Collect in New Layer

[Mike Witherell]

Hi gang,

In the Layers panel menu button is the command "Collect in New Layer". Yay, I use it a lot.

Under Edit > Keyboard Shortcuts, it appears that you cannot give it a keyboard shortcut.

Or can you? Do you know of a way?

Best to you,

Mike Witherell

[Monika Gause · Accepted solution]

It can be recorded as an action.

Then apply a shortcut to the action

[AGH23734394bre8]

Would you mind sharing step by step how to do it? I tried creating action, but when I Play it, the error pops up. the things I recorded was: clicking hamburger menu -> Collect in new layer. did I missed some important step?

[Monika Gause]

Please post a demo file to Dropbox or the like.

[AGH23734394bre8]

I attached file here. When I receive files from our agency, all the elements are always in one layer. When I want to animate designs in After Effects, I need each element to be on the separate top-level layer. It means, that I have to move every single piece to new layer and rename it. Right now I am selecting pieces in the layers panel and collect it into new layer, rename it and move the layer to be in top hierarchy - it's a chore because sometimes I have graphics with 100+ elements. Any way to creat action for that? I appreciate your help!
https://www.dropbox.com/s/iher5v4gerfnq01/example.ai?dl=0

[Monika Gause]

Your demo file consists of nested groups. 

If you say the files are organized differently each time, then it will get very complicated if possible at all to get the objects separated on layers each.

[AGH23734394bre8]

Thanks for replying! Is there any workflow you'd recommend to speed up the process? 

[Monika Gause]

There are a couple of scripters in the forum. So maybe using scripts this can be automated. They could at least give you some hints so you can decide if you want to commission a script or write one yourself.

What would help even more would be to set up specifications for your client so they do organize all the files in the same manner.