Expression Design – Layer Options

I am very much NOT a designer but, on occasion I play with the Expression Design tool to do simple vector graphics that I can use in WPF applications.

Today I found myself building a simple “add” icon. That looks like this:

When playing around in the layers dialog I found a little hidden setting call “Layer rendering style”

What I found is that this lets you modify the display quality of your objects on a given layer. The three options you have are Path, Wireframe, and Preview. According to MSDN

“Changing the display quality setting does not affect your final output, but can help in navigating your document and selecting paths. For example, if you have very complex paths, a lower display quality can speed up screen redraw on a slower computer”

The linked MSDN page shows examples of the three different display qualities. For example, if I take my Add Icon and change the display quality to wireframe it looks like this

This seems like a handy option to have, especially if you have very complex paths or a ton of different layers. Changing to wireframe could speed up rendering performance and reduce the amount of visual noise on the screen.