How do I keep the hard mix blending style when I merge down

[DRISKL]

Helllo, 

I need help! whenever i merge down my pattern in blendings style > hardmix  it loses the orginal effect that I like.

Ive tried everything, Is there a way around this?
Sam 

[D Fosse · Accepted solution]

The halftone screen is the problem here. To see the real effect of any blending or adjustment, you must view at 100%!

100% has nothing to do with size. It means one image pixel is represented by exactly one physical screen pixel. Any other zoom ratio means resampling, breaking up the halftone grid.

The merged result is correct, but the preview is misleading if it's not at 100%.

For performance reasons, all blending and adjustment previews are calculated on the on-screen version of the image. When you are zoomed out, that means a resampled and softened version of the image. Pixel levels are averaged out. You get a lot of intermediate values that aren't there in the full original data.

When you merge, commit an adjustment etc, the numbers are re-calculated on the full original data, pixel for pixel.

Viewing at 100% avoids all this and gives you a consistently correct view.

[DRISKL]

Hey Fosse, Thank you this was really helpful! I zoomed out to the percentage (34%) at which I liked the look of the effect and then adjusted the image size to that percentage and it worked!

[D Fosse]

Well, that's a pretty roundabout way of doing it, but whatever gets you there...

That will work if Photoshop (image) and the GPU (screen) use the same resampling algorithms, which is not at all given. But they were probably close enough.

Halftone screens can be a nightmare to control properly. Any kind of resampling is extremely risky, you really need to keep it at fixed pixel size. Before you know it, you have moiré and other very unpleasant artifacts. 

Adjustments and blend modes basically "don't take" on a halftone screen. It's hard pixel values, not smooth tonal gradations. Usually you need to give it a slight blur to make any meaningful adjustments.