A group's or layer's own fills and strokes paint every member's geometry, below or above the
members as the new contents slot (Appearance.contents_index) says; its geometry effects reshape
the members as one piece and its raster effects apply to the composite (one combined shadow),
respecting knockout groups. Type's own fills and strokes paint under or over its characters.
Render, SVG/PDF (via bake) and Expand Appearance evaluate them alike.
Commands: appearance.* / effect.* take target: "object"|"contents" and layer ids;
appearance.moveItem moves the Contents slot (from: "contents") or an item across it
(contents); appearance.targetContents selects a group's members. Graphic styles applied to a
group now style the group itself. The Appearance panel shows Contents/Characters rows that
drag, and double-click to target the members or edit the characters' paint.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
bflatastic