Cloning preview inconsistency?

[davidh]

I do not know if this may have someting in common with my previous subject so I posted as a separate topic.

I made some cloning Darken only, Continuous, Linked, clicked OK, saved the script, reopened the Clone transformation (Tool) and the latest changes were not there, or rather latest strokes of the last changes were not there.
I repeated the strokes that were missing complete the job and clicked OK, but when I reopened the Clone dialog some of the strokes were not there again. I had to repeat it several times times before I arrived at a situation where there were always some strokes missing or perhaps were just lighter - maybe depending on the transparency setting.


I tried to simulate it on a black to white gradient image cloning the dark part over the white and found that pretty soon the latest strokes displayed not at all or lighter after the dialog was reopened.

What is positive, however, is that it seems to be a problem only with the preview, for the images downstream do not show any traces of uncompleted cloning.

[jsachs]

There were serious problems with Lighten Only and Darken Only modes which I have fixed for the next release. I'm not sure if this fixes the problems with missing strokes, so let me know if this still happens. A quick test here ran OK.

[davidh]

The problem persits in the latest version of 26-Jun-2019.

However, I have found something concrete.

1. clone a patch on the gradient starting in the dark part of it
2. clone another patch over the first patch - both circles must be at least partly inside the previous patch as is shown in the image -> notice how the patch darkens as soon as it enters the previous patch
3. click OK and reopen the Clone transformation dialog -> the dark part of the second patch disappeared leaving the patch lighter as it would have been if it had been cloned outside the previous patch

This means that if the source and the target area come from an already cloned part of the image you may never complete what you want unless you do all the cloning at one go without releasing the mouse buton. Whatever you clone from it and over it later with other independent strokes, disapears or gets lighter.

Transparency makes it even more difficult to see the problem, which was my case as I mostly used something around 75%.

It happens with all three Modes and both Brushes.

It does not happen if the source or target area lie outside the previously cloned part of the image

It does not happen if you add another cloning step to the branch. This might mean many such steps when a delicate work would be needed.

[jsachs]

Have you tried setting Overlap to Yes?

[davidh]

Dear me! I have not. I saw it there but somehow...growing slow...
I am really sorry for having wasted your time.

[jsachs]

Not a problem - perhaps I should make the default Yes instead of No.

[Winfried]

Yes, I think this would be a good idea

[MarkT]

Yes, please. Would save me a mouse click every time I use clone...

[jsachs]

I changed the default for the next release.

Bear in mind that if you don't like the defaults, you can alter them from the settings menu via the Save as Default command after making whatever changes you want.