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Participant
May 9, 2020
Question

Photoshop ignores adjustment layers when exporting to any format

  • May 9, 2020
  • 2 replies
  • 4350 views

I've tried everything and it still doesn't work. jpeg png tiff, all. Ive tried to merge layers too, and when it merges, the adjustment layer isn't in that new layer, looks like i have merged only my image without the "levels" adjustment.
also tried contrast, curves, it doesn't work. 

HERE IS A GIF about the result, when i export or try to merge layers, it looks like that
https://i.gyazo.com/754053436b515262754d5340891b731d.mp4

2 replies

davescm
Community Expert
Community Expert
May 9, 2020

Check before and after at 100% zoom.

At zoom levels less than 66.7 % the on screen preview is blended using merged pixels within a layer and only 8 bits /channel from each layer. That is done for speed.  At 100% zoom the full image data and bit depth is used for the preview.

The difference is hardly noticable on most images but on some, particularly those containing noise or single point lights such as stars, then it is very noticable indeed.

At 100% zoom the blended preview and the merged layers should look exactly the same.

 

Dave

D Fosse
Community Expert
Community Expert
May 9, 2020

Absolutely, Dave, but also the downsampling when zoomed out. The preview is calculated from this downsampled and softened version.

 

Anyway - the answer certainly is to judge the adjustment at 100%, and then the discrepancy disappears.

 

The point here is that the adjustment doesn't "disappear". It was never there in the first place, because that particular adjustment doesn't have any effect on this type of noisy pixel data. A tonal adjustment has no effect on a black or white pixel. It's still black or white. Blur them together, however, so that it becomes gray, and suddenly the adjustment makes a lot of difference. In other words, the preview is false and misleading.

 

One could argue that this is an outdated piece in Photoshop's architecture. Modern hardware should be able to work with the full pixel data at all times. It used to be possible to set cache levels to 1, which does just that, but at least when I've tried to do that, it automatically snaps back to a higher cache level.

davescm
Community Expert
Community Expert
May 9, 2020

I've just tried and I can't get cache level 1 to stick here either.

The downsampling is what I meant by my, badly worded, "using merged pixels within a layer".

 

Dave

 

c.pfaffenbichler
Community Expert
Community Expert
May 9, 2020

Could you please post a screenshot taken at View > 100% with the pertinent Panels (Layers, Channels, Options Bar, …) visible of the layered and the flattened image? 

 

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