Very easy and precise sharpening tip in PS.

Blade Canyon

Senior Member
Saw this tip somewhere and it works great for easy and precise sharpening:

Make a copy of the background layer (CTRL-J).
On the new layer, use the High Pass filter. FILTER -> OTHER -> High Pass.
You will see a gray screen and an option menu to set the radius for the filter.
Set the radius to the very lowest amount where you see a few very small details on the gray screen. Click OK.
Now set the blending mode for that layer to Overlay. What you should see now is your original image with just a small amount of sharpening.

Here's the clever part: With the top layer still selected, just click CTRL-J repeatedly. Each click sharpens the image a tiny bit more. You can easily go too far, but then you can turn the visibility of the layers off until you find exactly the amount of sharpening that looks correct. You can even combine layers and use layer masks if you want to vary the amount of sharpening in different parts of the image.

Maybe everyone already knows this trick, but it was a surprise to me.
 

mikew_RIP

Senior Member
Before i got CC with its brushes and only had Elements i used high pass for my bird images as you could use the eraser to erase the sharpening on the back ground if you wanted.
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
Saw this tip somewhere and it works great for easy and precise sharpening:

Make a copy of the background layer (CTRL-J).
On the new layer, use the High Pass filter. FILTER -> OTHER -> High Pass.
You will see a gray screen and an option menu to set the radius for the filter.
Set the radius to the very lowest amount where you see a few very small details on the gray screen. Click OK.
Now set the blending mode for that layer to Overlay. What you should see now is your original image with just a small amount of sharpening.

Here's the clever part: With the top layer still selected, just click CTRL-J repeatedly. Each click sharpens the image a tiny bit more. You can easily go too far, but then you can turn the visibility of the layers off until you find exactly the amount of sharpening that looks correct. You can even combine layers and use layer masks if you want to vary the amount of sharpening in different parts of the image.

Maybe everyone already knows this trick, but it was a surprise to me.
Adjusting the Blend Mode will also vary the degree of sharpening, with Overlay providing the highest degree of sharpening. I tend to prefer using Soft Light, instead of Overlay, but it depends on the shot. I think Blend mode is more a matter of personal taste, really, but they do control the degree of sharpening applied.

You can also vary the Opacity of a particular layer to control the overall effect without creating additional layers & masks.
 

Bikerbrent

Senior Member
This high pass sharpening was great in the past with earlier versions of Photoshop and used it myself for many years. However, I now prefer to use NIK sharpening in my photoshop CS6.
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
interesting.. does this method actually increase noise like so many sharpening tools do?
It can; so to avoid that here's what you do.

After applying the High Pass filter, but before changing the blending mode, open a Hue/Saturation adjustment (Ctrl+U) and desaturate the image (Saturation -100). This step removes color noise from the sharpening process. Now change the Blend mode to Overlay, Soft Light, whatever. If the image is not sharp enough, you can duplicate the High Pass layer as many times as you feel is needed.
 
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Slipperman

Senior Member
thx Fish..
seems to work. but it looks like you have to do it on the background layer. i tried it after adding a viveza layer (5 copies) and even though the image displayed ok in PS after doing the blend, you get nothing but the gray when loading it into Topaz or On1. is there a way to restore the image in the last hi pass layer while still retaining the sharpening so i can further edit it?
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
thx Fish..
seems to work. but it looks like you have to do it on the background layer. i tried it after adding a viveza layer (5 copies) and even though the image displayed ok in PS after doing the blend, you get nothing but the gray when loading it into Topaz or On1. is there a way to restore the image in the last hi pass layer while still retaining the sharpening so i can further edit it?
In short, I'm not sure... Sharpening, even when using a HP Filter, is usually the very last step in my processing workflow.

Typically I do all my artistic adjustments before flattening the image. From there I crop, resize and finally... Sharpen. First globally, then selectively if needed.
 

Slipperman

Senior Member
In short, I'm not sure... Sharpening, even when using a HP Filter, is usually the very last step in my processing workflow.

Typically I do all my artistic adjustments before flattening the image. From there I crop, resize and finally... Sharpen. First globally, then selectively if needed.
yeah, i had to save to jpg (flatten) in order to be able to continue editing it but you're right - i normally try to save sharpening for last after flattening.
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
yeah, i had to save to jpg (flatten) in order to be able to continue editing it but you're right - i normally try to save sharpening for last after flattening.
Well you can flatten the image without converting it to JPG; assuming you're working with a raw file to begin with, and then continue to process the now single layer in NIK if you want. I think it's pretty much a fact though, that sharpening should be the last, or nearly last step in your post-processing workflow. That's how I understand things but I'm certainly willing to be shown the light if my understanding is not correct.

