Fading edges of an image in Illustrator CC 2019 has square edges
Hello hoping someone can set me straight. I have an image that I have masked with a white filled circle and a gaussian blur. The top/bottom/left and right edges result in being square. The image is considerably larger than the masking shape in case that's in question.
The masking was accomplished once the gaussian blur was applied to the circle by selecting both the image and the circle and applying the make mask option under the transparency panel.
What am I doing wrong? Thank you


