# Smudge

The Smudge tool evokes finger painting. It works in two ways:

- If the Flow option is set to 0.00 (default), the Smudge tool uses the current brush to smudge colors on the active layer or a selection. It takes color in passing and uses it to mix it to the next colors it meets.

- When the Flow option is more than 0.00, the Smudge tool works as a brush using the foreground color of the toolbox and blend it with the underlying color.

## Activating the Tool

There are different possibilities to activate the tool:

- From the main menu: Tools Paint Tools Smudge .

- By clicking the tool icon in the Toolbox.

- By pressing the S keyboard shortcut.

## Key modifiers (Defaults)

Shift

  The Shift key places the smudge tool into straight line mode. Holding Shift while clicking the mouse Left Button will smudge in a straight line. Consecutive clicks will continue smudging in straight lines that originate from the end of the last line.

  Smudge tool

  Shift click and drag to create line

Ctrl

  Using Ctrl with Shift, you can constrain the angle between two successive lines to vary by steps of 15°.

## Options

Smudge Options

Opacity; Brush; Size; Aspect ratio; Angle; Spacing; Hardness; Force; Dynamics; Dynamics Options; Apply Jitter; Smooth stroke; Lock brush to zoom

  Hard edge: this option gives a hard contour to the smudged area.

Rate

  This option could be called "Smudge length" since it sets the length of the smudging effect in a stroke.

  Rate example

  1: Rate=20 2: Rate=60 3: Rate=90

No erasing effect

  If smudging will decrease alpha of some pixels; this alpha is not decreased if this option is checked, and so pixels are not erased. This is useful to fill a gap between two color areas.

  An example of "No erasing"

  Without "No erasing effect"

  With "No erasing effect"

Flow

  We already saw the different behavior of the Flow option when it is set to 0.00 (works as the original Smudge tool) and set to more than 0.00 (uses the foreground color for smudging).

Here are comments and examples for the No erasing effect and Flow options from gimp-forum.net:

Tools Smudge
Smudge