6.2 The Selector: Scaling

Now let’s look at something more complex: scaling the selection, or making it bigger or smaller. This is not the same as zooming; when you zoom, you just view your drawing from closer up or from farther away without changing it in any way. Scaling means actually resizing the objects; this is an undoable action.

For scaling your selection, the Selector tool displays eight handles, four at the corners and four on the sides of the selection’s bounding box. Dragging the side handles scales selection in one direction (horizontally or vertically); dragging the corner handles scales it in both directions:

Figure 6-2. Scaling with the Selector tool

By default, the corner handles can move freely in any direction. This means that in the general case, the ratio between width and height (also called aspect ratio) of the selected objects will not be preserved. You can stretch or squeeze your selection, and you can even make it taller and narrower, or lower and wider, in a single drag. Side handles also do not preserve the aspect ratio, as they scale in one dimension only.

The simplest way to lock the aspect ratio is to scale with pressed. This makes scaling proportional for both corner and side handles. Another way to achieve this is by clicking the lock toggle in the Selector controls bar above the canvas, between the W and H editable fields:

Figure 6-3. The aspect ratio lock in the Selector controls bar

When this lock is on (pressed), corner handles always scale proportionally. Side handles, however, are not affected by the lock and still scale in only one dimension.

Normally, scaling works in such a way that the opposite side (for side handles) or the opposite corner (for corner handles) of the selection’s bounding box remain fixed. Sometimes, however, you will want the center of the selection to be fixed so that it is scaled symmetrically out from the center. This is what does. Note that during any scaling, the fixed point is always visualized by a cross mark:

Figure 6-4. Scaling around the center of selection with

Note

Here’s a useful mnemonic: When typing text, pressing makes the letters bigger (i.e., uppercase); when scaling, it also makes the result twice as big as it would be without (since it scales on both sides of the center point).

You can move the center of scaling anywhere, as described in 6.4 Center of Rotation below.

The remaining modifier, , also has a role during scaling. It allows you to scale the selection by integer multipliers: up to 2, 3, 4, and so on times the original size, or down to 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, and so on of the original size. can be combined with to lock the aspect ratio or with to scale around the center of the selection.