Document edge and layer FX don't mask all the way to edge.

[jdrux]

I've had this issue for a long time and haven't been able to figure it out or find any help topics about it. I mask an image (that is larger than my document size) in Affinity Photo. I select the object in the centre of the image and then use Refine Selection to adjust the selection. I then hit Mask and it masks the object onto a transparent background, which looks the way I would like it until I export it as a png or put layer effects onto the masked layer. When I export it as png i get the transparent background, but for some reason the mask didn't get to the very edge of the document, so I'm usually left with a sliver of the image. This gets really frustrating as I have to manually go back in and move the image around to mask off past the edges of the document. Does anyone have an idea why this happens or how I can resolve the issue? I doesn't happen with Photoshop. The only thing I can think of is opening the the original document and masking that to the edges, then copying the masked image into my final document, but I feel like this extra step shouldn't be necessary. Anyone else have this issue?

 

I've attached a couple of screen shot to show you what I mean.

 

Thanks for your help! 

[HVDB Photography]

I think this may be the FX (Inner/outer shadow ?)  

Rasterise the image before making the selection May solve it ...

[firstdefence]

Show us the fx settings?

[jdrux]

I guess I figured out what the issue was, but I wish there was a way around it.  The issue is that I am trying to add Layer FX to my masked layer (Outer Shadow or Glow), which affects the edge of the document as well (an unwanted result). What I had to do was save the masked image as PNG and then do the effects on the separate PNG file. Unfortunately, this ads a ton of extra time and steps to my workflow.

[walt.farrell]

11 minutes ago, jdrux said:

What I had to do was save the masked image as PNG and then do the effects on the separate PNG file. Unfortunately, this ads a ton of extra time and steps to my workflow.

Did you try simply rasterizing the (Image) layer as @HVDB Photography suggested above. I think you could do that before or after masking, with no need to create a separate file.

[jdrux]

Thanks, I just tried some tests with the rasterizing and the one that worked the best was "Rasterize & Trim" after creating the mask, not before. Then, after rasterize and trim I could add layer fx that only effected the masked area. You can see from the screenshot how the selected layer has a bounding box around the image only. Thanks for the tips!

 So again, for anyone else having this issue: Rasterise & Trim after creating the mask, then add layer fx to the trimmed layer.

[Dazmondo77]

Alternatively, make a vector box slightly bigger than your Mask size and drag the masked image into the box, remembering to set the boxes fill and stroke to none, this way you'll retain the ability to re-scale up the image without the horrible mask problem - another way I battle this is: instead of creating the mask, make a selection then create a pixel layer and fill with a colour then drag the pixel layer to the right side of your image and it will mask the image but without the horrible problem, I also use multiple  masks this way for doing hair and a gaussian blur mask to simulate depth of field - in theory, this way, you can have as many elements as you like which make up the mask with are all editable separately you can even mix vector and pixel to achieve this

Heres a quick demo vid:

[walt.farrell]

22 minutes ago, Dazmondo77 said:

Heres a quick demo vid

Your video doesn't work for me. Not sure if it didn't upload properly, or if you provided something Mac-specific.

[jdrux]

Thanks for the suggestion @Dazmondo77. Like @walt.farrell the video didn't work for me either. I didn't really understand your first suggestion and what I tried din't work. But the 2nd suggestion of creating a pixel layer with the desired shape fill and then dragging to the right of the image worked a treat! I'm interested to hear more about how you use this with multiple masks to create interesting depth of field effects. Thanks!

[Dazmondo77]

I'll try this one - I've had this video problem before on the forum, usually just re-uploading does the trick but I tried 3 times with the above vid then had to go out in the end.

This file was setup to simulate duotone type spot and black using soft masks for the spot (PANTONE 7467 C) and using blend ranges to isolate highlights and shadows to see if I could get spots to output to PDF without converting to CMYK - I found it worked, and that Screen layer effect knocks out colour and Multiply overprints which is a brilliant way to do it as you can see the actual finished effect in Affinity rather than set up overprint and have no idea how it will look until opened in acrobat and viewing seps. In this file theres a multi-task which is made up of 3 elements, 2 vector with different levels of gaussian blur for the body and 1 raster for the hair, all grouped then dragged to the right of the image to mask which gives the flexibility of being able to tweak the depth of field on the arms.

Hope this helps?