ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on drawing and editing simple geometric mask shapes, then feathering their edges. It also focuses on drawing Bezier and RotoBezier masks. The chapter offers some tips and techniques for animating and modifying masks. It discusses using effects with masks, rotoscoping techniques, importing paths from Photoshop and Illustrator, interchanging mask and position paths, and extracting masks from images using auto-trace. The chapter gives a good workout with the Mask Interpolation keyframe assistant. Mask outlines may be feathered, creating anything from a slightly wider antialiased edge up through a soft vignette effect. Mask Expansion allows to expand or contract the mask shape, and is represented in pixels. It is particularly useful when a soft feather results in too much of the desired masked area being cut away – if so, apply positive values to expand the mask.
