Smart object interpolation

SH
Posted By
Steve_H_Alexander
Jan 8, 2007
Views
622
Replies
2
Status
Closed
When running Photoshop CS2 in Windows;

When using smart object that are substantiailly larger then what is displayed in the layered image;

Does Photoshop use a different method of interpolation that would result in less quality in the displayed or printed smart object? (meaning different then if a regular transformation were applied to the layer).

If I were to convert a smart object to a layer would Photoshop apply a different method of interpolation that would result in better quality( meaning better quality then if the layer was left as a smart object).

When flattening a layered image containing smart objects what method of interpolation is used? would this be identical to converting a smart object to a layer?

A slightly different question —

Is there any loss of quality to the image if there are multiple smart objects within smart object?

Thanks!
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C
chrisjbirchall
Jan 9, 2007
I would very surprised if Photoshop used anything other than the default interpolation method set in your preferences.

The beauty of using "smart objects" is that interpolation only takes place once and this occurs when the layer is rasterized. Flattening an image rasterizes any smart objects.

I don’t know – but I am guessing – that when you group several smart objects into one smart object, each would be interpolated at that time to match the pixel dimensions of the resulting layer.

Does this result in any additional loss? If your image remains at that size size obviously not. And I would very much doubt there would be any discernible loss through one further resizing operation anyway.
C
chrisjbirchall
Jan 9, 2007
An observation on the subject of interpolation:

Whilst Bicubic Smoother is the preferred method to use when upsizing, and Bicubic Sharper is best for downsizing, it makes sense to leave vanilla Bicubic as the default.

This is because any procedure which results in resizing, uses the interpolation method set in the Preferences. Clearly, if you have "Bicubic Sharper" as your default and you upsize during a "transform" operation, you will be using completely the wrong algorithms.

I have long campaigned for a "smart interpolation" setting which would automatically use "Smoother" for upsizing and "Sharper" when downsizing.

As it is now, I keep having to go into Preferences to switch to Bicubic Sharper" before creating a web gallery – and then remember to switch it back again afterwards!

Chris.

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