Feathering object edge in Affinity Designer

[mann]

How does one feather the edge of an object in Affinity Designer. I'm seeing a smudge tool that kind of gives me what I want but I really want something that does a feather evenly around the entire object?

[GarryP]

You might get some suggestions if you give an example of the sort of thing you want to give a feathered edge to and say what you mean by ‘feathered’ as different people will have different ideas about what that means.
If you can give a visual example that already exists then that will also help.

[mann]

@GarryP Thanks for forcing me into the rubber duck mode of communication with myself to work it out. It turns out I wanted a gaussian blur on the object. I have attached a screenshot for those who might come across this thread later asking a similar question.

 

Edited February 5, 2021 by mann
tried out @firstdefense suggestion on resizing posted image. Thanks.

[GarryP]

Glad you found your answer.

[MickRose]

A nicer way is to create a mask (with any non-empty fill) and apply the Gaussian blur to the mask. Works well for photos.

[firstdefence]

@mann Re the image being big, you can double click on the image to get the scaling tools while creating the post.

[mann]

1 hour ago, MickRose said:

A nicer way is to create a mask (with any non-empty fill) and apply the Gaussian blur to the mask. Works well for photos.

@MickRose Would you be able to provide steps on how I get the mask layer in place to then apply a gaussian blur to the mask?

[firstdefence]

1. Duplicate the shape
2. Right click and select mask to below
3. Select the mask and add a gaussian blur
4. Now reduce the size of the mask a bit (the duplicate used to create the mask)

The premise of this method is it does not apply a gaussian blur over the whole of the shape, only the edge, which is why it's good for images.

 

[mann]

Thanks @firstdefence for pointing out this other method of masking. I can see it being used in various ways that the other method might now work as well.