Design Nomenclature / Digital Model Making

Path

Also called vector path, outline, contour, compound path

The drawing primitive of vector graphics: an ordered sequence of line and curve segments, open or closed, carrying a fill rule and a stroke. The segments are usually Béziers, but the path is the object — the thing that gets filled, stroked, clipped with, and animated along.

A two-column comparison, set against the axis “which regions of a compound path are inside”. Non-zero winding: counts crossings with direction, so an inner contour drawn the same way as the outer one fills solid and the counter disappears. Even-odd: counts crossings regardless of direction, so the inner contour always knocks through, whichever way it was drawn.

In practice

The fill rule is the part nobody reads until a counter fills in. Non-zero and even-odd disagree precisely where a path crosses itself or encloses a second contour, which is every letter with a bowl in it.

Not to be confused with

How this term connects

BézierControl pointCounterMaskRasterVectorPath
Related Confused with