Apply live effects

Article
10/10/2017

In Microsoft Expression Design, you can apply different effects (or "filters") to any vector, text, or bitmapped object. These are called "live" effects because they never degrade your original objects. Once you apply an effect to a vector or bitmapped image object, you can easily change the effect's settings, hide it, or remove it completely. You can also stack more than one effect on an object and reorder the effects for different results.

Applying a live effect

To apply a live effect

Select an object (this can include text).
In the Properties panel, at the bottom of the Effects section, click the Add Effect icon.
Select an effect from one of the submenus:
- Effects For more information, see Live effects overview.
- Adjust Colors For more information, see Adjust colors.
- Paint Makes the object look as if it has been painted in a variety of media. For more information, see Paint effects.
- Sketch Makes the object look as if it has been sketched. For more information, see Sketch effects.
- Surface Changes the apparent surface of the object. For more information, see Surface effects
- Arts and crafts Transforms the object into a craft project. For more information, see Arts and crafts effects.
- Photographic Applies a variety of photographic effects to the object. For more information, see Photographic effects.
The effects you select are listed in the Effects section. They are displayed every time you select the object.

To add another live effect to the selected object, select again from the AddEffect list. Each effect you add is compounded upon the last.

When you apply a live effect to an object, Expression Design adds an Effect icon ( Cc294505.c05d1eaa-b3a4-4e22-bf5b-de542491a75d(en-us,Expression.30).png ) next to the name of the object in the Layers panel.

Note

When you apply a live effect to a vector object, such as a path or text, Expression Design rasterizes the object (turns it into a bitmapped image) at the document resolution as defined in the Document size dialog box. This rarely causes any difference in your final output, but you will notice a difference when you increase your view magnification (you'll see a rasterized version of the vector object) or if you export to a vector file format. If you hide or remove the live effect, the object returns to its vector form. At a high document resolution, the live effect might take longer to display.

Modifying live effects

When a live effect is applied to an object, you can modify it.

To modify a live effect

Select an object to which you have applied an effect.
In the Effects section, click the effect you want to modify.
Adjust the controls to modify your live effect.

Note that if the effect is calculation intensive, you might see a progress-bar pattern overlaying the objects until the effect is finished drawing on-screen.

Hiding and removing live effects from objects

To hide a live effect

Select an object to which you have applied an effect.
In the Effects section, on the effect you want to hide, click the Hide/Show Effect icon. The icon changes to . To show the effect again, click the icon again

You can also permanently remove a live effect.

To remove a live effect

Select an object to which you have applied an effect.
In the Effects section, select the effect that you want to delete, and then click the Delete Effect button.

Reordering effects

If you have more than one effect applied to an object, you can reorder them.

To reorder live effects

Select an object to which you have applied an effect.
In the Effects section, select an effect, and then click either the Move Effect Up button or the Move Effect Down button.