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Snapping

LightBurn's automatic Snapping tools help align objects to other shapes in your Workspace, or to the Workspace grid itself — when you move objects close to a valid location, they will snap to that point.

As you hover your cursor over an object, the icon will change to indicate when it is over a node, line, midpoint, center, or intersection. Use these Snapping points when selecting, moving, or creating objects to ensure exact alignment.

Object Snapping

Object Snapping Points

Snapping Point Icon Description
Node The cursor is over any node in a vector graphic, or the corner of an image.
Midpoint The cursor is over the exact halfway point between two nodes.
Center The cursor is over the center point of an object.
Intersection The cursor is over the intersection of two lines.
Line The cursor is over a line, but not a node, midpoint, or intersection on that line.

Moving to Snapping Points

When you move objects near enough to a Snapping point, they'll automatically align to that point, and the cursor will change to indicate the type of Snapping point they've aligned to.

Snapping demo

Note

You can adjust how close your cursor must be to a point before Snapping behavior is activated in the Units and Grids tab of the Settings window. This value is set in pixels — when your cursor is within that distance from a valid point, it will automatically snap to it, and change appearance to indicate the type of point it is over. Object Snap Distance

Selecting from Snapping Points

You can select and move objects directly from Snapping points by clicking and dragging from a location where the cursor has changed to one of the Snapping icons.

  • To move multiple objects at once from a Snapping point on just one object, you'll need to select them all at once, or Group them first.

    Snapping multiple objects at once

    Snapping multiple objects at once demo

  • To move objects from a center point when using a Wireframe View Style, you'll need to select them before hovering your cursor over the center of the selection.

  • The center of objects that are already selected is indicated by the four-arrow icon

    Selecting from a center point

    Selecting from a center point demo

Creating From Snapping Points

When creating new objects using the Draw Lines tool or any of the Primary Shapes tools, your cursor will change to indicate when it is over a Snapping point.

  • Click and drag from any of those points to start a new line or shape at that point.

  • When you drag near a Snapping point, the cursor will automatically align to the point, and change to indicate the type of point it is aligned over.

    • If you're using the Draw Lines tool, click again to place a node at that point.
    • If you're using a Primary Shape creation tool, release to finish creating the shape.

Snapping during shape creation demo

Snap to Grid

Grid Snapping automatically aligns your cursor to nearby grid corners when you're dragging objects or creating new ones.

Grid Snapping demo

Note

Grid Snapping points are determined by the Grid Snap Distance setting in the Settings window, and not the Visual Grid Spacing distance.

  • Grid Snap Distance determines the size of the grid squares whose corners your cursor will snap to — for example, if your units are set to millimeters, and your Grid Snap Distance is set to 1, your cursor will snap to the corners of a grid of 1 mm x 1 mm boxes.

  • Visual Grid Spacing determines the visual size of grid squares at the standard zoom level. As you Zoom In, you'll see a secondary 10 x 10 grid of squares within each larger square. Each smaller square is 1/10th the size of the Visual Grid Spacing value.

    Grid Snap Settings

Keyboard Modifiers

  • Hold Alt/Option while dragging to make Object Snapping "stickier", meaning objects will automatically align to Snapping points from further away.

    Tip

    If you're moving an object or creating a shape, this will also enable Alignment Guides — temporary visual indicators that show when an object's edge or center is aligned to an edge or center of another object in your Workspace.

  • Hold Ctrl/Cmd while dragging to toggle either type of Snapping on or off for as long as the key is held down.

    Tip

    By default, this disables both types of Snapping. However, if you've disabled Snap to Objects or Snap to Grid in the Settings window, it will instead enable that type of Snapping for as long as the key is held down.

    Snapping Toggles

For more help using LightBurn, please visit our forum to talk with LightBurn staff and users, or email support.