jfraze

I think I figured it out. Evidently the layer was turned "off" even though the path itself showed up as selected. If I click the checkbox to toggle the layer on and off it makes no visual difference to my path or the active layer below it... i.e, there's nothing to warn me that the path is in an "invisible" layer. AFAIK this is how the layer created itself when I clicked on the pen tool and started "drawing" with it. Maybe I accidentally hit some key combo that turned "off" the layer? When I click on the checkbox to "show" the layer, however, the "Selection" button does what I expected all along. (Other than the fact that it deletes the path, which apparently is how it was designed!) That is, the selected path turns into a pixel selection.

I'm not sure you understand my question. I only brought up the mask option because the two buttons are right next to each other, and both should effect the selected path. One does exactly what I'd expect: it takes the selected path and turns it into a mask. I would assume the other would function the same way: it should take the selected path and turn it into a selection. I assume that's what it's supposed to do, right? It's not doing that. It's deselecting or deleting the selected the path, and apparently creating a new path in its place. This new path is just a box encompassing the entire area of the layer. Nothing in the document ends up selected. I've tried toggling "Show/Hide Pixel Selection" but nothing at all is selected. I gave up and just created a mask from the path, then used the mask to create the selection area I needed. Either I ran into a glitch or I'm misunderstanding something about the use of paths. While we're at it, why does creating a selection delete the path? This should not be a destructive process. I shouldn't really need to go through a bunch of extra hoops just to save my path. Is there a simple way to keep the path?

Seemed like the obvious solution to me... but when I click the "Selection" button it deselects my path and creates a new path encompassing the whole layer. What am I doing wrong? Clicking the "mask" button instead does indeed create the expected mask. Why would the "Selection" button not work the same way?

I'll add my vote. I downloaded the trial version to try to decide whether to purchase it (I already own Affinity Photo and love it). Within the first hour of attempting to do some very basic work designing badges I became completely confounded trying to find a way to accomplish this simple function. I'm shocked to discover it simply doesn't exist anywhere in the program. Definitely a must-have. I'm on the fence about purchasing it now, since I may still need to keep using AI just for this reason.