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S_ A
Inspiring
December 30, 2022
Answered

Anchor point of shape layer

  • December 30, 2022
  • 3 replies
  • 1456 views

Hello,

 

Am curious about something, When I draw something I see a baby anchor point in the middle of a shape, and then there is a big anchor point. I can move them both using the pan behind the tool. what is that baby anchor point? what is its role in animation? what can I do with it? why its even there?

 

 

 

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Correct answer David Arbor

The large anchor point is for the entire layer, the baby anchor point is for the specific shape. You can have multiple shapes on one layer and in the case of scale or rotation, the entire layer will move around that. Try putting one shape on the left side of your comp and the other on the right side, but both within the same layer and you'll see this in action. Now compare how this large anchor point affects both shapes vs. the baby anchor points that are taken into account when you animate the individual shapes' transform properties.

3 replies

Inspiring
December 30, 2022

The big anchor point is the layer's anchor point, accessible under the layer's Transform property group. If you open up the shape layer's Contents property group and then open the Rectangle 1 group, you'll see another Transform group, which has its own Anchor Point property. Every group in a shape layer's Contents has its own set of transforms, which allows you to set its position, rotation, scale, etc. and each by necessity has an anchor point to set its position within its parent coordinate space. The parent space of Rectangle 1 above is the layer's local coordinate space.

S_ A
S_ AAuthor
Inspiring
December 30, 2022

Thank you so much. I learned something new from your answer.

David ArborCorrect answer
Inspiring
December 30, 2022

The large anchor point is for the entire layer, the baby anchor point is for the specific shape. You can have multiple shapes on one layer and in the case of scale or rotation, the entire layer will move around that. Try putting one shape on the left side of your comp and the other on the right side, but both within the same layer and you'll see this in action. Now compare how this large anchor point affects both shapes vs. the baby anchor points that are taken into account when you animate the individual shapes' transform properties.

S_ A
S_ AAuthor
Inspiring
December 30, 2022

Wow! So nicely explained. Thank you so much.

Mylenium
Legend
December 30, 2022

The "baby anchor" is the anchor of the shape group, the other one is the one for the layer as a whole.

 

Mylenium

S_ A
S_ AAuthor
Inspiring
December 30, 2022

Thank you so much.