Less than impressed with Smart Sharpening

[patricklavoie]

<p>PARIS_cimetiere pere lachaise HIGHPASS</p><div></div>

[patricklavoie]

<p>PARIS_cimetiere pere lachaise SMARTSHARPEN</p><div></div>

[patricklavoie]

<p>You should clearly see in all example that the Smart Sharpen result is by far more precise and delicate than is High Pass counter part...and far from the original... in a good way.</p>

<p>let me know if there is something else you might want to see to get a better understanding of the SS plugin ; )<br>

____</p>

<p>This is what i would like to see from user who affirm that this or that is not as good as or better as something.. nothing is better to prove a point than visual example. SO thanks Tim for your demand, it push me further to demonstrate my point and i like that ; )</p>

<p>It may or not suit you or your workflow, but you now know the method exist and give good result...For ME its a perfect setup to give my client maximum quality out of there raw images.</p>

<p>____</p>

<p>On a side note, im in a process of doing my own personal web site with my own personal images.. so you would be able to see what i do during my trip, not just what i do for living... post a link when its time for those curious ; )</p>

[tom_mann1]

<p>Patrick, thank you for providing some examples. Of course, I couldn't resist playing with your original. I used my own mix of Focus Magic + multiple radii sharpening and obtained the attached image.</p>

<p>Unfortunately, I had to begin processing your image with the version of the original already degraded by the photo.net upload process, but folks should still be able to easily see a clear improvement over SS. Pay particular attention to:</p>

<p>(a) the reduced halos paralleling the closely spaced vertical lines in the stone column at the rear of the upper tomb;</p>

<p>(b) the reduced halos around the squares that go around the top of the largest tomb;</p>

<p>© the reduction in the bright halos on the leaves at the base of the red flowers closest to the camera; and,</p>

<p>(d) the general improvement in texture, particularly, in the nearest two dark stone markers, the dirt, the flat stone surfaces, the trunk of the tree on the LH edge of the frame, and the leaves in the upper LH corner of the frame.</p>

<p>I think that the improvement over a single step SS correction is obvious. OTOH, I will be the first to admit that my method involved about 4 steps (but all were easy and fast), whereas yours was a one-step operation, which is a big advantage to your method.</p>

<p>Cheers and Happy New Year to you and yours !</p>

<p>Tom M</p>

<p>PS - I will likely be away from the computer all day and this evening, so my next response will likely be tomorrow.</p>

<p>PPS - After I posted the image in this message, I now fully appreciate the importance of Patrick's suggestion to download all of the images into PS layers for comparison. It's quite difficult to see subtle changes like these by scrolling up and down the thread.</p><div></div>

[patricklavoie]

<p>Tom, maybe is my limited english language but i didtn say or implied that 1 setting is good for all everytime, and i didtn say that you should applied this effect all over in one pass... have you take the time to read the free tutorial i post once in while? it is clearly explain that you should do a 3 step sharpening on all your images, with different setting and by applying mask at least in the second step.</p>

<p>What i believe is that when you have found a amount that work well, and<strong> i discover than 225-250 was that number at least for my taste</strong> from a Canon G9 to a Phase One P45, and that <strong>if you use a radius of 1 or 1.1 you will not get halo and still keep the file as nautral as possible</strong> . Sure you can put 5 in the radius box and get a stronger effect a la dragan if this is you are after or if your file is really soft..but i like to start with good original not try to salvage all the time my poor shot.. and by learning how to properly shoot at first i achieve that most of the time.</p>

<p>And whats the idea behind you dont use this or that on bad exposure file, out of focus one, or other problem file..why imply that because you are not a pro you have the *rigth* to shoot badly? i dont understand that point of view at all and ear it a lot from amateur... If you end up having bad exposed / out of focus / cheap lens or else, well just buy better equipment or learn to use what you have.. but please stop with the i shoot badly so your technique wont work..</p>

<p>I didtn use USM for years because it simply sucks.. and to said what Bruce Fraser once said in is book " USM is like trying to cut a tree with a blunt tool, eventually you will get it down, but theres far more better tools to get the job done" or pretty close to this (dont have the book on sharpening with me).</p>

<p>The best use of USM would be for me to make a local contrast enhancement, like what the simplier and better Clarity slider do in Lightroom..other than that i dont see the use of it when you are after quality in any kind of file, from a pro or not, well or not exposed files.</p>

<p>As for the HighPass, it was THE tool choice by me to add sharpness to my images up to 2006, when i discover SS it change my life and the way i applied sharpening because as you can see and cant deny on the example above is that highpass seem to give a sharpness effect but in fact just emphazise edge, where the SS make all more precise for real.</p>

<p>Why did Adobe let this filter there, or the brigthness / contrast for instance still active..its because of people who learn that way years ago and didtn like to learn new stuff.. they have created Layer with version 4, and still today a lot of people still work directly on there original.. they have create mask and still today people still dodge and burn directly on the original.. why? because many people are too lazy to learn new stuff or dont feel the need to learn this new stuff. with every version of Photoshop i get better and faster because they create better tool for us, that help me acquire better quality images in less time (stamp tool vs healing brush tool for example).</p>

