I am not entirely sure what you want to do, as what you are explaining is difficult to explain in words. But I think this tutorial will help you. It is of the GIMP quickmask tool:

http://www.gimp.org/tutorials/Quickmask/

I don't really know of a good simple way to explain the functionality of the tool, however it is explained in the tutorial.

HTH, Stefan Maerz

Hi,

Am somewhat of a novice but what a out something like an expanded from the centre circular selection with a "huge" feather edge to it, then delete selection and place text on layer beneath. May need to add alpha channel to original layer. Alternatively what about a layer mask with a circular grad filter in the middle.

HTH

Francesco

--- (Apologies for any brevity - this email was sent from a mobile device) ---

-----Original Message----- From: "Jeff K."
Sender: gimp-user-bounces@lists.XCF.Berkeley.EDU Date: Sun, 22 Aug 2010 02:52:24
To:
Subject: [Gimp-user] getting a gradient selection

Hi, so I'm a mid-level GIMPer. But I can't figure out how to do this one trick. I made a 8.5" x 11" page of pictures that's going to become the cover of a notebook. I want to put several sentences in the dead middle to put a title on my notebook. So I want to have a circle behind the words, with no clear edges, where the pictures gradually fade to white, so the words are more readable.
So two questions come out of that:

1) How do I get a circle where the center is entirely selected, then as you move to the edge, the amount of the pixel that's selected is less and less until at the edge, they're entirely deselected? That way, I could make this selection and do something that results in a white circle where the center is pure white, and you can see more and more of the layers beneath as you move to the edge of the circle.

2) And once I have this selection, what do I do with it? My first thought was 'desaturate', but that only removes the hue while leaving the lightness/darkness. Once I get the selection, should I bucket-fill with white? Ooh, OR on the Layers tab, there's a slider that modifies the opacity, which is *PERFECT*, but it works on the whole layer, and I want it to work on the gradient-circle selection from #1.

Any help would be appreciated, thanks.

Jeff K. (via www.gimpusers.com)
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Almost, but that has hard edges. I wanted softer edges.

Is this what you want:

http://i337.photobucket.com/albums/n382/steferfootballdude13/test.png

I did a quick one, so the top and bottom were not done correctly.

If that is the case quick mask will certainly work.

Let me explain.

1. Make sure you have everything selected. CTRL+A does a great job of that. 2. Press the quickmask button.
3. Draw a radial gradient across the mask (make sure you have the "Foreground to transparent" option selected) (also note the mask should turn your image a red hugh)(Last note, bigger radial gradient=Larger resulting circle. You may use guides to help you out, and remember you define the radius of your circle when you use the radial gradient) 4. Press the quickmask button again. 5. Delete the selection. You may have to right click/select/invert to invert your selection if the incorrect selection is made.

This will make a soft edge for your image.

Stefan Maerz 5. You may (depending on some things