Molglorf Posted February 19, 2015 Share Posted February 19, 2015 I may be very dense, but is there a way to use a gradient as a mask on a group or object? I’ve been beating my head against the wall here. Maybe I’m just to used to the way it works in photoshop, but I can’t figure this out... Can anyone help? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Molglorf Posted February 19, 2015 Author Share Posted February 19, 2015 Ok, I figured it out, basically I was operating on the "white is opaque, black is transparent" mode that photoshop uses. To create a gradient mask, you need to change the OPACITY in the gradient, not the colour. So whatever is 100% opacity in your gradient is 100% opacity, whatever is 0% is transparent, and everything else in between. Guess this makes more sense, just needed to wrap my head around it better. Kal and greyscale 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bjurasz Posted October 1, 2015 Share Posted October 1, 2015 Glad I stumbled on this! Taking this further, if I want to use a brush on a mask then I also need to not select the color of the brush I use on the mask, but rather its opacity? Quote Bill Jurasz https://www.flickr.com/photos/bjurasz/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anon1 Posted October 2, 2015 Share Posted October 2, 2015 You can also use a grey scale gradient on a mask and also paint with grey scales with a brush on the same mask. Black reveals White conceals Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
audioboy77 Posted December 16, 2016 Share Posted December 16, 2016 but everytime i use the gradient tool it covers the whole screen, not just the layer. and i cant figure out how to set the rubberband selection to the layer. really starting to get irritated here, all the basics just seem very strange and so weird all the tools seem to be somehow 'modal', feels really old school. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
audioboy77 Posted December 16, 2016 Share Posted December 16, 2016 and i cant even get support, because my posts need damn approval... and the company itself do not offer support. i get that at the cheap price, but they should lift this need for post moderation. how frustrating it is when you just start out and desperately need help to have to wait for a moderator to approve your first posts! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billtils Posted December 16, 2016 Share Posted December 16, 2016 Just curious about what is meant by "Gradient mask" here and how people use the AP version. There is a gradient mask tool in CaptureOne that I use a lot. It draws a gradient (obviously :rolleyes: ) by selecting a start point and then dragging to the desired end point. You can then apply any of the C1 editing tools to that segment of your image, I don't see that flexibility in the AP version (and yes, I will be 0.001% amazed if the issue is my understanding rather than the capability of the tool in AP). Quote Retina iMac (4K display, 1TB SSD, 16GB RAM) OS X 10.11.6 Capture One 10. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alfred Posted December 16, 2016 Share Posted December 16, 2016 Welcome to the Affinity Forums, audioboy77. ) but everytime i use the gradient tool it covers the whole screen, not just the layer. and i cant figure out how to set the rubberband selection to the layer. really starting to get irritated here, all the basics just seem very strange and so weird all the tools seem to be somehow 'modal', feels really old school. If I select a layer and add a mask, the gradient tool only affects the mask, not the whole drawing. Perhaps you could describe your steps in detail so that we can figure out why this isn't working for you. Quote Alfred Affinity Designer/Photo/Publisher 2 for Windows • Windows 10 Home/Pro Affinity Designer/Photo/Publisher 2 for iPad • iPadOS 17.4.1 (iPad 7th gen) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeremyrh Posted July 30, 2019 Share Posted July 30, 2019 On 10/2/2015 at 6:25 AM, anon1 said: You can also use a grey scale gradient on a mask and also paint with grey scales with a brush on the same mask. Black reveals White conceals But when I try this, it doesn't work - painting black and white doesn't affect the mask, only OPACITY. This is different from usual mask behaviour, so I'm a bit puzzled!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
duke22 Posted June 29, 2023 Share Posted June 29, 2023 this also drives me nuts tying same approach as in Photoshop and cant get a Gradient mask to merge two images very frustrating and back to Photoshop Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GarryP Posted June 29, 2023 Share Posted June 29, 2023 8 minutes ago, duke22 said: cant get a Gradient mask to merge two images While I’m not sure if there is a consensus here as to what a “gradient mask” is, and I’m not absolutely sure what you mean by “merge two images”, does the technique shown in my attached video help any? If not, can you give us a visual example of two images which have been “merged” so we can see what you want to do? 2023-06-29 10-03-01.mp4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
duke22 Posted June 29, 2023 Share Posted June 29, 2023 Exactly what I'm after but when following this it does not reveal the image behind it but shows a white to black gradient and cant get any smooth transition. It takes me 1 minute in PS but in Affinity so far has been a nightmare CleanShot 2023-06-29 at 22.11.08.mp4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
duke22 Posted June 29, 2023 Share Posted June 29, 2023 This is an example how I achieve a smooth blend in Photoshop in less than a minute after 1h in Affinity I have not managed yet, it maybe that's just me CleanShot 2023-06-30 at 09.33.51.mp4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Th Posted June 30, 2023 Share Posted June 30, 2023 1 hour ago, duke22 said: in Affinity I have not managed yet Looks like you just need to expand the top layer and click on the mask itself before applying the gradient, as in the video above from @GarryP Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GarryP Posted June 30, 2023 Share Posted June 30, 2023 19 hours ago, duke22 said: shows a white to black gradient and cant get any smooth transition. Thanks sharing for the video. Now that I have more of an idea of what you want, to get what I think you are trying to do you can do what I do in my attached video. Select the top layer; Add a mask to it; Draw the gradient. Also shown in my video is one way to ‘reverse the blend’ by swapping the order of the layers and re-drawing the gradient. What’s shown in my video is still quite crude so further tweaking may be needed to get the best result. Note: In your Photo video you were applying two different masks, one to each layer, and that wasn’t going to work for this. To ‘blend’ two layers like this you only need one mask applied to the uppermost layer. 2023-06-30 08-39-58.mp4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
duke22 Posted June 30, 2023 Share Posted June 30, 2023 17 minutes ago, GarryP said: thank you very much for your help, very strange that's exactly what I do in PS and also what I tried in Affinity, I only brought a second layer into play after I could not achieve it with one layer. I started from scratch and imported images again and now it worked don't ask me how as I did exactly the same when I started on this yesterday. 2023-06-30 08-39-58.mp4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GarryP Posted June 30, 2023 Share Posted June 30, 2023 You’re welcome. Not sure why it wasn’t working for you earlier but glad you’ve got it working now. There are probably other ways, maybe better ways, to do this so you might get some more suggestions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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