P: Duplicating a layer with clipping mask removes the clipping mask from all layers above it

This is an interesting topic!

One workaround could be to run a script to copy and conditionally group the active layer if it is already part of a group. This would be used instead of the regular method to duplicate the layer. A custom keyboard shortcut an be applied to an installed script for easy access.

#target photoshop

activeDocument.suspendHistory('Copy Layer (conditionally group)...', 'main()');

function main() {
    if (activeDocument.activeLayer.grouped === true) {
        executeAction(stringIDToTypeID("copyToLayer"), undefined, DialogModes.NO);
        executeAction(stringIDToTypeID("groupEvent"), undefined, DialogModes.NO);
    } else {
        executeAction(stringIDToTypeID("copyToLayer"), undefined, DialogModes.NO);
    }
}

https://prepression.blogspot.com/2017/11/downloading-and-installing-adobe-scripts.html

Another approach could be to set up the Script Events Manager to listen for various events for duplicating a layer, then if such an event is triggered a script could be automatically run. The script would need to examine the previous layer to determine if it was part of a group and then group the active layer if this condition was true.

That behaviour started in Photoshop CS2 when Adobe did a major overhaul of the layers panel.

photoshop cs (ps ver 😎

3 layers clipped to black layer

photoshop cs

Duplicate Red shape 2 layer maintains the clipping masks in all layer above and below

Photoshop CS2 (ps ver 9.0.2)

3 layers clipped to black layer

photoshop cs2

Duplicate Red shape 2 layer releases the clipping masks in all layers above

In photoshop cs and below one could not duplicate a layer by Alt/Option dragging in the layers panel like one can in cs2 and later.

I know this is very old now and I am still in support of this behavior changing, but in case anyone stumbles on this thread via Googling, my workaround for this is to hold alt, then click and drag the layer I want to duplicate to a new position. This retains the clipping mask and duplicates the layer. It's not always ideal, but I hope it might help some out there in internet land!

When a layer in Clipping Mask chain of layers is duplicated by using keybord shortcut (command-J), the clipping is broken. This seems counter productive and leads to extra time needed to recreate the Clipping Mask.

henryl71042410  wrote This behavior is new to the latest update - in past versions of Photoshop when you duplicated a layer that was in a stack of layers which used the same clipping mask...............................

Which version acted differently?

These examples duplicate layer 1  using Right Click

CS6:

CC2015.5

CC2017.1.1

Dave

This happens more often.You just need to re-clip the layers. This happens when you duplicate and move stuff around. You can try putting them into a group to manage things a bit better.