"Mike Russell" <RE-MOVEmike@Curvemeister.comRE-MOVE> wrote in message
news:wRWEj.15928$5K1.12404@newssvr12.news.prodigy. net...
| "Norm Dresner" <ndrez@att.net> wrote in message
| news:3ZVEj.30124$D_3.29504@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
| > I've got a Photoshop CS2 file with two layers, the top one is a
| > modification
| > of the bottom and the blending mode is Dissolve with moderate opacity.
| > This
| > produces the very grainy, almost dirty effect I wanted. When I either
try
| > to merge the two layers or flatten the image, the entire Dissolve-effect
| > is
| > lost and the image appearance changes radically.
| >
| > A) What am I doing wrong?
| >
| > B) How should I create a single layer that encapsulates the Dissolve
| > effects
| > of the two layers?
|
| Hi Norm,
|
| The grainy effect you're seeing is almost certainly due to the approximate
| mathematics behind Photoshop's preview resampling. Zoom the image to 100
| percent to get an accurate preview of the merged layers.
|
| --
| Mike Russell - www.curvemeister.com
|

Absolutely! I zoomed in on a very small area and then flattened the image
and there was absolutely no difference in the pixels I could see at that
level. I suppose I should have guessed this when a previous experiment
showed that the effect was dependent on the size of the image -- doing the
same thing with a very small image produced no effect.

SO ... Let's see ... The images that Photoshop presents on the screen are
all approximate because they have to be sampled at the screen resolution --
which in my case is 1920x1440 or about 128 PPI. But when I print, the
resolution is (usually) 300 PPI. Does that mean that I can zoom to, say, 3x
the Fit-On-Screen magnification and see what the actual pixels that will be
laid down on the paper would look like? Your 100% recommendation is ~4.5x
the F-O-S magnification of 22.5%.

TIA
Norm