Smudge & Blur

These two tools change art that is already on the layer, instead of adding new color. Both work like a brush: pick a size and drag over your drawing.

Smudge

Smudge pushes existing color along your stroke, like dragging a finger through wet paint. Great for blending colors, softening a hard join, or pulling wisps of hair or smoke.

• Size: how wide an area you smear.
• Strength: how strongly the color is dragged. Low is a gentle nudge; high really pulls the paint along.

With an Apple Pencil, pressing harder smudges more.

Blur

Blur softens the pixels under your brush, like rubbing them out of focus. Use it for soft shadows, depth-of-field backgrounds, or gentle glows.

• Size: how wide an area you soften.
• Strength: how much it softens each pass. Go over the same spot again to blur it further.

Good to know

• Both tools work on the current layer only.
• Each drag is a single Undo step.
• They work at full canvas quality no matter how far you are zoomed in.
• On a big canvas with a very large brush, a stroke may take a moment to finish, that is normal.