Stoopid Illustrator Question

Digital Media
1

OK, so I have an amazingly stupid Illustrator question. I can’t get it to add or subtract points using the pen tool.

Details:

  1. Home copy of Illustrator (subscription, v 30.0, latest version).
  2. Problem repeats itself across multiple (all) paths, and files.
  3. Closing/re-opening doesn’t help and neither does rebooting.

The photo shows how I’m trying to do this. Since I can’t ever get it to work, I figure I must just be doing something wrong.

Needless to say, you have to beat yourself really hard to edit paths when you can’t add or remove points.

Thanks for any suggestions.

Screenshot 2025-12-13 at 1.36.09 PM illustrator
Screenshot 2025-12-13 at 1.36.09 PM illustrator2413×1348 365 KB

2

Is this a compound shape by chance? Try to make a new shape using pen tool, then turn into a shape with the properties menu.

1 Like
3

Good suggestion but it doesn’t even work with a rectangle. Same issues.

4

Yes, usually do it the same way, click and drag to create node, but wasn’t able to test it.