PSCS - Problem with selected mask area

[Cyrus]

I am currently working my way through a tutorial that requires me to use the brush tool and brush over a few parts of a womens face on a duplicated layer so I can add a gaussian blur etc later on. That's all working fine except that when I Select the brushed area and add the blur, it adds the blur to the whole photo and not the specified brushed area.... I'm wondering if there is a simple way of reversing which area is effected so I can reverse which area gets the blur, I'm pretty sure there is a reversing function but I can't find it.

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Cyrus

 

[jopel]

go to the menu: Select> Inverse

or keyboard: Shift + Ctrl + I

this will inverse your selection

 

[Cactus jACK]

go to the menu: Select> Inverse

or keyboard: Shift + Ctrl + I

this will inverse your selection

inverse selection is right if you are editing on the same layer.

but when you are playing with layers, but mindful of which layer you are editing. if your "brush area" is a new layer (e.g. layer 1), you would have to click on the layer before applying the filter. else you might be blurring the whole bg layer with layer 1 untouched.