Had it, Now I've Lost it

chuckinsocal

Hi Gang,

I had a method of blurring the background of a photo that went something like this in CS:

Create duplicate layer and remove the background isolating the object to stay in focus.
Go back to the original layer and select the object to stay in focus.
Go Invert selection.
Go New Layer via Cut. This leaves the background with a big hole where the subject was.
Lock transparent pixels.
Do Gaussian Blur.
Put the layer containing the isolated subject back in.

BUT ... here's where it goes wrong ... when I do the Gaussian Blur, it blurs the edges of the object that is no longer there, having been cut out before, leaving a halo effect around the hole, and later the object.

I haven't used this method in some time and I'm sure I'm just not remembering it right. I think I'm either leaving something out, forgetting a step, doing something backwards, or something else wrong because I never had this halo effect before and I can't get rid of it no matter what I try.

Any ideas out there?

Thanks.

Chuck Cannova
http://chuckinsocal.SmugMug.com

Travis

The problem is that when you apply the gaussian blur, it applies it to the whole image. The mask hides the part that is masked but the blur carries over into the masked area. You can do a couple of things....

1. Instead of gaussian blur, use lens blur applying the mask.

2. Select the area to be masked and while the selection is active, apply the mask.

3. Select the area to be masked, invert it, and copy it to its own layer. Then apply the gaussian blur to that layer only.

hope this helps.....

chuckinsocal

Thank you Travis!!!
After many frustrating hours, it turns out that I should have done the select, invert, new layer from copy, lock transparent, apply Gaussian blur on a new layer, not on the original background layer as I had been doing. I think it's working good now. Phew!!

I think I'll write it down now.

Thanks again and Happy Holidays to you and yours.

Chuck Cannova
http://chuckinsocal.SmugMug.com

Travis

Glad it helped.