Sharpness - correct amount?

[RonH]

OK guys ... I submit Can't take all this pressure from both up-over and down-under.
Now ... where is my bike?

Butt ..he,he ... I do have one little last question (if I have any 'credits' left). When you do what you do in ACR and then open file in PP, do you first convert to (say) jpg before doing the final sharpening etc or do you leave it as RAW and then convert?

[Colin Southern]

When you do what you do in ACR and then open file in PP, do you first convert to (say) jpg before doing the final sharpening etc or do you leave it as RAW and then convert?

Hi Ron,

When you open the file in Photoshop you can set it to be an 8 or 16 bit file ... my suggestion is to use 16 bits if you're going to be doing heavy edits (I use 16 bit all the time regardless). But to answer the question, the native format of Photoshop (before you save as anything) is an intermediate type format, which assures maximum quality. If you want to retain that quality then simply do nothing ...

... but all good things must come to an end and that's the point where you need to choose a format to save the file into - basically, 3 common choices

JPG - great for small file sizes - but image quality is lost (whether or not you can see the loss of quality is another thing)

PSD - Photoshops default format - no image quality loss, but big files

TIFF - No quality loss - more compatable with print shops and other programs, but even bigger files than PSD

Personally I open in 16 bit / ProPhoto colourspace - save as a PSD - and then just edit / resave periodically from there.

Does this help?

[carregwen]

Personally I open in 16 bit / ProPhoto colourspace - save as a PSD - and then just edit / resave periodically from there.

Colin

Do you then junk the original RAW file to save space? I have started doing that, because for some files I just wouldn't go back and start again from scratch. So, my finished PSD is effectively my new master file, from which I produced web/print copies. Is that what you do?

And do you leave the TIFF/PSD in 16bit mode even when you've finished all editing? Personally, I couldn't tell a 16 bit print from an 8bit, so what would be the point? I thought the benefit of 16 bit was that you took more data initially from your (14 bit) camera and avoided some destruction of data when editing. Once you have finished the edit process for good then surely you don't need 16 bit any longer? Or do I have it wrong again...

[Colin Southern]

Do you then junk the original RAW file to save space?

Hi Rob,

First step for me is to convert to DNG - after that's done I always delete the RAW CR2 file, but never EVER the DNG

And do you leave the TIFF/PSD in 16bit mode even when you've finished all editing?

Yes. For me it's an easy decision as disk space isn't an issue, and I do my own printing. Plus - I typically only print 1 in 100 shots. When you've finished an edit you can safely convert to 8 bit and jpeg too if you like -- it only becomes an issue when you need heavy editing and only have an 8 bit file. As output formats even jpeg is absolutely fine.

[RonH]

Hi Ron,

... but all good things must come to an end and that's the point where you need to choose a format to save the file into - basically, 3 common choices

Thanks mate, now the brain is engaging ... I thought it was essential to create jpg. I'm going to get the recommended book (Real World Camera RAW) which should help me tie up the loose ends. Now the weather is on a slow improve here I hope that I can capture some exciting shots and do a bit of serious processing ...

[RonH]

Another question to our experts please.
PSE8 (and other Photoshops) now include two primary sharpening options ... Unsharp Mask and Adjust Sharpening. The latter is the newer version and having done a bit of 'Googleing' its difficult to determine which of these two options is the better one to use. I have also read that the USM is only still a part of the programme for historical reasons ... its the one that most people are used to.

Any views on which is best ... or its just trial and error and experience, personal preferences. It seems that they do much the same.

[proseak]

OK, my 2c's worth...I too Googled for "Unsharp Mask and Adjust Sharpening" which took me here - http://help.adobe.com/en_US/Photosho...2138831AC.html Where it seems that "adjust sharpening" is to be found in ACR, not PS. The page includes the phrase, "The adjustment is a variation of Unsharp Mask"

I agree with Colin on this - sharpening is best left to Photoshop; there's just so much more control...

Now here's a tip I got from Dan Margulis; it's possible to sharpen the "L" channel from LAB without leaving RGB. Apply USM - possibly a lot heavier than normal - and immediately Edit> Fade>Mode; Luminosity, and fade the Opacity to suit. Not in PSE, though..

It reduces the halo affect, and avoids the colour artefacts altogether.

