Align or centre a polygon or star by its rotational centre in designer

[ronanski]

Hi, I am sure I used to be able to do this, but no longer seems to work. I want to centre a star in this case inside a circle. The star has not been converted to curves and still has it's bounding box allowing for this situation, i.e. the centre of box is centered on the rotational centre, however it will only snap to the centre according to the width and height of the star (as if it had been converted to curves or I had clicked cycle selection box). How do I get the rotational centre to snap/align to something?

[George-Frazee]

Hey, I just tested this and was able to do it regardless of the position on the canvas or relative size of either object (unless I'm misunderstanding you greatly).

The issue might be with your snapping settings. Here's what mine are currently for this test:

[ronanski]

Oh that's odd. My snapping settings are pretty much same as yours but screen tolerance is set to 5 and I also have snap to gaps and sizes and snap to pixel selection bounds selected. I just tried it on a fresh document and the same problem persists.

[ronanski]

So the only workaround I have found is to create a circle from the rotational centre of star or polygon (this I can do (I can create something from the rotational centre but not move something already created to snap to it or snap it to something else)), then move the star or polygon inside of the circle, then position the circle's centre on the point I want, and then move the star/polygon back outside the circle layer, and then delete the circle. But this is rather laborious and seems silly, and if it gets accidentally moved, or I want to relocate it to a different point I have to do all that again!

[NotMyFault]

While move tool is active, use „cycle selection box“ to toggle between box sizes, and activate „move origin“ to see the actual center.

[ronanski]

46 minutes ago, NotMyFault said:

While move tool is active, use „cycle selection box“ to toggle between box sizes, and activate „move origin“ to see the actual center.

that doesn't solve the issue. As you can see from the original post the selection box is right to begin with but even with this one selected it does not snap to the centre of this it snaps to the centre of the alternate one. And I always have the origin visible and I know where that is but my point is it doesn't snap to this, only the fake (for lack of a better term) centre.

[GarryP]

In Designer, you can do what you want with the Point Transform Tool in Translate Mode (in Windows hold the Right Mouse Button after drag starts) – see attached video.

[ronanski]

OMG thank you! Point transform tool worked, (slightly different than you described) but it worked thank you.

[GarryP]

You’re welcome.

7 minutes ago, ronanski said:

worked, (slightly different than you described)

Just out of curiosity, how are you using it differently to how I described it and what is in the video?

[ronanski]

Well you mention hold the right mouse button after dragging? I don't have mouse just trackpad so that isn't possible but when I right click I just get the menu. Also, in your video when you click the point transform tool the centre of rotation moves into a different place and then you select where it was to drag. If I try drag from here I end up just moving the centre of rotation not the object. And if I do move it out the way and then try click and drag from white dot where centre is (where centre of rotation was) it spins about the new centre of rotation instead of translating. But if I leave centre of rotation where it is I can just click anywhere on object space to drag it and it works fine then

[George-Frazee]

4 hours ago, ronanski said:

Oh that's odd. My snapping settings are pretty much same as yours but screen tolerance is set to 5 and I also have snap to gaps and sizes and snap to pixel selection bounds selected. I just tried it on a fresh document and the same problem persists.

Actually I apologize, after watching @GarryP's video I realize that what I was able to do isn't quiet what you were asking 100%. I was only able to line them up initially because I had made the star the same size as the circle. From there you can resize from the center. But I think Garry's way is faster and I'm glad I know about it now.