Why my stroke is pixelated ?

[CrossONE]

I have a problem with stroke in PS CS6. (2) When I use stroke on my curve line it looks pixelated and I don't know why ? (1) I did same line before and everything was clean and not pixelated.

Screen:

[Jeff Arola]

How did you apply the stroke?

[CrossONE]

In Layer Style.

[rkelly0137]

They both look pixelated to me.

I don't understand how you created that image.  It looks like a (not completely) blue brush, with a soft inner glow and outer hard-edged glow?  What's causing the color shift in the blue?  Is it part of the brush you're using, or are you applying some sort of effect to it after?

[CrossONE]

Here is the zoomed version first one is broken definitely.

The problem is only with stroke. It doesn't matter what effect I add. Here is just red brush with stroke.

[M Shaw]

What is the spacing on your brush set to? Setting is found in Brush Panel, Brush Tip Shape pane. Try setting it to 0% spacing.

[CrossONE]

It doesn't matter what spacing I set Even when I set it to 0% stroke is pixelated.

[M Shaw]

Is the blend mode on the Stroke FX something other than Normal?

[CrossONE]

Blend mode is set to normal

[harveyhoudini]

I'd soften the edge of the brush by a percent or two or soften the stroke by a pixel or two. You are getting single hard pixels on the initial brush stroke so you are also getting them on the layer stroke.

[CrossONE]

Same effect. Stroke is still pixelated.

[rkelly0137]

Have you checked the Fetzer valve?

[M Shaw]

Are the Good and Bad stroke docs the same ppi resolution?

[CrossONE]

yes both 300ppi

[harveyhoudini]

Is the stroke set to inside, outside or centered. I can reproduce this if I set a stroke on centered but it goes away if I choose inside or outside.

[CrossONE]

When I was trying to duplicate your first example, every brush I tried gave me the jagged stroke edge; honestly CrossONE, I'd like to know how you created the first smooth example!

Both of them was made in same way:

Is the stroke set to inside, outside or centered. I can reproduce this if I set a stroke on centered but it goes away if I choose inside or outside.

outside

[Semaphoric]

I just tried this, and had the same result, with both CS6 and CC2014.

[Jeff Arola]

You could also try using an Outer Glow Layer style instead of a Stroke Layer Style.

100% view

[pxp-design]

From my experience, this effect is common when applying a stroke to a soft-edged pixel layer. ( You'd see the same thing if you were to try a drop shadow or outer glow with the spread/choke setting at 100%)

The only way I know to 'fix' this, is to firm-up the transparent edges of your layer. When I was trying to duplicate your first example, every brush I tried gave me the jagged stroke edge; honestly CrossONE, I'd like to know how you created the first smooth example!   I can't get the brush tool to produce hard enough edges to avoid the jaggies, though pen & shape vector layers work great.

Workaround:

1. Create a new Solid Color layer
2. Select the mask that was created with the layer, and ctrl/cmd+I to invert the mask.
3. Paint on the mask.
4. When done painting, apply the stroke layer effect.
5. With the mask selected, press ctrl/cmd+L to edit the levels for your mask. (Or find Levels in the Adjustments panel)
6. By narrowing the output levels, you can "firm up" the edges to your desired level.

PS; by painting, blurring and using the levels adjustment on masks like this, you can achieve a bunch of cool effects and shapes, it's worth experimenting with.

[pxp-design]

A layer-effect-only solution occurred to me using drop shadow and editing the contour:

[Jeff Arola]

Try setting your brush to 100% Hardness and 1% Spacing, use your brush and then try the Stroke and the stroke should be somewhat smoother.

[CrossONE]

Tried it before, didn't help. It is not the brush problem but stroke.

[Jeff Arola]

See if resetting the photoshop cs6 preferences makes any difference.

reset photoshop preferences

Press and hold down the Shift+Ctrl+Alt (Shift+Command+Option on a mac) keys just after starting the launch of photoshop cs6

Keep holding the keys down until you get a dialog asking if you want to delete the adobe photoshop settings file

Press Yes

[CrossONE]

Didn't help. I tried to reinstall PS and I still have a problem with stroke.

[freshmate]

Try applying a gaussian blur and see if that helps soften up the edges.