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Preview (node)Show a live ghost of the input in the Modeling window without realizing it.
Category: Display | Add menu: Display > Preview
- Geometry (any): the shape to show as a ghost.
- Visible (on/off): enables the ghost; off draws nothing, unless the node is selected. On by default.
- Numbers (on/off): shows the per-item number badges. Off by default.
None. Preview is an endpoint: it declares no output socket at all, so nothing can be wired onward from it. That is what makes it the end of a branch rather than a link in a chain.
To tint the ghost, style the geometry before it reaches Preview with a Style node - Preview itself no longer carries Fill / Stroke inputs.
Preview is the one ghost that shows a style. A selected node's own ghost and an Inspect highlight keep their usual colors whatever style the geometry carries - they are there to say which geometry, while Preview shows what Realize will produce. A styled stroke width is in mm, so the ghost draws at the same on-screen width the realized line would have at the current zoom, with the same minimum legible width; a width of 0 draws no stroke.
Lets you see what you are working on without creating real geometry in the Modeling window. Select a node and its output lights up, but only while it is selected; wire it to Preview and it stays visible while you work.
Preview is the end of a branch: it takes geometry and shows it, and nothing carries on past it. What it draws is a ghost, so you can see it but cannot click, select or build on it. To make real geometry, use a Realize node.
Selecting beats the eye. A Preview with Visible turned off draws nothing, with one exception: select it, on the canvas or from its Layers row, and it draws as a highlight for as long as it stays selected. A Preview you have switched off is the one you most need to find again, so selecting it is how you ask what it holds. Deselect it and it goes quiet again.
An older file rewires itself on opening. Preview used to pass its input straight out again, so it could sit in the middle of a chain. Opening a document built that way moves the Preview out of the chain: whatever it fed is connected directly to whatever fed it, and the Preview is left hanging off the side as the endpoint it now is. The construction is unchanged, only the wire is, and a Preview inside a Cluster is rewired the same way. Saving afterward saves the new shape.