Creative Effects > Distort > Creating Splines >
Using Garbage Masks as Distort Splines

Garbage mask setups are created through the Keyer or the GMask node in Batch. You can import a saved garbage mask setup into Distort and use it as a spline. Note the following about how Distort interprets settings in the imported garbage mask setup:

- If the imported garbage mask has animation on its axes, the animation is recreated in axes above the main axis in the Distort schematic.
- If the imported garbage mask has shape animation or explicit animation on the gmask splines, the same animation on the source and destination splines is transformed into shape animations.
- If the imported garbage mask includes tracking data, the offset parameters on the geometry are duplicated on the offset parameters of both the source and destination splines.
- Garbage mask setups that use multiples axes to manipulate instances of splines are translated to Distort instances. See Instancing Distort Splines.

For help creating garbage masks, see Drawing a Mask.

To import a garbage mask setup into Distort:

1. Do one of the following:
   - In the Distort menu, click Load to open the file browser.
   - From the Distort node in Batch, click NodeSetup to display Distort’s Setup menu, then click Load Node to open the file browser.
2. From the Load Type box, select Gmask.

   The browser automatically points to the default Gmask folder.

   (a) Load Type box(b) Load Mode box

3. From the Load Mode box, select whether you want the Gmask setup to append to or replace any existing Distort splines in your scene.
4. From the file browser, select the name of the setup to load.
   TipA library of preset garbage mask setups is available. To load a preset garbage mask, navigate to the /usr/discreet/<product_name>/gmask/default directory.