# Vector
> Logos, icons and illustrations as real paths you can edit, written as SVG, all made on your Mac.
*Picture: The Vector bench with Dumpling Row's demo: a steamer basket logo, its app icon and a row of small food icons, with the tools and the layers on the left, Shape Builder and Live Paint among the tools, and the fill and colours on the right*
Vector is for logos, icons and illustrations. Every shape is a real path, written as SVG, so you can edit any point of it. Everything here is made on your Mac and nothing here calls a paid service.
**Robin can do this too.** From the chat, Robin draws with the same tools: it joins, cuts, intersects or excludes shapes, merges or takes away pieces and fills areas, offsets and insets them, turns a line into a shape, traces a picture, groups, and exports.
## Start
On an empty bench, press **Start a drawing** or **Trace a picture…**. Or start from a ready drawing:
- **A logo**: a mark, a name and a tagline.
- **An app icon**: every Apple size.
- **An icon set**: twelve icons on one grid.
Or ask in the chat ("Which logo or icon are we drawing?").
## Draw
The tools are Select, Direct select, Pen, Rectangle, Ellipse, Polygon, Star, Line, Text, Shape Builder, Live Paint and Hand. The inspector holds a shape's place and size, its fill, its line, caps, joins and type.
**Trace a picture…** turns a picture into paths, one layer per colour.
[Film: An 11-second loop, no sound: Trace a picture is pressed on the empty Vector bench and Thimble & Clay's hero comes in as paths, five colour layers listed on the left](https://getrobin.app/video/howto-trace.mp4)
## Shapes, exactly
In the inspector, **Union**, **Subtract**, **Intersect** and **Exclude** join, cut, intersect or exclude any shapes exactly. **Offset path** and **Inset path** grow or shrink a shape. **Outline the line** turns a line into a shape. **Group**, **Ungroup** and **Duplicate** are there too, with **Edit the words** for text.
Where shapes cross, two tools work on the pieces you see:
- **Shape Builder** (M): select the shapes that cross, then drag across their pieces to make them one shape. Hold ⌥ as you drag to take the pieces away.
- **Live Paint** (K): click any area the shapes and lines close, and a new shape fills it, in the fill set for new shapes.
Both are exact, as the shapes were drawn.
**Every icon's colour** sets one colour across a set. **Copy the SVG** puts the shape's SVG on the clipboard.
## Export
**Export…** writes SVG, PDF, or PNG at 1×, 2× and 3×; menu icons as a file each; or an app icon at every Apple size (28 files and its `Contents.json`).
## Keys
| Key | What it does |
| --- | --- |
| V A P | Select, direct select, pen |
| R E Y S L T | Rectangle, ellipse, polygon, star, line, text |
| M K | Shape Builder, Live Paint |
| H, or Space held | The hand |
| Arrows | Nudge 1 pt (with ⇧, 8 pt) |
| ⇧D | Duplicate |
| ⇧X | Swap fill and line |
| ⌥⌘G / ⌥⇧⌘G | Group / ungroup |
| ⌥⇧U ⌥⇧S ⌥⇧I ⌥⇧X | Union, subtract, intersect, exclude |
| ⌥⇧O | Offset by 8 pt |
| ⇧H | Hide or show |
| ⌥⌘L | Lock |
| 0, 1–9 | Every artboard, one artboard |
| ⌘' ⇧⌘' ⇧R | Grid, snap, rulers |
| ⌘E | Export |
| ⌘L | Ask about the selection |
| ? | Help |