behavior of Smart Objects when canvas is resized

Forum|Forum|5 months ago
December 26, 2025
2 replies
381 views

I have an image with a 'normal' background where I added animals as smart objects. (dragged in as SO and decreased size with ctl-T transform) I decided later to increase the image size and was curious what would happen to the smart objects. Actually most increased by the same amount as the background so looked like before. But a couple were bigger??? Don't understand why? And I don't understand why they wouldn't all behave the same way. All were at higher resolution than the background before and after resize.

Windows

Stephen Marsh

Community Expert

Raster smart objects are sized using their PPI resolution values vs. the main document PPI resolution value. Compare the PPI resolution of the document vs the placed smart object PPI resolution by editing/double-clicking the smart object to open as a separate document.

J

judy04Author

Inspiring

>editing/double-clicking the smart object to open as a separate document.

Neat! I didn't know you could do that and have wondered where/how the original size is stored.

So maybe a couple of my animals reverted to their SO original size. But the others scaled their size in the document like the document itself was scaled? I guess I still wonder why the different behavior.

Stephen Marsh

Community Expert

I guess I still wonder why the different behavior.

By @judy04

No need to wonder. Compare the PPI resolution of the document vs the placed smart object PPI resolution. There are multiple places where you can view the resolution value, such as the Image > Image Size command.

A

Aleke

Community Manager

Hi @judy04m, thanks so much for reaching out!
Could you let us know which version of Photoshop you’re using? If possible, sharing a screenshot or a short recording of the behavior you mentioned would really help us troubleshoot.
Appreciate your help!
Alek

*(If you mention me with an @, like @Aleke, I’ll get a notification and can respond faster.)*

J

judy04Author

Inspiring

Thank you @Aleke for getting back . I'm using PS Beta on a windows machine. I don't think an image would help you. You'd just see an appropriately sized animal along with one way too big for its environment. It was no problem to free transform the big one back to an appropriate size. I'm just trying to find out why a couple of the smart objects behaved differently from the herd (so to speak). I would actually have expected them all to stay the same size as before the up sample of the background, but instead some increased their size proportionately while a couple increased much more. I (not really understanding how SO's work and have access to their original size) wondered why a couple would behave differently from the others.

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