Work with layers in Dottie on Mac
Layers live in the inspector on the right (Window > Show Inspector, Shift+Command+L). Each layer has an editable name, a thumbnail, a visibility toggle, and an opacity slider. Drag rows to reorder; Option-click a visibility toggle to solo that layer.
Click a layer to select it. Command-click other layers to add or remove them from the selection, or Shift-click to select a whole range at once—commands like Merge, Duplicate, and Delete then act on every selected layer.
In Dottie, a layer is a single, flexible building block that plays several roles at once. Layers stack to form the composite image; each layer is also a frame of the animation; and in Tileset mode they lay out as a grid of tiles. It’s one thing viewed different ways—which is why the timeline calls them frames and the tileset view calls them tiles, while the Layer menu keeps the familiar term. Anything you do to a layer (draw, reorder, duplicate, delete) applies in every mode.
Layer commands
| Command | Shortcut |
|---|
| New Layer | Shift+Command+N |
| New Layer with Selection | Command+J |
| New Layer with Cut Selection | Shift+Command+J |
| Duplicate Layer | Shift+Command+D |
| Duplicate Layer to All Below | |
| Rename Layer | Shift+Command+R |
| Lock / Unlock Layer | Command+/ |
| Delete Layer | Command+Delete |
| New Vector Layer | Shift+Command+Option+N |
| New Layer with Clipboard | |
| Merge Down | Shift+Command+M |
| Merge Visible | |
| Merge Selected | |
| Flatten Image | |
| Center Layer | Shift+Command+C |
| Bring to Front / Send to Back | Shift+Command+] / Shift+Command+[ |
| Move Layer Up / Down | Option+Command+] / Option+Command+[ |
| Select Next Layer Up / Down | Command+↑ / Command+↓ |
| Layer Opacity 10%–100% | 1–0 |
| Nudge layer 1 px | Shift+arrow keys |
| Flip Layer Horizontally / Vertically | H / V |
| Rotate Layer Left / Right | Command+[ / Command+] |
| Group / Ungroup | Command+G / Shift+Command+G |
| Convert to Pixel Object | |
“Duplicate Layer to All Below” stamps the current layer’s pixels onto every layer beneath it—handy for a static background shared by all animation frames.
New Layer with Selection Command+J copies the current selection into a new layer in place; New Layer with Cut Selection Shift+Command+J does the same but removes the pixels from the source layer.
Merge Visible flattens every visible layer into the bottom-most visible one, leaving hidden layers in place; Flatten Image combines everything into a single layer and discards hidden ones. Use Bring to Front / Send to Back Shift+Command+] / Shift+Command+[ to jump a layer to the top or bottom of the stack, or Move Layer Up / Down Option+Command+] / Option+Command+[ to shift it one step.
Lock a layer
Choose Layer > Lock Layer Command+/, or use the layer’s contextual menu, to protect its pixels. A locked layer shows a lock badge in the inspector and can’t be drawn on, cleared, nudged, flipped, rotated or shifted—the pixel-editing commands are disabled for it. You can still rename, hide, reorder, duplicate and delete a locked layer, and change its opacity. Choose Unlock Layer (same shortcut) to edit it again.
Clear a layer
Press Delete to clear the layer to the eraser colour (or delete the selection, when one is active). Shift+Delete clears to the primary colour; Option+Delete clears to the secondary.
Trace over a reference image
Choose Canvas > Add Reference Image… to bring in any image as a non-editable underlay to trace over. It’s aspect-fitted to the canvas and sits behind your artwork—you draw on your own layers, not on it. Hide Reference Image / Show Reference Image toggles it, and Remove Reference Image clears it. When a reference is present, the inspector’s Reference section adjusts opacity, scale, and offset, or fits the image to the canvas again. Add, remove, fit, visibility, and transform edits are all undoable.
Convert a layer to or from vector
Layer > Convert to Vector Layer turns a pixel layer into a vector layer, wrapping its artwork as a single movable, copyable object. Layer > Convert to Pixel Layer goes the other way, baking a vector layer's shapes back down to pixels. Both are single undoable steps and round-trip cleanly.
When a vector layer is active, the sidebar switches to vector-capable tools. Use Vector Select 
V to select, move, resize, copy, paste, or delete objects. Use Poly Line 
B to click out a path vertex by vertex. Line, Rectangle, Oval, Fill, Eraser, Eyedropper, and Move also work on vector layers.
Edit nodes on a vector path
Double-click a path with Vector Select to enter node-edit mode. Drag any node to move it. Click the path outline between two nodes to insert a new node at that point. Click a node to select it, then press Delete to remove it; its neighbours reconnect automatically. To break an open path into two separate objects at the selected node, choose Layer > Split at Node.
Layer modes
Choose a mode from the Mode menu, or press Control+1–5, to change how layers display on the canvas: Composite (the normal stack), Onion Skin (neighbouring frames ghosted), Solo (active layer only), Tileset (all layers laid out as tiles), and Animation (frame-based playback view). The active mode is checkmarked in the Mode menu, and the segmented control at the top of the inspector reflects it too.