There is an export option to 'store masks’. The ‘tool tip’ says ‘store masks as layers in exported images.only works for some formats’
Can anyone elaborate on this please, as I can not see it referenced in the documentation.
This is only “fully” supported in TIFFs - masks are stored as separate “pages” in a multi-page file, and thus loaded as layers in e.g. GIMP.
There is support for EXRs and XCFs as well, but there they are stored and show up as extra channels in GIMP rather than layers.
As a Photoshop user, masks in channels makes sense, but getting Ps on Mac to read EXR is rather problematic - bit of a shame store masks is implemented that way.
Thanks for the reply!
getting Ps on Mac to read EXR is rather problematic
So try TIFF then.
I only ever export TIFF from DT - Ps can’t read the masks as either channels or paths - just reads the tiff and nothing else.
I’d tried that before I posted!
It’s always useful to say what you have tried and what you’re actually after straight out.
They’re definitely not paths - exported masks are rasterized and stored as float 0-1 values in either layer or channel variant. See e.g. how it works w/ GIMP here.
It may require one more step, but you can use e.g. krita to convert tiff to psd.
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Stunning, works a charm…thanks Danny 
