The Sharpen Filter - Photoshop

Saturday, December 22, 2012
                     (# 2 post of the day)

The Sharpen Filter

(Photoshop)

Introduction

     In my opinion, one of the weaker features (but not Adobe's fault) of image-editing software had been in allowing people to take bad photos and then spend hours in Photoshop to fix them up. In the BDE (Before Digital Era-my phrase), students would spend hours in the darken working on bad photos, when they could simply re-shoot the scene or studio image in much less time!

    The digital came, with its mini-computer within is so sophisticated that only on "rare" occasions can a photo be taken badly. For a guarantee, it's best to have a tripod, a faster shutter speed, a remote or cable release, auto-focus (25 point or whatever) and so forth.

    Certain pro photographers will even take a computer on location and tether the camera to the computer (laptop or even battery-operated IMac) to be 100% that the focus is there! Tethering simply means attaching your camera (wired or remote via IR transmission or radio transmission) so that the images can both be captured and viewed on the computer monitor.

   As Photoshop has evolved, it has improved techniques of "sharpening" photographs. Also, there are a whole host of stand-alone and plug-in software programs to "somewhat improve" the sharpness of the image. Also,as I've mentioned before, Adobe likes to almost keep everything within the program from way back. Consequently, every improvement is included, and that's why there are 20 different ways to "somewhat improve" the sharpness  both with specific menus and choices, and combinations of choices.

   Before I start, I'd like to pass on a short and funny, at least to me) story.  The U.S. military always had spy satellites, and  cameras in high-altitude jets to do what the U.S. military does - spy or to use  better words - "do surveillance". I remember also when I was in school,there was a "special" 

B & W film developer called H & W control that was made in all places -Vermont. You could also buy special film that on 35mm would be able to enlarge 30" x 40" (762 mm x 1016 mm) in B & W without great sharpness, acutancy*, and no grain. (*It's a term for film that you may have trouble finding anymore). It's slightly different from "sharpness" in the sense of being able to see fine detail and keep the detail there. There's another term called "resolution".

   Of course, you'd have to run test with your camera, the f-stop, on a tripod, shutter release and so forth. Then you'd need to figure out the proper development time, ASA (now ISO),  minimal time in the wash to keep the gelatin from expanding too much and moving the silver grain around.

  So of course, no student ever bothered to test the film that carefully, and you only read about all  this in magazines. Anyway, coming back to the U.S. spy satellites, the government with their satellites, and jets would be taking photos at 20 miles high, travelling at 100 miles an hour and could record some Russian (it was the Cold War  at that time) reading Pravda and be able to read the headline. What I used to laugh about is that there was technology available (classified of course) that far exceeded any capabilities that we as photographers and students had them.

  I can't even imagine what the U.S. military has now! I do know that you can't buy certain "quality" of satellite images from private satellite agencies because the U.S. military considers that "classified". So I can go on the Net to see my house with the pool in the back yard, and trees, and my long driveway.  But I'd certainly love to see my house from a U.S. military satellite !

A 1930's Tootsietoy Die Cast Toy (American)

Length: about 4" (102 mm) 

The same photo but with Image >>  Adjust >>  Highlight / Shadow adjustments

Just doing basic adjustments will have the image appear "sharper" A flat (low contrast) image adjusted for contrast will appear sharper, just form the variations (contrast between adjacent light and dark tones.

Here is where the Sharpening menu resides in Photoshop

I tried "curves", but wasn't happy wioth the results.

What you want to do is maximize the quality of your photo before sharpening. 

If the photo appears good just with those improvements, then why go further. If you're enlarging to huge wall-sizes, the go woith sharpening.

Unsharp Mask

Unsharp Mask  @ 54%

Unsharp Mask  @ 104% 

Close-up at 104%

There comes a point whereupon any further change will decrease the quality of the photo or make the "sharpening" too apparent and distracting!

Smart Sharpen

Zero Setting 

 50% Fade 

* I'll research the term later and add the explanation

100% Fade

Not much change, but I didn't use all of the variables (sliders)

Sharpen More

I'm not sure (will revise) where this sharpening starts from or 

which of the other 4 options is used as the starting point.

Starting Point

None changes done.

Sharpened More 2x

Sharpened More 3x

The Original Untouched Image

 My "played around" image with selective sharpening options.

1. Rubber Tire - Unsharp Mask

(using the  elliptical marquis tool to isolate the tire from the rest of the car)

2.  Front Grill - Sharpened More 3x

3. Left front Fender - Unsharp Mask

Conclusion

    The first 50-100 posts will be just introductory so that you can familiarize yourself with Photoshop. Of course there are many, many more options such as masking, channel sharpening, and so on and so forth. In some cases of sharpening options "colour noise" and unwanted grainy lines started to appear. When you try Filter >> Noise  >>> Reduce Noise, you end up sacrificing sharpness for reducing the noise, so this option is not of any use. 

 I can't show you much noise because the file sizes are small. Some of the images are 
4" x 6" @ 300 dpi, so that you can enlarge them to try and view them better. Also, it's best to work with Camera RAW files, which I haven't done. 

So that's another post for today.

Thanks for visiting,

and have a great day, wherever you may be.

Stacey