If I understand what you're asking I think the answer might be hiding the Viveza layers by clicking off their "eyeball" icons and then clicking on "Merge Visible Layers" under what I call The Hamburger menu (the Three-Horizontal-Lines menu in the top right corner of each of the palettes). That would merge only the Background and Background Copy layers, leaving your Viveza layers separate and intact while still applying the sharpening of the High Pass Filter to the Background layer.

That, or I'm not understanding you situation. Either is possible. :)
 

Blacktop

Senior Member
If I may add something to this thread in case anyone imports from LR into PS (Many of us do). It is important to remember that LR adds some sharpening by default when importing files. (I have this "feature" turned off).
If I'm going to do NR and sharpening in PS, (or anywhere else outside of LR) I want to work with an unsharpened image to start with.
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
If I may add something to this thread in case anyone imports from LR into PS (Many of us do). It is important to remember that LR adds some sharpening by default when importing files. (I have this "feature" turned off).
If I'm going to do NR and sharpening in PS, (or anywhere else outside of LR) I want to work with an unsharpened image to start with.

I will add a reminder then,if you start with camera raw it adds a default sharpening also.
You are both correct and thanks for pointing that out.

I too like to start with a purely unsharpened image and whats more is the default sharpening applied in ACR, and I assume LR is the same, is also global.

What's neat is you can hold down the ALT key (in Windows, not sure what the equivalent is on a MAC) while clicking and dragging the Masking slider to selectively sharpen. When you press the ALT key while holding your click on that slider the image will turn completely white, indicating the entire image has been selected for sharpening. Dragging the Masking slider to the right, while holding down the ALT key allows you to control more precisely what's being sharpened. I find myself dragging that slider right to numbers such as 80 or 90, sometimes more, because I want to sharpen edges only probably 99% of the time. Again, the exact numbers will vary depending on the image. That's how it works in ACR, not sure if it's exactly the same in LR but I would guess that it is.
 

Blacktop

Senior Member
I just tried this now the first time. It works nicely as long as you don't go overboard. (like with anything else.)

_DSC6401-Edit.jpg
 

Horoscope Fish

Senior Member
Not tried it but was watching a video and the guy said change from 16 bit to lab colour for the sharpening as it does not create color sharpening artefacts?
Oh yes, I've heard of this technique. It's a bit more complicated but once you get the swing of it, it's not too bad. It does requires being very familiar and very comfortable working with the Unsharp Mask tool in Photoshop but that's something everyone who uses PS should know anyway. :D

I do want to point out that bit depth (8-Bit vs 16-Bit for instance) is totally different and independent from Color Space (sRGB, aRGB, LAB, CMYK, etc.). If you're shooting and processing raw files and you're NOT doing so in 16-Bit Mode, you really need to be. You're not just shooting yourself in the foot processing raw files in 8-Bit Mode, you're blowing off your leg above the knee.

So, as I understand it, the process of Sharpening an image file while in a LAB color space would look something like this... Open the raw file in Photoshop and duplicate the Background layer. Then convert that layer to the LAB color space (Image -> Mode -> LAB Color). The logic behind this is that LAB separates the image data into three channels just like an RGB color space does, but... LAB breaks the image data down into the L-Channel, which controls Luminance, the A-Channel which controls the Greens and Magentas and the B-Channel which controls the Yellows and Blues. The important take-away here is that Luminance information is now completely separate from the Color information. The advantage is that you can sharpen the black and white pixels without any impact on the color pixels. There's a logic behind why you do it this way, but it's early and I don't feel like diving into the details unless someone's really interested.

Anyway... To sharpen your image in a LAB color space you would go to the Channels tab and work on the L Channel ONLY. To do that you simply turn off the A and B channels via the Channels tab on the Layers palette. Now sharpen the image using Filter -> Unsharp Mask as you normally would. And no, you won't be able to use a High Pass Filter here.

Edit (just too clarify): Technically speaking duplicating the background layer isn't a required step... You *could* work directly on the Background layer, but best practice dictates working on a copy and not on the background layer itself. Still, that's up to you.
 
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