Shortcut for positioning multiple layers in 3D space

- [Instructor] Now for this project, I want to share with you one of my favorite keyboard shortcuts I like to use to help me reposition layers in three-dimensional space. So, let's start by looking at our project. You'll notice in the timeline, I have a blue background illustrator layer. And then I have a shape layer, shape layer one, that I created above it using the pen tool. You can see it's just a shape that has a solid fill, but when I select that shape layer, you'll notice the anchor point is over here, not in the middle of that shape. So to reset the anchor point to the middle of a shape I've just drawn, I'm going to hold down Control + Alt on Windows, or Command + Option on the Mac, and I'll use the Home key to reposition the anchor point of that layer to the center of the shape that I've drawn. Alright, now, I want to create duplicates of this shape and reposition them in kind of a circular arc shape. So, before I do that, in order to create the arc, I want to use 3-D positioning for these layers, so, I'll select shape layer one, go over to my switches area here, and enable 3-D. If you don't see your switches, toggle your switches and modes 'til you see switches. So with 3-D enabled on that layer and shape layer one selected, I'll go ahead and press Control + D on Windows or Command + D on the Mac to duplicate. So for shape layer two, I'll hover over the X axis handle and I'll move this layer over to the right like so. And to get the rotation and arc started, I'll change my active camera review from active camera to the top view. Now I'll press R on my keyboard to open the rotation orientation settings, and I'll change the Y rotation to a value of 35 degrees, and I'll use the access handles here to reposition this layer, so that there is a unique relationship between layer one and layer two. So, if I click in the bottom of the timeline here to select both these layers, you can see the relationship between these two layers. But technically, there is no actual relationship. So to tie these two layers together, I'm going to go to the Parent & Link column. If you don't have the Parent & Link column, you can right click next to the layer name and go to columns and make sure Parent & Link is enabled. Alright, in the Parent & Link column, I'll click on the pick whip, and point the pick whip for shape layer two to shape layer one and let go. And that means shape layer two is now the child of shape layer one. Alright, so now there's a relationship between these two layers. So, what I'm going to do is select shape layer two here and I'll press Control + D on Windows or Command + D on the Mac to duplicate that layer. To create the same offset between this layer and the new duplicate layer that we have between layer one and layer two, I'm going to hold down Alt on Windows or Option on the Mac, go to the Parent & Link column, I'll click on the pick whip and point the pick whip for shape layer three to shape layer two and let go. Now you'll notice those elements have the same relationship. Just to repeat this one more time so you can see the key strokes more clearly, I'll make sure shape layer three is selected and I'll press Control + D on Windows or Command + D on the Mac to duplicate. Then I'll hold down Alt on Windows or Option on the Mac, click on the pick whip and point it to the previous layer and when I let go, you can see there is my arc that I've created. To see the results of this, I'm going to go ahead and change my view from the top view back to the active camera. Then I'll select shape layer one, which is layer four here in the timeline, and I'll press R to open its rotation and orientation settings. And since this layer is the parent of all of these layers in the chain, when I address the Y rotation, notice they're all moving together. So, when it comes to orienting multiple layers in a pattern, you can go ahead and use the Parent & Link column and hold down Alt or Option as you choose the parent/child relationship. And the layers will offset in their proper orientation as long as you've set up that initial orientation between the first two layers.