As a reply and a complement to the selective feathering questions here is a little tut which can work with Xara X too but which greatly benefits from the new XPE.
However, one couldn't imagine the GREAT progresses which could be bring through the introducion of "reversible" 32 bits bitmap filters in XPE !!!
enjoy,
ivan
1 import a picture and convert it to editable shapes
2 open the bitmap gallery, right click on the picture in the Gallery and check "Xara Picture Editor", then apply an effect (here I have applied a blur), select toghether the picture on the page and the newly alterated picture in the Gallery, then on top of the Gallery, chose "Fill". Then draw the line (or the shape) which will be used as your selection.
3 give a width to your line which will correspond to the progressive area of your effect.
4 Give your line a 100% transparency ; select the picture below and clone it ; then open the Bitmap Gallery again, apply another effect to your cloned bitmap with XPE like above at step 2 ; while your cloned bitmap is selected, press Tab (that will select the transparent line below), then Shift + click on the cloned bitmap (it will be selected toghether with the line) and Arrange/Apply Clip View.
5 While your Clipped object is selected, add a feathering.
6-7 Now you have a true interactive selection area and you can change interactively anything you want :
- Ctrl + click on the clipped object to select the bitmap filled shape and modify it like above (you can even add some transparency shapes to it),
- then press Tab to select the line and move its points or redraw it with the drawing tools (you could also select directly the line by Ctrl + click on it in outline display mode, or you could give a name to it and another one to the bitmap filled shape to select them easily afterwards),
- or simply click on the below bitmap filled shape to change it too.
