• Introduction
• Manual has moved!
• Why use Inkscape?
• Professional Software
• About this Book
• Installing Inkscape
• Windows
• Mac OS X
• Gnu/Linux
• Getting Around in Inkscape
• Interface
• Managing the Workspace
• Drawing with Geometrical Shapes
• Ways of Drawing with Inkscape
• Shape Tools
• The Selector Tool
• Squares and Rectangles
• Circles, Ellipses and Arcs
• Stars and Polygons
• Spirals
• 3D-Boxes
• Freehand Drawing
• Freehand Drawing
• The Pencil Tool
• The Pen Tool
• The Calligraphy Tool
• Boolean Operations
• About Nodes
• Editing Paths
• Stacking Order
• Align and Distribute
• The Node Tool
• Tracing an Image
• The Tweak Tool
• Color
• Colors
• The Color Palette
• The Fill And Stroke Dialog
• Custom Colors
• Copying a Color
• Creating Gradients
• Creating a Mesh Gradient
• Using Patterns
• Modifying Patterns
• Creating Custom Patterns
• Strokes
• Markers
• Ordering Markers, Stroke and Fill
• Customizing Markers
• Text
• Text
• Writing Text
• Styling Text
• Changing Text Color
• Moving and Rotating Letters
• Putting Text on a Path
• Flowing Text into a Frame
• Creating Custom Fonts
• Advanced Techniques
• Beyond the Basics
• Saving Your Work
• Exporting a PDF File
• Exporting a PNG File
• Exporting to other File Formats
• Importing Pictures into a Document
• Importing other File Formats
• Copying and Duplicating Objects
• Cloning Objects
• Customizing Keyboard Shortcuts
• Clipping and Masking
• Filters
• Extensions
• Live Path Effects
• Where to Go from Here
• Test Chapter (for trying out styling)

The Tweak Tool

This is the ideal tool for illustrators who first draw their designs on paper, then scan and vectorize their work. It allows you to modify paths on the canvas by making use of its numerous options, without ever switching tools.

[Shift]+[F2] or [w]

To use it, select the path or the part of the path that you would like to modify with the Node tool. Then switch to the Tweak tool and click on the area that you wish to edit.

First, let's have a look at its parameters:

• Width. Determines the size of the tool. If you only want to edit a small region on the canvas, make the circle smaller, else, make it bigger.
• Force. Determines how strong the effect of the tool will be.
• The Pressure sensivity icon should be activated when your graphics tablet has support for pressure. However, the tool can be used well without a graphics tablet.

Now let's look at the heart of the tool, its different modes:

• Move objects. The first three icons move the selected objects in various directions. Read the hint in the status bar to learn about additional key presses that change how the tool works
• Shrink/Grow objects. Reduces the size of the paths, or, when you hold down the Shift key, enlarges the paths.
• Rotate. Rotates the paths. 
• Duplicate. Creates duplicates of the selected paths. These will be placed directly above the originals, so remember to move them, if you want to see the effect.
• Push path parts. Deforms the paths by pushing the nodes like a snow shovel.
• Shrink/ Grow path parts. The borders of a part of a path will be moved closer to each other, with Shift, they will be moved farther away from each other.
• Roughen path parts. Roughens the contours of a path.
• Paint color and  Jitter colors modify the color of the paths.
• Blur objects. Adds blur to the paths.

This drawing will serve as an example. The chameleon was drawn with a pencil, and afterwards it has been vectorized with Inkscape.

The tail needs to be edited, so it will gradually become thinner. Here, the effect has been exaggerated for demonstration purposes.

Some roughening has been added to the tongue, to emphasize the beast's dangerous side.