Pen tools

The pen tools draw vector paths for logos, custom shapes, and illustrations. Five modes share one floating tool bar: the bezier pen, the freeform pen, the curvature pen, the anchor tools, and the line tool. Paths you draw become editable objects on the canvas.

The shared floating bar

Every pen mode uses the same floating bar, so you can switch modes without losing your settings.

Control	What it does
Tool switcher	A row of buttons for all five modes. The active mode is highlighted.
Stroke color	The color of the path outline.
Stroke width	The line thickness in pixels. The default is 2 px.
Fill toggle	Turns the interior fill on or off. Off by default, so paths start as outlines.
Fill color	The interior color, shown only when fill is on.
Smoothing	A slider from 1 to 100, default 50. It controls how much the freeform pen simplifies your drawing.
Single	A lock toggle, on by default. When on, the tool exits after you finish one path; turn it off to keep drawing path after path.
Close	Closes the current path into a loop.
Done	Finishes the path and adds it to the canvas.
Exit	Discards the path in progress and leaves the tool.

You can change stroke color, width, and fill before you draw, or afterward from the properties panel.

Bezier pen

The bezier pen is the most precise mode. You build a path point by point, choosing a sharp corner or a smooth curve at each anchor.

1. Pick the bezier pen from the floating bar, or press P.
2. Click to place a corner anchor, a sharp point with no curve.
3. Click and drag to place a smooth anchor, which pulls out two curve handles.
4. Keep clicking and dragging to extend the path.
5. Close the path by clicking the first anchor when you are within about 10 pixels of it, or by double-clicking once you have at least three anchors.
6. To finish an open path instead, press Enter. Open paths have no fill.

The difference between corner and smooth is set as you place each point: a plain click gives a corner, a click that drags more than a couple of pixels gives a smooth curve. You can change a point's type later with the convert tool below.

Freeform pen

The freeform pen draws like a pencil. When you release, your raw drawing is cleaned up into a smooth vector path automatically.

1. Pick the freeform pen, or press Shift + P.
2. Click and drag to draw.
3. Release. If you drew at least three points, the path is simplified and smoothed.

The smoothing slider

Freeform uses a line-simplification pass, then smooth curve interpolation, so the result follows your drawing without keeping every jitter. The smoothing slider controls how aggressive the simplification is.

Smoothing	Result	Good for
1 to 20	Minimal simplification, many anchor points, high detail	Tracing, calligraphy
40 to 60	Balanced point reduction	General organic shapes, the default
80 to 100	Aggressive simplification, very few anchors	Quick blobs, decorative shapes

The smoothing value is shared across the pen bar, so changing it here also affects the other modes.

Curvature pen

The curvature pen places smooth curves through the points you click, with no handles to manage. Every point is smooth by default.

1. Pick the curvature pen.
2. Click to place points. A smooth curve appears through them as you go.
3. Double-click to finish, once you have placed at least two points.

Two points give a straight segment, and three or more give a full smooth curve at every anchor. To add a sharp corner afterward, use the convert tool.

Curvature pen or bezier pen

You want	Use
Organic shapes like leaves, waves, and blobs	Curvature pen, fast, no handles
Precise curves for logos and lettering	Bezier pen, full control of each handle
A quick decorative path	Curvature pen, fewer clicks
A mix of sharp corners and smooth curves	Bezier pen, choose per anchor

Anchor tools

Three tools edit the anchors on an existing path: add, delete, and convert. They only work on paths drawn with the pen tools, so clicking a shape, image, or text does nothing.

Add anchor

Inserts a point on a path. Hover over a path, and the nearest segment within about 30 pixels highlights. Click to insert a new anchor there without changing the shape, giving you a new handle to work with.

Delete anchor

Removes a point. Hover over an anchor, and the nearest one within about 15 pixels highlights. Click to remove it. The first point of a path is protected so the path stays valid, and the surrounding curve is recalculated to stay continuous.

Convert point

Toggles a point between smooth and corner. Click an anchor within about 15 pixels.

From	To	Result
Smooth	Corner	Handles are removed and the segment becomes straight.
Corner	Smooth	Handles are generated from the neighboring points, blending into the shape.

Line tool

The simplest mode. Click a start point, drag to an end point, and release to draw a straight line.

1. Pick the line tool, or press L.
2. Click to set the start, then drag. A dashed preview shows the direction and length.
3. Release to create the line. A drag shorter than about 3 pixels is ignored, so a stray click does not make an invisible line.

