ZTools is a plugin for Adobe Illustrator that give you ultimate control over the z-order arrangement of you drawing elements. While Illustrator has controls for positioning art objects above or below each other, it is not always fast and easy to make many changes or to move multiple objects.

Let’s face it, sometimes you just want to explore different presentations of your artwork and changing the way your artwork stacks up can make a huge difference in its final appearance. Without additional help, it can be a challenge selecting and moving many objects, one object at a time.

ZTools respects groups, layers and locked layers so your work is always safe. To work on a locked layer, unlock it first just like Illustrator’s built-in tools. To work within a group, use isolation mode to make adjustments.

Work with z-order arragement of art your way:

• There are three main ways to arrage your art with ZTools
  • One-click cursor tools to arrage a single object without menu or shortcut keys. Just click to move the art.
  • Advanced arrage tools arrage one or many artwork objects in powerful ways.
  • ZTools panel buttons move one or more selected objects where you want them.

Advanced arrage tools can do heavy lifting easily:

• The Reverse Order tool will swap the top to bottom prder of a seletion of art objects.
• The Drawing Position tool changes the stacking order of slected artwork based on their horizontal or vertical document position. You decide how they stack up.
• The Send to Layer tool moves a single or multiple selection of art objects to the layer or sublayer you choose. You may move them to the top or bottom of the target layer.
• The Send to Key tool moves a single or multiple selection of art objects to the selected object set as the alignment key. You may move them to the above or below the key object.

ZTools lets you control the depth position of your artwork objects quickly and easily. It is the fastest way to adjust your art.

• Illustrator has four arrange tools in the menu. They are Forward, Backward, To Front and To Back. Ztools has fast one-click pallet tools that replicate Illustrator’s Arrange menu but do it without the menu, shortcut keys or even selecting objects. Just choose the tool and click your art to move it.

Industrial strength panel buttons to arrange multiple selected objects at once:

• Reverse – Select objects and swap their positions top to bottom. The top object moves to the bottom, the next topmost moves to the next to bottom. It reverses the order of the entre stack without changing the stack’s position relative to other objects in the drawing. It works with two objects to swap their position without moving them relative to other objects in the drawing. The selected objects may be in different layers.
• Drawing Position – Use the X or Y position of objects to determine their Z position. For example, choose to put the left-most object on top and each object to its right below it. For some artwork designs, this can be the fastest way to rearrange objects.
• Send to Key – Make a selection and choose an alignment key object (click it once). Move all selected objects above or below the key object. The relative positions of the selected objects will not change.
• Send to Layer – Send a selection of one or more objects to the layer of your choice. You may choose whether the selection moves to the top or the bottom of the target layer.

Move selected artwork with the ZTools panel buttons:

• You may select one or many objects to move with the buttons
• They replicate Illustrator’s arrange menu items, Forward, Backward, To Front, To Back. We call them Up, Down, Top and Bottom.

Introducing Layer Scope and Document Scope arrange tools:

• The arrange menu in IIllustrator moves obejcts within their current layer. ZTools replicates these functions, we call these Layer Scope tools.
• Ztools 2 has new arrange tools in the document scope. They can move objects within their layer but can also move them through any layer in the document, limited only by the first and last layer of the document. One or many objects may be selected. Multiple objects may be in different layers and they move in unison.
• Document scope arrange tools always respect locked layers, locked objects and in isolation mode, group boundaries.
• As you move objects through layers in the document, you can see them move in Illustrator’s layers panel so you always know where the objects are in the stackup.
• Document scope tools are only available in ZTools.

Group controls added to the ZTools panel:

• Group button – Creates a group of selected objects. It does exactly what the group menu item does in Illustrator but is conveniently located on the ZTools panel
• Ungroup button – Removes the top level group from selected groups. This is the same behavior as Illustrator’s Ungroup menu item.
• Ungroup All – Removes all groups and subgroups in a selection. This works exactly the same as Illustrators Ungroup All menu item.
• Regroup – Performs the function of Ungroup All and then groups the selected objects within a single top level group container. This function is only available in ZTools.