4 Reasons Why Your Objects Aren’t Visible in Inkscape
4 Reasons Why Your Objects Aren’t Visible in Inkscape https://logosbynick.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/objects-not-visible-inkscape.jpg 800 470 Nick Saporito https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/8e31bf392f0ba8850f29a1a2e833cdd020909bfd44613c7e222072c40e031c34?s=96&d=mm&r=gIn this post I’ll be covering 4 common reasons why your objects aren’t visible in Inkscape and how to fix it. This is a rather common problem with Inkscape and it can be frustrating if you don’t know why it’s happening.
When Objects Aren’t Visible in Inkscape
Let’s say you go to create a circle or ellipse, but nothing shows on the canvas. All you can see is the bounding box around the object and the editable properties you’d see on any other ellipse. It might look something like this…
You’ll notice that it’s nearly impossible to select this invisible object. The only way to do so is to press control + a on the keyboard, which selects every object on the canvas (including the invisible object.) Or you can also click and drag a large selection over the general area where the circle was drawn, which should select it.
Why Objects Aren’t Visible in Inkscape
| If your objects aren’t visible in Inkscape, it’s most likely for one of three reasons: either there’s no set fill and stroke color, the alpha channel of the fill and/or stroke color has been reduced to zero, or the opacity of the object has been reduced to zero. |
Let’s briefly go over 4 reasons why your objects may not be visible.
Reason #1: There’s No Fill & Stroke Colors Set
One reason why an object you’ve just created isn’t showing could be because there’s no set fill and stroke color. Have a look at the bottom-left of your screen. Whenever you have an object selected, there should be a display indicating what the fill and stroke colors are.
If your fill and stroke indicators read “None” for both, then that’s probably why your objects aren’t visible. Simply click on any color you’d like in the color selector and your object will become visible. If not, read on.
Reason #2: The Color’s Alpha Channel Is At Zero
If you do have a fill and/or stroke color set and your object still isn’t visible, it could be because the alpha channel of the color has been reduced to zero.
Maybe your screen looks something like this…
If that’s the case then you’ll have to open the Fill & Stroke Menu by pressing control + shift + f on your keyboard. Click on the Fill tab, then click on the HSL tab and have look at the last row that reads A: (shorthand for alpha channel.)
If that alpha channel is set to 0 then that would explain why your objects aren’t visible. Click and drag it to the right to bring up the visibility, or simply type 255 into the box where it currently reads 0.
Reason #3: The Object’s Opacity Is Set To Zero
Another reason why your objects may be invisible in Inkscape is because the opacity of the object is set to 0%.
Let’s have another look at the Fill & Stroke menu. At the very bottom you’ll see a row for object Opacity (%).
If your object’s opacity is set to 0% like mine is in the screenshot above, simply click and drag to bring the opacity up to 100% and your object should become visible.
Reason #4: Incorrect Display Mode
Finally, let’s address Display Modes. Although display modes won’t cause your objects to become invisible, it could be a reason why they’re only appearing as outlines.
To ensure that objects appear on your canvas with the fill and stroke colors fully displayed, set your Display Mode to Normal.
To do this, go to:
View > Display Mode
Choose the Normal option if not already enabled. Sometimes this gets switched unintentionally, and if you have any other setting enabled, it won’t display objects properly.
Conclusion
If you’ve checked all 4 of these steps and your objects aren’t visible in Inkscape still then leave a comment below and I’ll see if I can help.
As always, thanks for visiting!
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47 comments
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Nick Saporito
Hi Laura, try checking the “Shape” dropdown in the tool settings menu. It should be set to “None”.
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Sam Persoon
Hi Nick,
Thanks for the advice here! Unfortunately all of these potential issues didn’t change the problem for me. I’ve been through the 3 different cases you’ve described.
Any idea? Can i share a screenshot here?
thanks a lot!
Sam-
Seadubbu
I recently had this problem after installing Inkscape 1.2.2. Fill and stroke would not color any objects and text would only show in black. After reinstalling several times we no fix. I finally found the problem was under View/Display mode was not set to “Normal”. After selecting normal view everything works as it supposed to.
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Logos By Nick
This is a common problem I’m noticing with a lot of users. I will be updating this article shortly.
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CAMAI
THANK YOU SO MUCH ! I HAVE BEEN DEALING WITH THIS FOR WEEKS. I TRY AND IT WORKED!
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JIm
I had this issue and the only thing that ended up working for me was turning the alpha channel down and then back up. Found that out by screwing with stuff out of frustration.
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Tabitha W
I was having the same issue. I checked all the settings you suggested and that was not the issue. I decided to take a look at all of the View settings. I changed View > Display Mode to Normal. It was on outline by default. That fixed my issue. I’m able to see my objects display colors now.
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Brenda Evans
Hi Nick, I found your videos today and they are just what I need. However, when I draw a shape it is transparent. I have checked the 3 suggestions and sill not working. On the last one where you are showing a X besides the colours, mine says N/A. I am using a MacBook, could that be the reason. I downloaded the 1.2.2 version. I hope you can help.
Thank you for your videos.
Brenda
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Logos By Nick
I’ve never heard of that problem before, Brenda. Try opening the Layers menu and ensuring that a layer is present. Try adding a new layer and seeing if it works then.
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Sonia
Hi, thanks so very much for all the steps. Unfortunately, non of these steps resolved my issue. Any help would be greatly appreciated please and thank you
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Olu
Thanks!
This was very helpful.
It was the alpha channel at zero.
Olu -
Tom
Thank you. I almost gave up on Inkscape.
What a horrendous new user experience!
Trying it out for the very first time and suddenly I cannot draw certain shapes! After a lot of head scratching found a blog telling me to reset preferences. That did not work. Uninstalled and reinstalled. That did not work. Rage quit for a couple of days and decided to give the application one last chance.
Finally tripped over you explanation and now it seems I can finally start getting something out of the tutorials (that all assume that everything is working as expected).
Unless there is a reset tool button introduced, the application may scare a lot of new users away, because nothing is intuitive until you have just a bit of idea about what you are doing. -
Alan
Thanks mate!
(It was the stroke width set to zero!)
I appreciate your help and you sharing your know-how and spending the time to write about it.
Regards.
Alan
Laura Brock
Hi Nick,
I’m wondering if you can help! When I select “draw freehand lines” and the “Create regular Bezier path” mode, any straight lines I try to draw immediately disappear. If I make it messy, it shows up and fills in whatever weird shape it makes.
The lines all DO show up in outline display mode, but I can’t just make plain old straight lines in normal mode!
Any ideas? I’ve checked stroke style and color and that “A” slider setting.