Selection¶

To edit a mesh you select its components: vertices, edges or faces.

Component modes¶

Pick the component type in the Modelling Edit toolbar in the Scene view, or with the keyboard:

Choosing a component mode switches Unity's tool context to WTK: Editable Mesh, where clicks select components instead of objects.

Selecting¶

• Click a component to select it. The rest of the selection is cleared.
• Drag across empty space to box-select.
• Click empty space to deselect the components of the current mode.
• Hold Shift to add to the selection, or Ctrl to remove from it. Both work with clicks, double-clicks and box selection, and with either key held a click on empty space leaves the selection alone.
• With Alt held, clicks go to the Scene view camera instead of selecting.
• Q switches to the Select tool.

When several components are under the cursor, a component on a face turned toward the camera wins over one on a face turned away. After that, the vertex or edge closest to the cursor wins, or the face closest to the camera. Components on faces turned away from the camera can only be picked when Backface Picking allows it (see Modelling Settings). Hidden components can't be selected.

Double-click¶

A double-click selects a whole group of components at once. What it selects depends on the component mode, and on whether you clicked another component of the same mesh first:

• The result replaces the selection. Hold Shift to add it to the selection, or Ctrl to remove it, for example Shift + double-click to add a second edge loop.
• Vertices: the first vertex must still be selected when you double-click the second one, so hold Shift for the double-click: click the first vertex, then Shift + double-click the second.
• Edges: the first edge must be picked with a single click, not a box selection. It doesn't need to stay selected.
• Faces: the path starts from the face that was selected on its own, or else from the last face you clicked if it's still selected.
• The first click is remembered until you box-select, click empty space or switch component mode.
• Path Diagonal in the Topology tab (Advanced Selection) also applies to vertex and face paths made by double-clicking. Edge paths always follow the edges.

Box selection rules¶

The toolbar lets you decide what a box selection includes:

Edges

Intersecting (any edge the box touches), Midpoint (edges whose middle is inside the box) or Fully Inside.

Faces

Touching Box, Center Only (faces whose center is inside the box) or Fully Inside.

Support Edges, also in the toolbar, lets edge selection pick the support edges made with Create Support Edge (see Cleanup). It turns on by itself when you create one.

Keyboard shortcuts¶

On macOS, use Cmd instead of Ctrl.

Advanced Selection¶

Found in the Topology tab:

Loop

Selects the loop that runs through the current selection.

Ring

Selects the ring of edges or faces around the current selection.

Linked

Selects everything connected to the current selection.

Path

Selects the shortest path between the first and the last selected components. Enable Path Diagonal to let the path cross faces diagonally, for straighter paths.

Grow / Shrink

Expands or reduces the selection by one step.

Invert

Selects everything that isn't selected, and deselects the rest.

Similar

Selects components similar to the current selection.

Convert Selection¶

Convert Selection, in its own section of the Topology tab, turns the current selection into another component type, for example from faces to their edges:

Convert To

The component type you want, out of the two you're not in.

Approach

Which components count:

• From faces: All of their components, only the Boundary of the selected group (inner loops included), or only the Interior, leaving the group's boundary out.
• From vertices or edges: components Touching the selection, or only those Fully Contained in it (all of their vertices or edges selected). Converting to vertices takes All.

Then click Convert Selection.

Selection Filter¶

Selects components by their properties:

Hiding components and objects¶

Hide parts of a mesh to reach what's behind them. Under Visibility in the Topology tab, the Components card has:

• Hide Selected Components and Hide Unselected Components.
• Select n Hidden selects the hidden components of the current type, and Reveal n Selected shows the selected hidden components again. The buttons count the components they affect, for example Select 4 Hidden Faces.

For whole objects, the Mesh card has:

• Hide Mesh hides or shows the selected objects, the same as the eye icon in the Hierarchy.
• Isolate shows only the selected objects.
• Reveal shows the other hidden objects again.

X-Ray¶

The XR button in the Modelling Edit toolbar turns on a temporary X-Ray view of the selected meshes. You can see and select components on the far side.