Photo is currently unusable because merging layers (even non-overlapping ones) blurs the whole document.

[picolo]

I am also have this problem with merged layers looking blurred. Has anyone found any reason or rectification for this?

[walt.farrell]

8 hours ago, picolo said:

I am also have this problem with merged layers looking blurred. Has anyone found any reason or rectification for this?

Can you share a .afphoto document just before you do the merge?

[lepr]

39 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

Can you share a .afphoto document just before you do the merge?

Here is one: merge down test.afphoto

The document is 72 PPI with a pair of Pixel objects that are 144 PPI.

Select the top object and do Merge Down to get a fuzzy mess instead of the expected crisp result.

 

 

[walt.farrell]

3 minutes ago, anon2 said:

Here is one: merge down test.afphoto

The document is 72 PPI with a pair of Pixel objects that are 144 PPI.

Select the top object and do Merge Down to get a fuzzy mess instead of the expected crisp result.

 

 

Thanks, but I don't want yours

I want one from the user having the problem, not one specially constructed to prove that there are scenarios where it can happen. Then, seeing what the user is doing, we can provide guidance on what they should be doing instead.

[lepr]

37 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

seeing what the user is doing, we can provide guidance on what they should be doing instead.

Oops, I forgot this is the workarounds forum

 

 

[picolo]

I have to apologise for posting in the wrong section. I am a Windows user but the issue seems the same. Attached file shows a screen capture of a before and after. I have read through some of the comments regarding this issue so I ensured I tried both the forced pixel and move pixel thing as well as maintain the same DPI of 300 as per my original file. The sequence is as shown: Open file, apply two layers of Unsharp Mask then Merge Visible. 

I am running V1.8.5 but I have the same problem with the latest 1.9.2 as well. I run the latest version update of Win 10 Pro with AMD 3600 and Nividia 1650 Super. 

[walt.farrell]

53 minutes ago, picolo said:

Attached file shows a screen capture of a before

It would help to have the actual .afphoto file before the Merge operation.

[picolo]

20 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

It would help to have the actual .afphoto file before the Merge operation.

All this was done before saving as a .afphoto file. Are you asking for the original Raw file?

[walt.farrell]

22 minutes ago, picolo said:

All this was done before saving as a .afphoto file. Are you asking for the original Raw file?

No. I'm asking for you to save a .afphoto file before you do the Merge Visible, and give us that.

We need to see the actual document, to know more details about what you have.

[picolo]

2 minutes ago, walt.farrell said:

No. I'm asking for you to save a .afphoto file before you do the Merge Visible, and give us that.

We need to see the actual document, to know more details about what you have.

Aff respond.afphotoOk here it is.

[lepr]

39 minutes ago, picolo said:

Ok here it is.

The merge doesn't really become more blurred than the stack.

The app was giving a misleading view of the live filters when you were zoomed out. The view of live filters cannot be trusted when zoom is less than 100%.

A live filter (and the preview of a destructive filter) is applied to a scaled down representation of an object or entire document when the view is at less than 100% scale and so the filter's effect is exaggerated when the zoom is less than 100%.

That is unrelated to the Merge Down problem of this thread.

[walt.farrell]

Thanks, @picolo.

As @anon2 says, the merged layer is the same sharpness, if you view at 100% zoom before doing the merge.

[picolo]

39 minutes ago, anon2 said:

The merge doesn't really become more blurred than the stack.

The app was giving a misleading view of the live filters when you were zoomed out. The view of live filters cannot be trusted when zoom is less than 100%.

A live filter (and the preview of a destructive filter) is applied to a scaled down representation of an object or entire document when the view is at less than 100% scale and so the filter's effect is exaggerated when the zoom is less than 100%.

That is unrelated to the Merge Down problem of this thread.

Is there anywhere on AP documentation that says a live filter needs to be 100% for it to be accurate? Seems like a real flaw since not everything requires such a zoom level to work with and so people may be making adjustments based on a "misleading" view. I also think it's very common to view the overall picture at full screen size which is typically less than 100%. How then are we to actually see the whole picture at once accurately?

[walt.farrell]

24 minutes ago, picolo said:

Is there anywhere on AP documentation that says a live filter needs to be 100% for it to be accurate?

I have never found it in the Help files. I don't know if it is stated in any of the Tutorials.

[picolo]

10 hours ago, anon2 said:

The merge doesn't really become more blurred than the stack.

The app was giving a misleading view of the live filters when you were zoomed out. The view of live filters cannot be trusted when zoom is less than 100%.

A live filter (and the preview of a destructive filter) is applied to a scaled down representation of an object or entire document when the view is at less than 100% scale and so the filter's effect is exaggerated when the zoom is less than 100%.

That is unrelated to the Merge Down problem of this thread.

If what you say is correct, Affinity should state in their literature that anything less than a 100% zoom does not represent the real result. 

So is it correct to say the only way to get a full screen view of a sharpen process is to do a Merged Visible and see the results from there? 

[MEB]

Hi @picolo,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
No, just make sure you check the image at 100% zoom or above. No need to merge to see the result. At lower zooms levels the filter is being applied to a mipmap - a lower resolution version of the image for performance reasons.