<p>I insist of using Smart Sharpen and i like to show the world that this filter work amazingly when you have some number to start to remove the burden of doing test all over the placer, i feel as strong with that filter as someone else would feel strong about PK Sharpener; for me they are doing the exact same thing when well execute, just depend of the knowledge you have and the money your are ready to spend to simplify your life in need.. i dont think that PK Sharpener will do more for me today vs the use of SS, and yes i use it and test it extensively before saying that in case someone ask.</p>

<p>What you should retain from this post is simply that SS work very well when you have the correct setting, and that i dont feel anyone should or could be not impressed by it after seing the example i post (not to say that my image are the best a user have seen but the example i think are well done)..you have to agree that it seem to work well at least : )</p>

<p>In the end, use whatever tool that make you happy and make you think its the best method; USM, HighPass, Smart Sharpen, PK Sharpener or else.. I feel comfortable using Smart Sharpen on 9 out of 10 of my or client images, and i still use HighPass for some for different reason or need.</p>

<p>I dont say that if you dont use SS you dont know nothing about quality, but i could say that if you dont think after this post that its not a good <strong>alternative</strong> you dont know much about quality for sure.</p>

<p>Tell you what, send me a shot that you will be proud to print (by proud i mean a basic file with quality, not out of foucs, not soft focus to the extreme..not a file to salvage, but a file you would like to show the world), and i will sharpen it for you for free.. that way you will see that SS work on anybodys image, not just mine. Dont do anyhting on it, if its a JPEG or a RAW i will do it if no sharpen have been applied first (thats is after all THE way of working wiht a file no?) I limited this offer to the first 3 email.. One of them being Bill the OP if he want ; )</p>

<p>*hope this post doestn sound too arrogant.. im just passionate ; )</p>

[patricklavoie]

<p><em>*a quick edit to start, as i just post this and see Tom answer. As i said, i apply the effect in one pass witch i never do and a bit stronger so you can see the effect on a unedit image..no contrast or curve have been applied to any of them that could have also make a more interesting visual of course ; ) , but i agree with him that his version look more natural with a bit of manual work (and the filter seem to have applied a kind of contrast alos, witch is good) I will get the demo myself and start experiment with it.<br /> </em></p>

[dan_south]

<p>Tom, </p>

<p>That's interesting. I'll have to check out Focus Magic.</p>

<p>Smart Sharpen seems to be particularly brutal on skies, especially when applied repeatedly. Also, I find it incompatible with Lightroom's sharpening tools, e.g. when I edit a Lightroom image as a Smart Object in PS and then switch back to LR when I'm done. Now as a rule I never mix PS an LR sharpening, which seems odd since they both come from Adobe.</p>

<p>Sharpening is such a broad and mysterious topic. Someone could probably write a Masters thesis on sharpening and not cover all of the options.</p>

[bill_tuthill]

Focus Magic is totally amazing for reducing shake-induced lens blur, or bad IS behavior as sometimes occurs. My friend Ted Marcus says it's good for sharpening also, but I have never had time to investigate. However in Tom's Pere LaChaise FM sharpening, I see strong black halos at 200% zoom. Tom sharpened a lot more than Patrick did in his SS example.

 

HighPass seems quite poor as a technique. In all of Patrick's samples, except maybe EuroDisney, I think the original looks more natural on my LCD monitor. It seems to me that HighPass reduces the 3D illusion.

 

I like to look at 200% zoom to judge image quality. Luminous-Landscape is a site that pushed high pass at one time, and it appears to me that most of the images posted there are mildly to extremely oversharpened when viewed at 200%.

 

This is an interesting discussion, but the bottom line is that I don't have time for fiddling around with every image. I want something that works fairly well all the time, and SmartSharpen seems to be it. Thanks again Patrick.

[Tim_Lookingbill]

Patrick, those are excellent examples of good sharpening using SS. On my display they're a bit on the crispy side. Don't know if those are 100% crops. Just FYI I never used High Pass sharpening. USM has always worked for me in the past but I have to admit viewing on a pixel level SS has a lot of control but I still get halos from it but not thick ones like USM. I can't show any examples right now because my main computer went down about a week ago and I'm stuck with PS 7 on a 2000 Pismo PowerBook in OS 9. 2003 version of Mozilla is the only browser that works and I have to turn off JavaScript to be able type a response which accounts for the lack of line breaks so I'm keeping it short. Happy New Year everybody. Waiting for my power supply to arrive by FedEx so I can get my 2004 iMac working.

