newbie: faded backgrounds

[mg.architect]

Hi, I am a Photoshop user...ah...abuser. However that is changing. The flip side is I now need to re-learn everything I once thought I knew.

One thing I like to do is to blur the backgrounds in photos, leaving the subject crisp and clear. I'm not sure how to accomplish this in Xara X.

Where to start, what to do?

I have watched every movie and demo-clip I could find. Also, I did a search for faded backgrounds before I posted here. The search came up negative.

Thanks for the help.
mg

[Soquili]

Hi MG,

Welcome to the forum.

You say Xara X, is it X or X¹ or Xtreme? Just to make it clear to me which version you are using. X doesn't have the Picture Editor, but it does have some bitmap editing abilities. If it is the original X, I don't have it available here at work so I wouldn't be able to make some picture of how I would do it.

Anyone else have X installed and ready to show how they would do the background?

If not, I'll work something up this evening.

[toffeeman]

Photoshop is a bitmap editor - it deals with individual pixels.
Xara is a vector drawing package. The images are made up of a series of lines mathematically plotted with start and end points. This allows vector drawings to be scaled without any resultant loss in quality.

To achieve what you want, I suspect you will need to find a plug-in filter and use that.

Dave

[mg.architect]

My apologies. I purchased Xara Xtreme.
mg

[Soquili]

Dave, it can be done entirely in Xara X, X¹, or Xtreme. Just takes a different approach as MG mentioned in his post.

The attached image was done entirely within Xara Xtreme without using Xara Picture Editor. I used the Utilities > Special Effects menu option to blur the image. I used another copy of the original and created a shape around the Owl then used the Combine Shapes > Intersect Shapes to get a non-blurred version of the Owl. I placed the Owl over the blurred image and then feathered the edges.

The original Xara ClipArt photograph is on the left and the edited version is on the right.

In Xara X the Utilities menu has Bitmap Effects instead of Special Effects, I believe. Other than the menu name the editing is the same.

Edit: I believe Egg Bramhill made an example of this same techique several years ago. It was quicker to recreate it (approx. 2 minutes) than it was to do a search.

[Luciano]

I believe this is what you wish to do, it is quite easy to get it with Xara Xtreme

ciao
Luciano

[Luciano]

Here is xara file:

[Soquili]

Great example, Luciano!!

Here's a slight modification I made.

[toffeeman]

Thanks Bill - I never even knew those options were there

I do now

Dave

[Soquili]

You are welcome Dave. I've used Xara X, X¹, and Xtreme for ages and there are still a lot I don't know about

That's why I read every Tutorial and Workbook that Gary creates

Gary, I know I don't always tell you how much I appreciate your work on the Tutorials and Workbooks. Thanks!!