Shapes and Placement

Start a shape from the Shapes category. Adjust the preview before turning it into a new object or applying it to another object.

Choose a shape

Available properties depend on the chosen shape. For example, a Cylinder exposes Top Radius and Bottom Radius, while a Torus exposes Major Radius and Minor Radius. Screw and Gear provide their own dimensional controls.

Place a 3D shape

1. Choose a solid shape.
2. Click to place it in the viewport.
3. Adjust its handles and Properties.
4. Use Move, Rotate, or Scale to position the preview.

The shape alignment control switches between viewport and face alignment. Choose face alignment when the shape should be oriented to a surface.

Edit a Freeform Box

Choose Freeform Box in Shapes and place it. The small selection icons in Quick Ops switch between the entire object, Corners, Edges, and Faces. Hover an icon for its tooltip. Click an element to select it; Shift+Click adds or removes elements. You can switch selection modes and combine corners, edges, and faces in one selection.

With the viewport focused, use 1 for corners, 2 for edges, 3 for faces, and 0 for the entire object. These shortcuts apply while editing a Freeform Box; W/E/R select Move, Rotate, and Scale.

Use the ordinary transform shortcuts: W for Move, E for Rotate, and R for Scale (or your customized bindings). A single corner supports Move; edges support Move and Scale; faces support all three. Multiple selected elements share a gizmo at their common center. A corner shared by several selected elements moves only once. Choose the object selection icon to transform the entire preview.

The X, Y, and Z mirror buttons beside the selection icons enable symmetry across the box's local origin planes. Enabling an axis makes the existing shape symmetric by averaging opposite corners. Subsequent edits also affect their mirrored partners. You can combine mirror axes with multiple selections.

The six sides interpolate smoothly between their four corners while retaining sharp boundaries between sides. Edits stop at a safe limit before the box folds, collapses, or intersects itself; some extreme deformations are therefore restricted. Undo/Redo restores shape edits. The existing Reset button restores the default box and placement. Escape first cancels a drag or clears selected elements.

Use Create and Enter to create the object. The box goes through the usual SDF-to-mesh conversion, so the resulting detail depends on the voxel resolution. Saving a project preserves the active box's corner positions and mirror axes.

Draw a 2D shape

• For a Rectangle, click the first corner, then click to confirm the size.
• For a Circle, click the center, then click to confirm the radius.
• For a Polygon or closed Curve, add points and use Ctrl+Click to close the outline.
• For a Trim Curve or Profile, use Ctrl+Click to finish the path.
• For Bevel, first pick its exact start point on an object edge, then pick one tangent point on each adjacent face. Extend the edge-snapped polyline and use Ctrl+Click for its final point.

These are the Shapes tools. The Sketch workspace uses its own drawing gestures and persistent sketch geometry.

After confirming a Polygon, select one of its control points to move it either directly or with the Move gizmo. Bevel and Chamfer are applied to both outward and inward-pointing non-collinear corners.

Choose and apply an operation

Press Q to show the Actions Panel. Choose Create for a new 3D object; the equivalent operation for a drawn 2D shape is labeled Add. Choose an available boolean operation to act on a target instead.

Bevel is the exception: it is always Subtract, enables its live cut preview automatically, and shows only its Bevel and Chamfer amounts instead of operation choices.

For ordinary 3D and completed 2D shape previews, Enter applies the current operation. Ctrl+Click on an object explicitly supplies the target. Check the viewport instructions when a tool has a specialized confirmation gesture.

Refine before applying

Use Bevel and Chamfer where the active shape exposes them. Apply Array or Mirror when the shape should repeat.

A preview is still an active tool session. Confirm it before treating it as a finished scene object, or press Escape to cancel or close the active tool.