Smart Layers: Split One Flat Image Into Pieces You Can Actually Move

Every other tool here gives you back a picture. This one gives you back the pieces, background on one layer, product on another, the headline on a third, each independently movable.

It's the closest thing on the platform to being handed the designer's working file for an image that never had one.

Easier shown than described. Half a minute inside the editor:

That is one flat poster going in, and a different finished poster coming out - the croissant swapped for a pretzel, the headline retyped, the layout untouched. No mask, no cutout, no rebuild.

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What you get

Upload a composed image and you get a stack of layers, each a separate asset:

• Move a piece without disturbing what's behind it
• Hide one, pull the product out, keep the scene
• Restyle one on its own, leaving the rest untouched

The important part is what sits behind each piece. When the product is lifted off, the background it was covering has been filled in. That's the difference between this and the background remover, which gives you the subject and nothing else.

The headline has moved and the croissant has moved, and the cream background under both is intact - not a hole, not a smear.

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The two ways layers get decided

Boxed. You draw boxes around the elements you want separated. You can see and count them before you press anything, and what you're charged for is exactly what you drew. Delivered always equals billed.

Auto. The model decides the count itself. Nothing is requested, so there's no honest number to charge in advance.

The way auto is billed is worth knowing, because it's unusually fair: it charges a ceiling up front and credits back every layer the provider didn't deliver. The ceiling is 16 layers, or 7 on your first-ever split. If the model returns 5, you're refunded the difference. If it returns more than the ceiling, the extra layers are absorbed: you aren't billed for them.

So the auto quote you see is a maximum, not a price.

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What it costs, and why it scales

The formula:

base + per-layer × number of layers

Both halves are set by the resolution tier:

Tier	Base	Per layer
1K (default)	30	30
1.5K	45	45
2K	60	60

The reason the per-layer charge equals the base is that the provider bills per output asset: a 3-layer split produces 4 images, not 1. Every layer really is another render.

Which makes the arithmetic stark. A full 16-layer split at 2K is 17 images: 1,020 credits. That is the most expensive single operation on the platform.

Three things follow:

1. The tier matters more here than anywhere else on Gendia. It doubles the price of every layer, not just the output size.
2. Draw fewer boxes. Every box is another 30 credits at 1K. Split the four elements you'll actually edit, not the fourteen you can see.
3. Read the live quote. The editor prices the job before you run it, precisely because this one can run away from you.

Start at 1K. It's the default for a reason, and it's what you want while you're finding out whether the split is clean.

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Restyling a single layer

Once split, any individual layer can be restyled for 30 credits, change the product's colour, redo the background's texture, restyle the type, with everything else held exactly as it was.

This is the payoff. Restyling a layer costs 30; regenerating the whole composition on a top model costs 125 and gives you a different composition. One is editing, the other is rolling again.

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What splits well

• Posters and ads with clear, separated elements
• Product images where the subject sits distinctly against its scene
• Layouts with a few large pieces rather than many small ones

All four of these came out of Smart Layers runs on Gendia - a drink ad, a cosmetics poster, a Thai-language menu and a sneaker campaign:

Note what they share: a headline, a product, a background, and clear space between them. That is the shape the splitter handles best.

What struggles

• Elements that overlap heavily: the model has to invent what's behind, and heavy overlap means a lot of inventing
• Fine detail at the boundaries, hair, smoke, transparency, the same edges that trouble every cutout
• Busy compositions, more pieces means more chances for one to come back wrong, at 30 credits each

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When something cheaper does the job

Be honest about what you actually need before spending here:

You want	Use	Cost
Just the subject, transparent	Background remover	10
Subject in a different scene	Background change	20
One thing gone	Object remover	20
Every piece separately editable	Smart Layers	60+

Smart Layers earns its price when you need to keep working on the image, several rounds of edits, a set of variants from one layout, a client who wants the headline moved. For a single change, one of the cheap tools is the better answer.

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Try it

Open the layer splitter with a poster you've already made, stay on 1K, and box just two or three elements. Around 120 credits, and you'll see immediately whether the pieces come apart cleanly on your kind of image.

It's also available inside Canvas, which is where it's most useful: the layers land straight into the workspace you're already building in.

More in the photo tools.