Why have I never been able to get the blur tool to work... need to know what the trick is.

Forum|Forum|5 years ago
October 25, 2020
2 replies
14918 views

I've used Photoshop for many decades now and still, the blur tool is a mystery to me. While there are times it would be great to be able to 'soften' areas of a photograph with a painting tool, every time I have tried the blur tool it does nothing. I've set the mode to normal and see no other controls to either enhance or select gaussian blur or other if those are available. Would love to get this tool working but need help please.

TIA,

Ken

How to

Correct answer D Fosse

Actually the OP means the blur "brush", the Blur Tool in the toolbar.

This is one of the original Photoshop tools, probably not much used anymore. But I actually use it quite a bit on masks (not images; not precise enough for that), and I have sort of the same problem. It doesn't seem to work.

It took me a while to figure out why. It simply isn't made for modern high resolution files. It works with very low radius. You'll notice there's a setting for strength in the options bar, but no setting for radius which is what we need.

Try it on a 1000-pixel image, and you'll see it works.

Derek Cross

Community Expert

Hi Ken

It's Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur (you can apply the blur to the whole image or to a selection, or to a mask).

Here's a picture of the blur dialogue box where you can apply various levels of blur and see a preview.

Let us know how you get on.

D Fosse

Correct answer

Community Expert

Actually the OP means the blur "brush", the Blur Tool in the toolbar.

This is one of the original Photoshop tools, probably not much used anymore. But I actually use it quite a bit on masks (not images; not precise enough for that), and I have sort of the same problem. It doesn't seem to work.

It took me a while to figure out why. It simply isn't made for modern high resolution files. It works with very low radius. You'll notice there's a setting for strength in the options bar, but no setting for radius which is what we need.

Try it on a 1000-pixel image, and you'll see it works.

Ken NielsenAuthor

Legend

Gracias Senior D Fosse, Although I do not like the answer, it is the correct answer. I would recommend Adobe stop everything and fix the blur tool so that it works, especially with today's 45mp cameras images. Nobody is using this tool because it does not work... Fix it and it will give way to new control and finess of retouching for image artists everywhere in the world. My opinion.