suddenly 3mb layered file saves as 230mb file on disk?

ML
Posted By
Mary_Littell
Oct 10, 2008
Views
181
Replies
3
Status
Closed
all the sudden i’m seeing that when i’m working on smallish layered psd files, they’re saving on my disk at huge sizes. for example, small layered file in p’shop says the doc is 3.09M/27.1M but when it’s saved it’s 230M. file has 2 layers with one alpha channel and one layer mask.

why is this happening? nothing has changed as far as i know.

thanks!
mary

Pshop CS3
mac os 10.5.4
quad intel mac with 4 GB ram
Related Tags
disk file layer save

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SV
Stevie_V
Oct 11, 2008
Are you saving it as a DCS file instead of a .psd?
MO
Mike_Ornellas
Oct 11, 2008
Does it contain a Smart Object?
JM
Jonas_M._Rogne
Oct 15, 2008
I believe the "doc size" shows the size of a flat uncompressed image (flat/layered). However it doesn’t seem to take into account smart objects etc. It’s not the actual file size you will get when saving but should give you a hint of how heavy your file is.

PSD with layers etc. will always be quite large. You can compress them to save some space, flatten/remove unnecessary layers/channels, use solid color layers instead of layers filled with color and so on…

Also you can go to preferences and tell it to ask you about "maximize compatibility" for PSD files. This feature saves a flattened copy of your image with your file (as well as some additional info for backward compatibility). I recommend leaving it on but if you don’t need it and size is critical, feel free to turn it off.

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