But then you might prefer to sharpen in CMYK...has it's virtues

HTH

proseak

[RonH]

OK, my 2c's worth...
I agree with Colin on this - sharpening is best left to Photoshop; there's just so much more control...
proseak

Hei Peter, thanks for your reply.
The Adjust Sharpness (to which I referred in PSE8 ... Enhance/choose Unsharp Mask or Adjust Sharpness) is I think called Smart Sharpen in CS4 which is a more powerful version than that in Elements for sure. These are both in Editor (distinct ACR sharpening) which is where Colin guided me to do sharpening of RAW ... and who would be brave enough to dispute him, just look at the beaut shots he uploads.
My enquiring mind asks which optional Photoshop Editor sharpening method was better, if there is indeed a 'better'. I guess that it simply comes down to personal preferences and practice, practice, practice.

Now here is my address for your 2c

[RonH]

After a lot of great help (tusen takk) and heaps of error and error, I would like to know if this portrait pic is sharpened correctly. Taken in RAW, heavily cropped (it was not a close-up ... opportunity shot!), left the basic 25% sharpening etc in ACR (forgot to zero it!),then worked on it in Elements Editor to change colours/contrast with final sharpening using the optional Adjust Sharpening. Is it any good?
(I intended to test the RAW again but without the 25% pre-sharpen but have 'orders' to get on with some non-photography stuff just now )

[Colin Southern]

Hi Ron,

Hard to say without seeing the original, but I suspect that there's a little more to be squeezed out of it yet. If you'd like to send me the original I'd be happy to have a go at it for you.

[RonH]

Hi Ron,
If you'd like to send me the original I'd be happy to have a go at it for you.

Thanks Colin, that would be great ... will send it tomorrow our time but ... ain't ever sent a RAW file before, anything special I need to do? Also what address should I send it to? Its approx 9MB.

[arith]

Looks superb.

[RonH]

Looks superb.

Thanks Steve for your input ... spent hours on this and its great to get such comments. I will send the RAW file to Colin 'cause I'm sure that he can improve it and then via PM tell me his 'secret' settings ... once I can work out how to 'send' such RAW files - Its a long way from Norway to New Zealand

[Colin Southern]

Hi Ron,

Pop along to www.sendthisfile.com - create a free account - upload the file to them using your OWN address as the destination - and then copy/paste the download link they send you into a PM to me - really easy

[RonH]

Hi Ron,

Pop along to www.sendthisfile.com - create a free account - upload the file to them using your OWN address as the destination - and then copy/paste the download link they send you into a PM to me - really easy

Thanks Colin. Quick ask ... do I need to send both the NEF file and its associated XMP. They are two files on my pc

[Colin Southern]

Thanks Colin. Quick ask ... do I need to send both the NEF file and its associated XMP. They are two files on my pc

Grrrr - another "yet to be converted to DNG" person!

Nah - just the NEF - I'll work it out from there

[RonH]

Grrrr - another "yet to be converted to DNG" person!

Nah - just the NEF - I'll work it out from there

Wilco and thanks. Over Umm does DNG stand for 'Do Not Grovel'

[Colin Southern]

Hi Ron,

OK - here we go

First up - get it right in ACR. The strong window backlighting messed up the metering - so I had to adjust the levels in ACR - in the end I settled on Exposure -0.45, Blacks 23, Brightness +39, (all else at their defaults) (still a little flat, but I like to have a little bit of wiggle room with Photoshop Levels).

Because the image is cropped heavily we're now essentially looking at a 100% crop (which is different to normal content/creative sharpening and then down-sampling) (I cropped first) - plus - it was shot at ISO 400 which means that as a 100% crop, noise will be starting to creep in (not a big deal, but it does affect sharpening).

Once open in Photoshop I applied standard capture sharpening 300 / 0.3 / 0 - chucked on a levels layer and tweaked the black and mid-tone points slightly (lowering the tones to give better exposure to the face). For content / creative sharpening on images like this (ie low-res, as I'm doing this after down-sampling) you have to use relatively high amounts, but at a low radius ... what you're after is an apparant improvement in focus - if you use a higher radius setting then you'll emphasise bigger edges like wrinkles, which isn't what we want - so in this case I used 300 / 0.3 / 3 (essentially 2 doses of capture sharpening, but with the threshold of 3 so as to not emphasise the noise). I also selected the shirt and chucked a 0.25 pixel radius gaussean blur over it at the sharpening was starting to produce a hint of frosting.

Enough talking ...

[RonH]

Hi Ron,

OK - here we go

Thanks for all your tips mate ... you have made him look so much younger, he will be pleased I have copied off your adjustment notes for future ref thanks.
For me this was a hard one. As you said, the very strong window backlight added some challenges as did the heavy crop. In my attempt I also tried the 'Trendy High-Contrast Portrait Effect' as detailed in Scott Kelby's book 'Elements 8' but probably oversharpened it somewhat. But I was pleased with my overall result, particularly because it was taken on the fly.
Time you had your night cap and got to bed!

[Colin Southern]

No worries Ron