Sharpening

[Snurk71]

I have a question about editing pictures. I use PSE, and have Scott Kelby's book (which I like). If I remember correctly (too lazy to look it up) Scott describes the last step in editing to be sharpening the photo for final presentation (after adjusting color, exposure, etc).

I've done some sharpening with the unsharp mask, as he guides the reader through. And I can really see some detail pop in the pictures after the sharpening. But someone also commented that in print a picture was pretty noisy (they really liked them on screen). I know that sharpening increases the noise. Maybe there is some secret balance to how much to sharpen without taking on too much grain.

So, what do the experts here say about sharpening your photo?

Thanks

 

[KrazyPete]

When you are sharpening are you looking at the results at full resolution? I know some cameras take some pretty big pictures and it's difficult to work on them at 100% zoom. But if you are working on them at 50% or less you may be introducing some artifacts that you just don't see until you zoom in or print them out at 300dpi.

From my own experience, sharpening is an easy thing to over do.

 

[boBQuincy]

Some guidelines appear to contradict each other but some that seem to work well most of the time are:

save sharpening until after all other operations are done;
set the image magnification to 100%;
don't go beyond about 0.5 pixel;
set levels to minimum;
for printing, sharpen until it just looks overdone, the print will reduce it a little;

Some 3rd party sharpening routines seem to be much better than Photoshop's. Whether this is actually so or if it is slight of hand (slight of eye?) is questionable but it's worth looking into. I sometimes use one of Fred Miranda's sharpening routines.

 

[photo_chick]

Well... not an expert but been working with digital files for a long time now.

It is really easy to go overboard with the sharpening. Also if you are using jpg files from your camera, chances are they have already been sharpened in the camera. IMO, (feel free to disagree with me here cause I know some will) it is not a good idea to sharpen both in camera and in post. Pick one or the other. IF you want to control the amount of sharpening then turn the sharpening off in the camera, if you don't want to mess with it then don't sharpen in post. WIth my old p&s I never sharpened in post, it would cause the image quality to decline too rapidly. Now with my DSLR I shoot RAW so I do any sharpening in post, but have found it is not necessary on every single image.

 

[safetymom]

I use Nik Sharpener Pro and I know a lot of pros use it also. It does a nicer job that Photoshop does. I never liked sharpening in PS, it looked too artificial.

It is a good idea to save your work before you apply any sharpening. Then sharpen and print. Don't save the sharpened print.

 

[Gdad]

I agree with some of the previous sentiments- sharpening is easily over done and gets over the top. I kind of feel that way about all post processing these days though. I look at some of the stuff I tried to 'improve' a year ago and cringe.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Only sharpen the parts of the picture you want sharp. Don't sharpen the OOF areas.

 

[SharonLowe]

I like the Nik sharpener pro too. And, I always sharpen on a separate layer so that I can only sharpen the areas I want to stand out. It is always the last step and is set for the specific size and use so that if I have a photo with different uses, I can just turn off the layers I don't need.

 

[Lizziejane]

I use the "adjust sharpness" tool in PE5. I find it more subtle than the other, and never get that halo effect. The prevew area is also much larger.

 

[handicap18]

I was doing a lot of sharpening for a while. Mostly because I felt that the lens I was using at the time was soft. As I look at a lot of those pics now, the vast majority of them are way over done. They look a lot like there was noise added that wasn't there.

Since I've changed lenses I've done almost no sharpening what so ever. I will sharpen most of the pics that I've scanned. But for digital files, not any longer unless it is absolutly necessary. Just my take.

 

[Groucho]

Well, it's a taste thing, too. I've read more than one old-time film shooter bemoaning the emphasis on supersharpness nowadays. They prefer a slightly softer look.

I haven't done enough research to have a worthwhile opinion on sharpening, I usually set sharpness to about 2/3rds of the way towards the max when processing my RAW files with the Pentax software (which uses Silkypix algorithms), I've been considering switching to Lightroom if I take the time to learn it properly, so we'll see what happens then.

For some other photos, I'll use unsharp mask in Irfanview (or Photoshop if using it) at the default values. Again, I haven't played with enough settings to see if I really like one or the other. It's a battle just to keep up with the photos I've taken, without doing any post-processing!

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I've been considering switching to Lightroom if I take the time to learn it properly, so we'll see what happens then.

I'm a big lightroom booster, but I have to say that sharpening is one of it's weaknesses. It doesn't give you much flexibility on how you sharpen (just how much) and it doesn't let you mask the areas you want sharpened. I use it for sharpening bulk shots, but I still use PS for anything important. The same is true for noise reduction (except that I use Neat Image for that).

 

[boBQuincy]

I was doing a lot of sharpening for a while. Mostly because I felt that the lens I was using at the time was soft. As I look at a lot of those pics now, the vast majority of them are way over done. They look a lot like there was noise added that wasn't there.

I really like the term someone applied to the look of over-sharpened images, "crunchy".

I tend to under-sharpen as I don't like crunchy images.

 

[photo_chick]

Yes, I find Lightroom slightly lacking in the sharpening tools. If I have an image that needs more than just a little sharpening I use CS2. I get the reference to thos eknocking sharpening. When I first go tmy DSLR and was working with images DH said you should sharpen that. I cringed. Sharpen my images? But that's cheating!

I got over that really quick.


Though I still say if your gonna work in RAW you gotta get Lightroom!