[Merged] Masking panel revamp and new masking possibilities

[lkzk]

@Masterpiga

If it’s a path, you just scroll on it, or use the “shrink / grow” control from the properties panel:

This is a new feature of flexi and not available in current 5.6 - right?

[lkzk]

Thank you for the clarification. I’m afraid I didn’t fully understand the advantage of the raster ai masks. Can you please point me to the relevant thread, or writeup where I can get more background without asking you to repeat what you’ve probably already explained 10 times elsewhere?

[Masterpiga (Daniele Pighin)]

@lkzk

I didn’t fully understand the advantage of the raster ai masks

With a vectorized mask, there are two error sources that compound:

• The segmentation algorithm is not perfect
• The tracing (raster → vector) algorithm is not perfect

With a raster mask, the second step is not needed, so the boundary is more precise. I.e., you only have the errors introduced by the segmentation algorithm, without the errors introduced by the tracing algorithm.

Another advantage is that raster masks are computationally friendlier: they trade memory for compute (the path boundary does not need to be recomputed dynamically, it’s just a pixel map).

The major drawback is that you cannot edit them.

[Masterpiga (Daniele Pighin)]

I added updated doc pointers here:

[New masking panel] [Flexi] Interim user docs (subject to change)

After the new masking panel has been pushed to master, a lot of users who had not followed the development found themselves in the difficult position of having to get used to a new masking system (both the model and the UI) without any kind of documentation other than tooltips (when enabled!). While full documentation will be released only around the time that 5.8 is ready, so that it can include concrete references to the UI that we will sheeip ( vs. ) , I wanted to share some ear…

@Eddie_Lambrechts @Fenny @priort @Underexposed @perriko @bazdesh @don51 as you all had some questions more or less recently.

[Thad_E_Ginathom]

Thank you for that.

I’m glad to see that we “smooth intersections,” even though, every time I see it , I start humming Smooth Operator!

One question (I have started to use the new system today). There used to be a slider called Mask Opacity. Not the main opacity slider, but another one with feathering and stuff. Has it become “Mask Brightness?”

Blockquote
mask opacity
The strength of the module’s effect is determined by the mask’s local opacity. Feathering and blurring the mask may reduce the opacity of the original mask. The “mask opacity” slider allows you to readjust the mask opacity to compensate.

[Masterpiga (Daniele Pighin)]

@Thad_E_Ginathom

Has it become “Mask Brightness?”

Yes, to differentiate it from… the mask opacity