[picolo]

4 hours ago, MEB said:

Hi @picolo,
Welcome to Affinity Forums
No, just make sure you check the image at 100% zoom or above. No need to merge to see the result. At lower zooms levels the filter is being applied to a mipmap - a lower resolution version of the image for performance reasons.

Personally I think the difference from the mipmap to the actual reality when viewed at less than 100% zoom is really too much (see my attachment form prior post). My habit is to zoom out to a full screen view to make a final decision if sharpening has achieved a nice result and now I know that is not indicative of what it actually is. While I understand Affinity's concern about performance, perhaps there should be a setting for users to see the actual result albeit with performance trade-off. At the least, there should be some documentation telling users about this. Strangely, this "issue" is more pronounced with poorer quality pictures, when an accurate sharpened result is more critical. Just my feedback.

[Stokestack]

The original problem report doesn't involve a filter, and the degradation is in fact rendered into the final result.

[Susheel C]

On 5/4/2021 at 6:04 PM, walt.farrell said:

But @Gabe has explained the issue with the original document you provided. You two layers in it. One with a DPI of 165 and the other with 166. Merging down is going to cause issues due to the mismatched DPI even if the alignment to the pixel grid is correct. Further, the document DPI is 144, which probably also contributes to your issue.

 

I find this discussion ludicrous. Why should this even matter? Why can't AP just sort things out and merge layers without causing blurring? If this happened in Photoshop there would be hell to pay. Don't put this on the user... Make the app easier to use. Excuses won't make a better application for the end user. It will only lose AP potential users.

EDIT: That said, I've not been able to reproduce the issue in my installation.

Edited June 3, 2021 by Susheel C

[Susheel C]

On 5/26/2021 at 4:56 PM, anon2 said:

Here is one: merge down test.afphoto

The document is 72 PPI with a pair of Pixel objects that are 144 PPI.

Select the top object and do Merge Down to get a fuzzy mess instead of the expected crisp result.

 

 

Wow! I see it now... same two layers being merged produces different results between Merge Down and Merge Visible. This is crazy.

 

On 5/26/2021 at 5:00 PM, walt.farrell said:

Thanks, but I don't want yours

I want one from the user having the problem, not one specially constructed to prove that there are scenarios where it can happen. Then, seeing what the user is doing, we can provide guidance on what they should be doing instead.

Again, it should just work... It's atrocious that you want to give 'guidance' to someone who expects something to work the way it should, and instead of seeking to have it sorted out, you're looking to find out what the user is doing wrong. This kind of thinking won't help anyone.

Second, why not try a sample file that's created, and that clearly demonstrates the issue at hand? Stop being so defensive and acknowledge that there is a problem.

I repeated the same process in Adobe Photoshop, and there was no discrepancy between Merge Down and Merge Visible.

BTW, I'm on Windows 10, so this is not a Mac OS bug. It is common to both.

[Susheel C]

On 5/26/2021 at 8:29 PM, picolo said:

Is there anywhere on AP documentation that says a live filter needs to be 100% for it to be accurate? Seems like a real flaw since not everything requires such a zoom level to work with and so people may be making adjustments based on a "misleading" view. I also think it's very common to view the overall picture at full screen size which is typically less than 100%. How then are we to actually see the whole picture at once accurately?

I think that this is a fair requirement... Looks like AP has a ways to go yet... Will keep exploring though.

[picolo]

I have had more time look at the issue while processing more files from my recent batch and I think I have a better handle on the matter now. I resized my original file from 300dpi to 96dpi and exported to a jpeg. The "Merged Visible" screen looks very similar to the 96dpi file. So I think what happens is what AF calls the mipmap might be a shrunken file at a smaller dpi/resolution so that layer manipulations will be faster but may looks different from the actual file unless the original is also around 96dpi. Just my observation.

[Stokestack]

Just ran into this again today. I was pasting a copied area to fill a gap in a layer and then merging down, and it degraded the entire image.

Pathetic. There should be no higher priority bug than this one.

[NotMyFault]

The unwanted blurriness will occur if and only if you merge a sharp layer atop a blurry layer.

It will not occur if you merge a blurry layer atop a sharp layer.

• On the left, i merged down a sharp atop a blurry layer -> blurry
• On the right, i merged down a blurry atop a sharp layer -> sharp

So one workaround is to swap both layers. This might need some extra steps to handle alpha channel correctly, but if there is interest these steps hopefully can be automated (i volunteer if users able to provide example files).

The better option is to Rasterize & Trim the lower layer before merge down.

The file has a snapshot just before merging down for those of you who want to reproduce.

used a rectangle shape with nested PT filter to create 4 identical checkered quadrants.

The blurriness was added by moving the pixel layers x position and reducing width by 0.3px

 

merge down blurry.afphoto

Edited September 10, 2021 by NotMyFault

[NotMyFault]

And based on what said above it now absolutely makes sense that Photo works correctly, and this is no bug:

If you merge a sharp 300dpi layer into a layer with different / stretched DPI, it technically unavoidable must become blurry. This blurriness the gets amplified by being stretched again for rendering in the document DPI  settings.

 

So merge down is a directed non-commutative operation. It merges to upper layer into the lower layer. If the users decides to use a pixel layer unsuitable for sharp rendering, Affinity will perfectly execute this request.

merge down DPI.afphoto