Skip to main content
Participating Frequently
July 6, 2016

P: Wrong gamma when blending with transparency grid

  • July 6, 2016
  • 3 replies
  • 345 views

The "transparency grid" used to visualise the transparency in a document appears to get blended with the image using Gamma 1,0 instead of honouring the gamma of your document (usually ~2,2). Confirmed in CS6 and CC2015.  

This means that you do not get a realistic preview of how the transparency actually will blend once you put the image on top of something else.

Workaround: Use a pattern fill layer or similar with a grid instead. That will blend correctly.
Solution suggestion: Blend the transparency grid using the same gamma as the rest of the document.

It's easier to show with an image (view full size):  


Expected behavior: Both images should look the same.
As you can see a soft transparency-transition looks very wrong against the transparency grid (and the colour shifts slightly), but looks fine against an image of a grid.

---

If you turn on "Blend RGB Colors Using Gamma 1,00" the image of a grid blends like the transparency grid does. But this obviously not a good workaround (and you cannot use it to get the transparency to blend using 2,2 anyway as the transparency grid ignores the setting):

3 replies

Participating Frequently
April 25, 2020
Just now came across this, and it answers a problem I had years ago when I started using 1.00 gamma blending. All of the transparencies look much too thin. I would like to see a new preference field for transparency, defaulted to 2.20.
Community Expert
July 28, 2017
Participating Frequently
September 5, 2016