A line is created as a line object with two endpoints you can drag to resize, rather than a full path, so the anchor tools do not apply to it.

Editing a finished path

There are two different ways to reshape a path after it is on the canvas, and they are not the same tool.

Anchor tools (live, while a pen mode is active). Add, Delete, and Convert Point act on the path's real anchor points and rewrite its underlying commands directly: Add inserts a straight midpoint on the nearest segment, Delete removes the nearest anchor, Convert swaps a segment between a straight corner and a smooth curve. They find the nearest path near your click, so you edit without first selecting anything, but they only act on true path objects.

Vertex Edit (a separate mode). Select a finished path or frame, then click Edit Vertices on its floating bar (or right-click it). This drops you into a dedicated editing mode with a sparse set of round drag handles rather than every point on the contour:

1. Drag a handle to reshape that part of the outline; the surrounding curve follows smoothly.
2. Click near an edge, within about 12 pixels, to insert a new handle there.
3. Click a handle to select it, then press Delete or the Delete Point button to remove it (a contour cannot drop below 3 handles).
4. Press Enter or Apply to rebuild the path, or Esc or Cancel to leave it untouched.

Reach for the anchor tools for a quick single-point tweak while you are still drawing. Reach for Vertex Edit when you want handle-based, whole-contour reshaping after the fact. Vertex Edit is documented in full under Image editing.

A closed pen path is also a frame

Every finished pen path (bezier, freeform, curvature, and line) is created as a frame. A closed loop can therefore clip an image the same way a Selection Tools frame does: drag a photo onto it, or select the path plus the photo and merge. See Selection tools.

Step by step

Draw a logo mark and refine one curve

1. Pick the bezier pen and set a stroke width in the bar. Turn the Fill toggle on if you want a solid mark.
2. Click to place corner anchors, and click-drag where you want a smooth curve, working your way around the shape.
3. Close the loop by clicking back on the first anchor (within about 10 px) so the fill shows.
4. To soften one sharp junction, pick Convert Point and click that anchor to turn it smooth, or select the finished path and use Edit Vertices to drag its outline into place.

Trace something loosely, then simplify it

1. Pick the freeform pen and set Smoothing low (around 15) to capture detail.
2. Draw over the reference in one continuous drag, then release.
3. If the result carries too many points, select the path, open Edit Vertices, and delete the handles you do not need, or redraw at a higher Smoothing value.

Troubleshooting

A fill only appears on a closed path

Finishing with Enter or Done makes an open path, which stays unfilled even with the Fill toggle on. Click back on the first anchor, use Close, or double-click to close the loop first.

The tool keeps exiting after one path

That is Single path mode, which is on by default. Turn off the Single lock button in the floating bar to keep drawing path after path without re-picking the tool.

Other behaviors worth knowing:

• The anchor tools seem to do nothing. They only act on true path objects and only within tolerance: Add needs to land within about 30 px of a segment, Delete and Convert within about 15 px of an anchor. Lines, primitive shapes (rectangle, circle, and so on), images, and text are ignored.
• You cannot delete the very first point. The starting anchor is protected so the path stays valid; delete a different anchor, or remove the whole path instead.
• The line tool made nothing. A drag under about 3 pixels is treated as a stray click and discarded.
• P, Shift + P, and L do not switch modes in the standard page editor. Those letter keys activate the pen, freeform pen, and line only in the infinite-canvas workspace (see Scenes and frames). In the standard editor, pick the mode from the floating bar. Enter (finish) and Esc (cancel or exit) work in both.

Keyboard shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
Enter	Finish the current path as an open path
Esc	Cancel the path in progress, or exit the tool
P	Bezier pen (infinite-canvas workspace only)
Shift + P	Freeform pen (infinite-canvas workspace only)
L	Line tool (infinite-canvas workspace only)

Tips

Sketch first, refine later

Rough a shape out with the freeform or curvature pen for speed, then switch to the bezier pen or the anchor tools to fine-tune specific segments.

Close for a fill

A fill only shows on a closed path. Click back on the first anchor, or double-click, to close it. Open paths stay unfilled.

Related

• Shapes for ready-made geometric objects
• Selection tools for masking images and shapes into frames
• Image editing for reshaping a frame outline with vertex edit
• My shapes to save a path you want to reuse