Option+Shift Drag (Coming from Illustrator)

[ChristopherS]

Hi Affinity Community, 

Is there a way to Option ⌥ + Shift ⇧ + Drag a Shape tool to constrain centering (Option / Alt) and concentric size (Shift) while dragging. I'm coming from Illustrator to Affinity Designer, and having trouble copy/paste a layer to constrain size and centering. 

Thanks in advance! 

ChristopherS

[R C-R]

When creating shapes, refer to the Status bar at the bottom of the workspace window, which shows which modifier keys to use for the various constraint & centering options. I'm not sure what you mean by "concentric size" but the Shift ⇧ key constrains proportions, for example to constrain a rectangle to a square or an ellipse to a circle.

Similar options are available for use with the Move Tool (& they too are shown in the Status bar), but be aware that there are 3 available default behaviors for the Move Tool Aspect Constrain feature, which you can choose from in Preferences > Tools. Two of them are self-explanatory but the third, "Automatic (based on selection)" may not be. It is the first one on the popup menu & I think the factory default. Basically, it assumes that some object types (like placed images & embedded files) have a 'natural' aspect ratio, so for them the aspect ratio is automatically constrained by default, but other object types (rectangles, cogs, shapes made with the Pen Tool, etc.) do not, so for them the aspect ratio is not constrained by default.

The Status bar is context-aware, meaning that what it shows may change depending on where the pointer is on the canvas. So for example, with an object selected with the Move Tool, when you move the pointer over (or near) a control handle, it will tell you which modifier keys you can use to invoke each option available at that point. It even takes into account the Move Tool aspect constraint setting, so by referring to it when dragging a resize handle, you don't have to guess if you need to use the Shift ⇧ key to preserve or change the aspect ratio.

[ChristopherS]

I'm more concerned about how to constrain the proportions on a shape from the center rather than from a side. Meaning when I drag the shape to resize, it's resizing from the center of the object rather than from any of the other sides. Is this possible to do? I'm coming from Illustrator so I'm curious if this were possible.  

[v_kyr]

The bottom Info bar tells you how to, on a Mac hold down and Cmd-Drag an anchor point to do that ...

[cinemachine]

Is there a way to reassign the keys you use for scaling/modifying an object so they exactly mimic not only Photoshop, but every other photo editing tool I've ever use?.  For the life of me I can't figure out why Affinity had to be different and create their own version.  I tried looking in Preferences->Keyboard Shortcuts but couldn't find how to remap the keys for scaling.  So strange to me 😞 

[yeffdaley]

+1 As @cinemachine pointed out, Affinity apps are the outlier here. It would be nice to customize the modifiers to match AI, PS, Sketch, Figma, etc.

I'd also like a more consistent approach to constraining proportions. I shouldn't have to think about whether I'm grabbing a side or corner handle (and thus whether I have to shift-constrain or not); I just wanna grab whichever's closest. Consistency means I can work off muscle memory which means I can work faster.