Befuddled by Bitmap Feather

[tad]

Greetings All,
I'm confused !?!! I had this idea to apply what I would call a "gaussian blur" to a bunch of vector shapes from a trace, so I thought the Bitmap Feather would be the perfect tool. But, things look wierd. I would think you could choose how many pixels to feather, but the only option seems to be dpi. Anyone got a handle on this ?????? Or have I tried the wrong tool entirely ???
Rgds,
tad

[John Rayner]

Hi Tad,

the feather tool just feathers the edge of an object... Bitmap or shape. A 50 pixel feather on a 100 pixel square will fuzz out the image from the center outward. There are gausian blur plugins that will work with X1 and Xtremes live effect tool will let you play with bitmaps to your hearts content. It is really worth playing with. I think you would love it.

[tad]

Thanks John,
Have you any idea how the number of pixels for feathering is chosen ?

And, which gaussian plug-ins would you suggest ?

Rgds,
tad

[molucca]

Looks like you can enter a value, or click on the pointer to get a slider. The other control is the profile adjustment. Rich

[Charles Moir]

Tad, that is what I'd expect to happen in both cases. If you have multiple shapes selected and adjust the feather (or any attribute control, say transparency) it applies that effect to all the shapes, which is what you are seeing (and is going to be quite slow feathering 300 separate shapes).

On the other hand, if you group them, then adjust the feather or transparency, that makes the single group feathered, which is what I think you are expecting.

[John Rayner]

hi Tad,

I think I used one from a copy of PS I have. Not sure exactly where I got it. I have had it for a while...

the attached pics are an untouched shot and one that I applied gausian blur to twice...

[gwpriester]

Instead of a Gaussian Blur try the Blur/Sharpen slider in Xara Picture Editor. Open XPE then press Ctrl e to open the Enhance menu. Move the Blur/Sharpeness slider to the left to blur.

It does a very excellent job.

Gary

[tad]

Thanks everyone, for the fine advice. Somehow, I had overlooked the Control Bar with the feather pixel selection.

Now, with all the other suggestions, I will have a great time experimenting.

Rgds,
tad