Help Needed!

[CWag13]

I am a new mom and just want to be able to take and edit pictures of my daughter. I have a Sony Cyber Shot, not just like a point and shoot I think it's the HX100V. My question is using the PhotoEditing program Gimp, how do I use the "Blur" effect to simply "blur" just the background of a picture and keep my daughter in focus?? When I click "blur" under "Filter" it blurs the whole image.

Thank you for any help!! :-)

[mshockley]

Unfortunately i do not use Gimp, but I'm going to suggest something until someone comes along that does. You've got to figure out in Gimp what tool you can use to select only the background. Some kind of a "quick selection tool" it might be called. When you have figured out how to do that and have the background area selected, in Photoshop it looks like a running line around what you've selected, THEN add the blur filter to your liking.

I'm sorry, if you were using photoshop I could walk you right through it! Someone will come along that uses Gimp!

[CWag13]

There is a lasso rope looking button? I do not like Gimp at all, I think it is very hard to use but I can't justify paying for PhotoShop since I am just doing pictures for my daughter. Thanks for your help though! I will keep trying to figure out what in the world I am doing.!

[faeriegodess612]

Yeah, Gimp is very frustrating sometimes.

I think you might be able to do what you want in Gimp. The easiest way that I can think is to use the scissors selection tool, it kinda does that smart selection thing. Then click on the selection, inverse selection, then gaussian blur, and blur it to the degree that you want. Another way that you might be able to get DOF from your point and shoot, is by using the portrait or macro settings. And remember to fill your frame.

My suggestion as far as editing software,...Photoshop Elements. It's usually anywhere from $100 or less. I highly suggest it. I love it. I had Gimp, then finally got PSE9, it makes editing SO much easier.

[RLucas]

In GIMP. Create a duplicate layer. On the duplicate add a Gaussian Blur at the desired Radius. Next, add a layer mask to the top layer. Make sure Black is set to your foreground color, and take a soft brush and paint back over the areas you don't want the blur. Also, make sure you are working on the top layer. Black is transparent when using a layer mask, and will reveal everything underneath. If you make a mistake, you can flip the foreground color back to white, and paint the blur back in. Then you can adjust the opacity of the layer to taste. Flatten and save.
To me, this is much easier than fooling around with selections.
Hope this helps!

Edit: It's not going to look as natural as using a wide aperture, but it CAN get you by in a pinch.

[Biomech]

The best way to do it is to select the "A" on the dial at the top. Put the aperture, which will look like one of these 2.8, 3.5, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, put that to the lowest it will go (3.5 I think on the HX100), zoom in a little and take the photo. That will give you the same effect

I forget, but the HX100 might even have an option called "Background Defocus", essentially that's idiot speak for changing the aperture.

HTH