proper design I would have several objects and alignment wouldn't be as straight forward as with only two objects.

I was not able to make the square an immovable object by command clicking. Once I Command-Click the square then just click the rectangle the square selection is deselected. Am I doing something wrong?

https://dsc.cloud/bcee1e/2019-12-21-13.55.44.gif
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2019-12-27 11:24:06

Sorry, my explanation was way more complex than it should have been. :smile: You'd need to Command-click the layer thumbnail in the Layers sidebar (or choose Edit > Load Selection with the square layer selected), which will load the layer outline as a selection. And by "immovable object" I simply mean that a selection cannot be moved by the Align & Distribute feature, so loading the layer outline as a selection will make things work the way you'd like, though it's not necessarily by design, it's just a workaround I managed to find.