Paste into a new image with smart clone

[Bill Ames]

I have an image open and make a new transparent image. So two images. I go to the first image, use Smart clone to select something, it works, go to the new image and try to paste the cloned selection into the new image. I can hover the cloned selection over the new image but the left click makes the cloned images blink or disappear until I move the mouse. Right-click and the cloned selection disappears.

PaintShop Pro Build Information:

Build Date Monday, October 07, 2019 @ 13:02:11
Build Mode Release (16000004)

[patara]

Bill, I think that is because you are trying to paste into a transparent layer.
I get the same result if transparent.
If on a normal layer with fill it works for me.
The normal Clone Brush works with a transparent layer, but Smart Clone doesn't seem to be able to.
From the Corel blurb, it is meant to be used on a layer with content.

They state "SmartClone is a content-aware cloning tool that lets you blend a source selection into a new background."

[Bill Ames]

Yes, you are correct. Thank you.

Now, I looked at the Smart Clone help, and it did not mention this restriction. Also, the software will throw an exception when things do not work as expected, and the software should have displayed an error message informing the user what is going wrong. One wonders if this inability to past onto a transparent layer is part of the design specification or lack of a design specification, and this is what you get.

[JoeB]

I suspect that the reason Smart Clone won't work on a transparent layer or image is because it is a Content Aware tool while the regular Clone brush is not. For the Smart Clone tool to be able to seamlessly blend a cloned image detail into another image it has to have actual image content in the target image to analyze so as to be able to blend the source image into it seamlessly. A transparent image or layer doesn't have any content for the tool to analyze to determine how to seamlessly blend the source, so it can't finish the task. If it could, the best it would be able to do would be to determine that there was not data on the transparent layer to analyze and then lay down the source image as originally captured without any of the blending that the tool is meant to achieve. And PSP can already do that by simply copying the source content and pasting it into a transparent target layer.