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4

Well I was trying to look this up through Google but didn't find anything, but then I just got the invite for this beta, so I might as well ask here :) I'm trying to export individual layers in Photoshop as PNGs, keeping their size. So if I have a layer that is 200x200 in a composition that is 1000x1000, I want to export just that layer as a PNG at 200x200. Possible?

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4 Answers

up vote 8 down vote accepted

I'm not sure this question is on-topic, but it's the first question on the site, so here we go:

What you're looking for are layer based slices.

  1. Select the layers you want to export, go to Layer > New Layer Based Slice(s)
  2. Go to File > Save for Web & Devices...
  3. When saving, choose "All User Slices"

If you have overlapping layers, which you will have more often than not, you might have to repeat the process a few times, hiding certain layers each time.

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This is a good point, although I assumed it was on-topic, unless there's another StackExchange site for digital design. A lot of people these days avoid the slicing tool (myself included) because of its association with table-based web layouts, but I'll admit this is not a good reason to ignore a perfectly good tool. – NateDSaint Jan 4 '11 at 21:12
@NateDSaint I can't think of a better SE site for this question either. We should definitely discuss this over at meta. – Can Berk Güder Jan 4 '11 at 21:17
up vote 4 down vote

I'm not sure I understand what you're trying to do, but when you say your composition is 1000x1000 do you mean that the canvas is actually that size?

One thing you can do is :
1) hide everything you don't want to see (option click the "eye" icon of your chosen layer)
2) select all
3) copy merged
4) create a new file (it'll automatically be the size of your clipboard, which should have resized to the size of actual pixels in your selection)
5) Paste and save as a PNG
6) Repeat!

There are scripts for this if you have an insane amount of layers, but an initial Google search didn't turn up a whole lot of these.

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2  
If I recall correctly, if you option-click a layer on the eye icon it will hide everything except the one you're clicking. Useful if you have lots of layers. – Duopixel Jan 4 '11 at 21:04
Good point! I'll add that to the process. – NateDSaint Jan 4 '11 at 21:08
Simple and Powerful. – piyushnp Apr 15 '12 at 10:54
up vote 3 down vote

File->Script->Export Layers to File.

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up vote 2 down vote

Solution number 1:

Draw a Marquee selection around the element; choose Edit → Copy Merged File → New; hit Return; “Paste.”

now you have your element ready to be saved in png format

Solution number 2:

right click on the layer (or group of layers) choose to duplicate the layer (or group) choose New as a destination

and you get a new document with your layer(s)

:)

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