C is for coast

DDW - Feb 2014 challenge - alphabet

Technique challenge - Tilt shift.

The tilt shift effect is a guided edit in Elements 12, but I am struggling with it. Firstly, I don't really "get" the idea visually. Secondly, the drag and drop focus area selection seems to be very haphazard. Yesterday it didn't work because my gradient settings were wrong. Today it does something, but I can't seem t get enough in the focus area. Maybe I am still using some wrong settings in the gradient somewhere. Help out if you know how...