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Gradient help – should be simple?
I’m having a hard time figuring this out, so if anyone could help I’d much appreciate it.
Anyway I would like to make a rectangle, like a frame around the outside of the… frame. So maybe a 40-pixel wide rectangle that goes the entire way around my DV widescreen frame. I’d like it to be a gradient from black at the outside edge to a dark grey at the inside edge of the frame (all the way around), but I can’t figure out how to make this happen.
In photoshop, I can do 4 straight lines, but the corners are messy. There’s also a circle gradient, but no rectangle.
In AE, there’s ramp – which again will do a circle or a line, and there’s 4-color gradient which comes closer but still not perfect.
The closest I came was to make a blac rectangle, then a grey one slightly larger, blur they grey one and delete it to create the gradient frame. Close again but not quite what I want.
I do not need/want the opacity to gradate, just the solid color – again from black on the outside of my rectangle, to grey on the inside. Is this at all possible?
Thanks.
Scott Bush
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2 Replies
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this may work for you…
create a new black solid (this color will be the outside color of the frame, you can adjust this later if needed). then create a mask that will be the size of the inside of the frame, set the mask to subtract so it cuts a hole in the layer.
add the solid composite effect, set color to the inside edges color. then add the cc radial fast blur effect, adjust the amount to suit.
now you need to cut the hole back in, duplicate the layer, remove the effects from the top duplicate and set the lower duplicate to use the upper duplicate as a track matte (alpha matte setting)…
is this the frame-like look you were looking for?
Kevin Camp
Senior Designer
KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW -
YESSS!!!
Thanks so much! That is pretty much what I was looking to do.
So why is there no “normal” way to do this? I’m kinda surprised neither AE or PS have a “rectangular” gradient. Are there any plugins that might offer it? I remember once upon a time seeing at least one gradient toolkit plugin (or set).
Anyway thanks again, this will get the job done!
Scott
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