Tips & Best Practices
Keep paths clean and Vextra edits easy to control.
Choose Objects with Care
Leave Double-Click to Activate Path on when several paths or images overlap. An ordinary click then edits the current path, and a double-click changes the active object.
Turn it off for faster one-click switching. Vextra checks the current path first either way.
Fix the Main Shape First
Settle the overall sizes and proportions before you tune individual handles.
Use Nudge for a small change that should keep nearby curves similar, and Power Nudge for a larger reshaping.
Add Smart Corners and G2 nodes once the main path structure is stable.
Drag the Curve Directly
When a curve looks wrong, drag its marked point. This is usually faster than moving both handles by hand, and Vextra preserves smooth and tangent joins as it goes.
Pick the Right Cleanup Tool
- Soft Eraser — remove extra nodes only where the new curve stays close to the old one.
- Optimizer — clean one span between two points.
- Simplify — clean a selected area or a full contour.
- Correcting Pencil — redraw a part that needs a new shape.
Keep Live Features Until the Shape Is Ready
Smart Corners and G2 joins are easiest to change while they are live.
Keep one live master document, and expand a copy when you need ordinary Illustrator nodes or have to send the file to someone without Vextra.
Check the Finished Shape
Hold backtick often. It hides the editing marks and leaves the finished path.
Turn on Curvature to check how smoothly the bends change; it follows the processed Vextra result.
Watch for Double Nodes
A red diamond marks two neighboring nodes in the same spot.
Keep them when you want the overlap, and delete or move the extra point otherwise.
To copy a run with Option-drag / Alt-drag, select the run first and hold Option / Alt before the drag starts.
Work at the Right Zoom
Vextra matches its cleanup strength to the artwork size and shrinks nodes as you zoom out, so a small icon needs no enlarging before you clean it.
Zoom in when handles or nodes sit very close together.
Use Normal Illustrator Styling
Change fill, stroke, opacity, and other appearance settings while Vextra is active. Illustrator applies them to the processed Vextra shape.
Report a Problem Clearly
Include:
- The Vextra version and build from About.
- Your Illustrator and operating-system versions.
- Whether the artwork is a path, a compound path, or an image.
- The active Vextra tool.
- The exact mouse and key action.
- Whether the feature is still live or already expanded.
- A small sample file where possible.
For common problems, see Troubleshooting.