PaintDotNet-QuickExport

One-click flattened PNG & JPEG export directly from Paint.NET's File menu.

Paint.NET natively requires multiple clicks, flattening confirmations, format dialogs, and navigation steps just to export a flattened preview of a layered document. PaintDotNet-QuickExport integrates directly into Paint.NET's native File menu, adding instant, zero-dialog export options:

• Quick Export as PNG (Ctrl + Alt + G or Alt + F, G)
• Quick Export as JPEG (Ctrl + Alt + J or Alt + F, J)

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Features

• Instant Flattening: Composites all visible layers into a buffer using Paint.NET's native rendering engine and saves immediately.
• Smart Path Detection: Automatically saves alongside your active file (e.g. MyProject.pdn → MyProject.png / MyProject.jpg), or to your Desktop if the document hasn't been saved yet.
• Alpha & Color Aware:
  • PNG: Full 32-bit alpha transparency preserved.
  • JPEG: Automatically composites transparent layers over a clean white background and encodes at 95% quality.
• Safe & Fully Reversible: The patcher automatically preserves paintdotnet.orig.dll so you can restore your vanilla installation at any time with a single click.
• Automated Patcher CLI:
  • Auto-locates your Paint.NET installation (Current folder, Parent folder, C:\Program Files\paint.net, or Windows Registry).
  • Supports automatic Windows UAC elevation if Paint.NET is in Program Files.
  • Staging folder and side-by-side File Explorer opening fallback if you prefer manual copy/pasting.

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Quick Start / Usage

Option 1: Using QuickExportPatcher (Recommended)

1. Download the latest release from GitHub Releases and extract QuickExportPatcher.exe (or build from source).
2. Run QuickExportPatcher.exe.
3. The tool will auto-detect your Paint.NET installation:
   • If located in C:\Program Files\paint.net, the tool will offer to elevate via UAC to install the patch cleanly.
   • Alternatively, it stages the files and opens Explorer windows to both folders for easy drag-and-drop.
4. Launch Paint.NET, open an image with layers, and check the File menu!

Option 2: Restoring Vanilla Paint.NET (Unpatching)

Run QuickExportPatcher.exe and select option [2] Restore original Paint.NET (Unpatch). Your original paintdotnet.orig.dll will be restored immediately.

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Repository Structure

paintdotnet-quick-export/
|-- PaintDotNet.QuickExport.sln            # Master solution file
\-- src/
    |-- PaintDotNet.QuickExport/           # Companion DLL plugin (QuickExport)
    |   |-- PaintDotNet.QuickExport.csproj (Outputs PaintDotNet.QuickExport.dll)
    |   \-- Exporter.cs                    # UI injection and image flattening logic
    \-- PaintDotNet.QuickExport.Patcher/   # Standalone automated patcher CLI
        |-- PaintDotNet.QuickExport.Patcher.csproj (Outputs QuickExportPatcher.exe)
        \-- Program.cs

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Technical Details: How It Works

Paint.NET v5.x runs on modern .NET 9 and uses Ahead-Of-Time (ReadyToRun) native compilation and strict menu item integrity checks. Standard plugin architectures only allow FileType and Effect plugins, neither of which can add hotkeyed actions to the root File menu.

To achieve seamless File menu integration, PaintDotNet-QuickExport utilizes a two-part hybrid design:

1. Lightweight Binary Hook (paintdotnet.dll):
   • Injects a dynamic reflection hook at the end of PaintDotNet.Menus.FileMenu.OnDropDownOpening. This dynamically loads PaintDotNet.QuickExport.dll from the application directory without introducing brittle static assembly references.
   • Bypasses internal menu membership checks (FileMenu.OnDropDownItemClicked, PdnMenuItem.OnDropDownItemClicked, and PdnMainMenu.OnItemClicked), allowing standard ToolStripMenuItem instances to dispatch click events without throwing InvalidOperationException: Invalid menu item detected.
   • Preserves Win32 PE resources, GUI subsystem flags, and switches the CLR header to ILOnly to bypass stale native ReadyToRun offsets.
2. Companion Library (PaintDotNet.QuickExport.dll):
   • Contains all the UI and export logic.
   • Dynamically inspects AppWorkspace and ActiveDocumentWorkspace.
   • Calls curDoc.Flatten(surface) to perform native multi-layer compositing.
   • Encodes to PNG or high-quality JPEG and writes directly to disk.

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Building from Source

Prerequisites

• .NET 9 SDK
• Paint.NET 5.x installed (required for reference assemblies)

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Option 1: Visual Studio 2022

1. Open PaintDotNet.QuickExport.sln.
2. Press F5 (or Ctrl+F5) to build and launch the patcher.
   (The solution is pre-configured to launch the Patcher project automatically. You can switch the configuration dropdown to Release for an optimized build).

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Option 2: Visual Studio Code

1. Open the repository root folder in VS Code.
2. To Build: Press Ctrl+Shift+B and choose Build (Debug) or Build (Release).
3. To Run: Switch to the Run & Debug panel (Ctrl+Shift+D), select QuickExportPatcher (Debug) or QuickExportPatcher (Release), and press F5 (or Ctrl+F5 to run without debugging).

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Option 3: Command Line (.NET CLI)

# Build the entire solution (Debug)
dotnet build

# Build in Release mode
dotnet build -c Release

# Run the patcher directly
dotnet run --project src/PaintDotNet.QuickExport.Patcher

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Packaging a Release (.zip)

To create a standalone, distribution-ready release zip containing the single-file executable, documentation, and a SHA-256 checksum:

• Via PowerShell:

  ./package.ps1

• Via VS Code: Press Ctrl+Shift+P, select Tasks: Run Task, and choose Package Release (.zip).

The output package will be placed in dist/QuickExportPatcher-v<Version>-win-x64.zip alongside dist/checksums.txt.

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Changelog

See CHANGELOG.md for release history and version notes.

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License

This project is licensed under the MIT License.

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Acknowledgments

• dnlib (0xd4d) - High-performance .NET module reader/writer used by the patcher for IL bytecode injection (MIT License).
• Paint.NET (Rick Brewster / dotPDN LLC) - The image editor this tool extends.