Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers Tutorials
Output / Sharpening - Smart Sharpen
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Subtitles of the Movie (Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers / Output / Sharpening - Smart Sharpen)
Adobe added the Smart Sharpen Filter to Photoshop several versions ago. It offers a choice of three different algorithms for how the sharpening is applied. The basic concepts that were true with Sharpening using Unsharp Mask still apply. You're still adding edge contrast, it just does it a little differently. Some people prefer Unsharp Mask, others love Smart Sharpen. I find that my preferences vary by image. You begin the same way. Set your image to be able to use the Smart Filter, size your image to its desired size, we'll say that I'm going to make roughly a 10 by 15 print, so I set the Resolution at 300. My image is now resized and I'm ready to go to Filter, Sharpen, Smart Sharpen. You can see that the dialog is a bit larger than the Unsharp Mask dialog. There's still an Amount Slider and a Radius Slider, but there's no Threshold Slider. The Amount Slider controls the amount of edge contrast to add, and the Radius Slider controls how far out from the edge the contrast goes. In addition, here are the three different algorithms. If you choose Gaussian Blur you'll be using virtually the same algorithms that are used in Unsharp Mask. Lens Blur is slightly different and is extremely effective and one of the advantages of using Smart Sharpen. Now you might say, but wait a minute. There's a Motion Blur one there, and it's true, there is, and theoretically you can match up the angle of the motion blur in your picture and remove some fuzziness that's due to motion blur. However, it's very difficult to do this accurately and if there's a significant amount of motion it's not going to sharpen your image. Concentrate on using Smart Sharpen in the Lens Blur Mode. I find that the default settings that are usually around 100 and a Radius of 1 are a good place to begin. This file is very large, so it might take a little bit more sharpening. As I mentioned, there's not a Threshold Slider, there's just a box that says More Accurate. If I check More Accurate it's as though I set the Threshold down to zero and Photoshop will find more edges. Without it, it's as though you had your Threshold set up higher, more like around 8 or 10. So you can see the effect that that has on this image. When you have More Accurate checked often you can use a little bit less Sharpening. There is an Advanced Mode to this dialog where you can set the amount to Fade the Sharpening in the Shadows and in the Highlights. I personally prefer to sharpen on a Layer and use a Layer Mask to apply the sharpening where I want the sharpening and to remove it where I don't, but if you have an image that suffers from a lot of Noise in the Shadow areas it can be helpful to Fade the Sharpening from the Shadow areas slightly and don't forget the Tonal Width is going to refer to the entire Tonal Width so I would back it off into just the Shadow areas. That's reduced some of the sharpening where we had a bit of noise in the darkest areas. When you're happy with your settings click OK. Some people feel that Smart Sharpen creates more artifacts than Unsharp Mask. I think it depends on the image and the settings that are used. As I said, whenever possible I apply sharpening only to the detailed areas of my image to avoid obvious artifacts in the background. So, I'll click on the Smart Filter and I'm going to change most of this Mask to black and only allow the sharpening on the front zebra. The fastest way to do that is to go to Edit, Fill, Use Black, click OK. That makes the Layer Mask black and so there's no sharpening anywhere. Then I go make sure that my Color Picker foreground color is set to white, I'm on my brush and set 100 percent Opacity, and I'll use a soft brush and make it a little bit larger and I'll come over my image and paint in the sharpening, that way I can control exactly where the sharpening is occurring. This is a very fast way to apply your sharpening. The Mask doesn't have to be 100 percent precise. The only thing you need to do is to make sure that the entire animal is sharpened and since we can't use the Backslash trick since this is a Smart Filter Mask, we can hold down the Alt or Option key, click on the Mask and have it come in the Preview and we can see any areas where we've missed sharpening. Quickly go over them, hold down the Alt or Option key, click on the Mask again and we're done. You'll decide for yourself whether you prefer the Unsharp Mask or Smart Sharpen even though the results are usually good with both of these Filters. Recently I've started using a Plug-in, Sharpener Pro by Nik, for some of my sharpening. It has specific settings to take into account whether the output is a monitor or print, as well as the type of paper and printing process. No matter what sharpener you use remember that no sharpener can make up for poor camera technique. Use good shooting techniques to take the sharpest image possible and then use a digital sharpener to make the image pop.
Tutorial Information
| Course: | Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers |
| Author: | Ellen Anon |
| SKU: | 34036 |
| ISBN: | 1-935320-74-2 |
| Release Date: | 2009-09-23 |
| Duration: | 8.5 hrs / 112 lessons |
| Work Files: |
Yes |
| Captions: | No |
| Compatibility: |
Vista/XP/2000, OS X, Linux QuickTime 7, Flash 8 |
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