[photom]

<p>It sounds like a lot of expert opinions above.</p>

<p>I happen to really like smart sharpen as follows:</p>

<p>Use lense blur and <em><strong>NOT</strong> </em> <em><strong>more accurate</strong> </em> mode for first pass. Play with settings. The larger the original file and more real info. the more the sharpening and the larger the pixel. Usually a bit less than 1 pixel and and near 100 as to amount.</p>

<p>Sometimes I like to do a second pass at half or more the pixel size and half the amount as the previous pass using <em><strong>more accurate</strong> </em> mode.</p>

[gt1]

<p>"It seems to me that HighPass reduces the 3D illusion." I agree, particularly in the eurodisney image.</p>

[matt_needham]

<p>It's not like chocolate and vanilla. It's like blaming the stove because the food keeps burning. While it could be the stove, we have to assume that if other people can get the stove to work it's most likely the stove operator's error. I rarely find tutorials that match my taste. They are for initial learning. Practice and study may still be required to figure how the technique or tools work best for me.</p>

<p> </p>

[patricklavoie]

<p>some good tutorial are out there, and some are really not well done or show old technique, or worse show a good technique but wrongly applied..</p>

<p>lynda.com is a good place to learn, photo.net is also a good place when people provide visual example of what they say, but like Matt say, blaming a technique because it doestn work for you but strangely work for others is too simple. While practice and study is good, you always need a start up manual or some sort of direction to be on the right track fast, and this is where tutorial are good.</p>

<p>As for the thesis on sharpening that Dan ask, it exist and its call > <em>Real World Image Sharpening with Adobe Photoshop, Camera Raw, and Lightroom, Second Edition</em></p>

 

[Kent Shafer]

<p>I'm pretty new to digital processing and know that I'm deficient in experience and judgment when it comes to sharpening (along with a lot of other things). So here's what I've been doing lately as a learning technique: Put two copies of the image side by side in Photoshop. Run the applicable PK Sharpener routine on one. Then use Smart Sharpen on the other to try to tweak a <em>little</em> more sharpness out of it without significantly changing the overall look compared to the PK sharpened version.</p>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

If sharpening full rez images later to be downsized for the web to like say 700 pixels wide, create a New Window set at 25% zoom while you sharpen the original at 100% view giving you live feedback as it will closely appear downsized for the web. This helps avoid the crispy look after downsizing. LCD's have gotten really sharp lately and combined with the way an OS draws pixels in web browsers (which isn't exactly the same as Photoshop BTW) can deliver unexpected results.

[bill_tuthill]

<p>As I discovered while researching another thread (ImageMagick sharpening, not of interest to Photoshoppers), <strong>JPEG parameters make a lot more difference </strong> than sharpening techniques for thumbnail-size images.</p>

[rsampson]

<p>One quick trick for reducing the amount of halos when sharpening in photoshop is to switch to LAB mode and use any of the sharpening tools on the Lightness channel. I find many thrid party sharpening tools better than those within photoshop.</p>

[patricklavoie]

<p>no need to go into LAB for that (or to use LAB at all for 99% of anything you do in Photoshop) just use the Luminosity blending mode..same effect, quicker and simple.</p>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

Agree with Patrick with that LAB go round. The only thing it will do to halos is to prevent color fringing along edges, but there is a more powerful weapon for that using ACR's sharpening combined with Chromatic Abberation panel setting the drop down menu selection to All Edges (requiring a saturation boost afterward) or Highlight Edges with hit or miss on some edges. Viewing at 200% or above to where you see how the pixel spread looks along edges is the only way to see how powerful this combination really is. You're looking for clean stairstep edges and you can get this very quickly in ACR or LR. Not sure how it looks on jpegs but Raw really shines using these two tools.

[tom_mann1]

<p>Hi Patrick - I'm sorry that I couldn't get back to this thread before now, but the holidays were very busy and I've been in and out of town. <br /> <br /> <br /> <em>[PL]: "...Tom, maybe is my limited english language but i didtn say or implied that 1 setting is good for all everytime, ..." <br /> </em> <br /> Patrick, in your post of Wed, Dec 30, 2009 at 12:49 PM, you state: <br /> <em>[PL]: "...i think that when you have find the correct settign in<br /> Smart Sharpen, witch is kind of always 225%, radius 1.1, lens blur and do not<br /> check the more precise button (dotn need ever to touch the more advanced tab by<br /> the way) you will get a perfect most of the time if not ALL the time a perfect<br /> result as a first sharpen...."</em> <br /> <br /> I think that most people would categorize the above statement as an extremely strong emphasis / insistence on using only Smart Sharpen, and using it only with a narrow range of radii (ie, around 1 pixel, not the tens or hundreds of pixel radii typically used in large-R USM). This is what I claimed in my earlier post in this thread.<br /> <br /> Going back over quite a few of your other postings on sharpening and re-reading your tutorial, I could not find one single instance where you recommended any other sharpening tool over Smart Sharpen (aka, SS) for any situation, and I certainly have not seen you even discuss SS's range of applicability in a logical and dispassionate manner. Repeatedly recommending SS to the exclusion of all other algorithms is limiting, illogical and impossibly optimistic. It's a "one-size-fits-all" approach. Every algorithm has its domain of optimal applicability, has its own unique set of adverse side effects, etc. and SS is no exception to this. While Smart Sharpen is certainly a reasonable choice for images of a certain type (ie, fairly high quality; a tight, isotropic point spread function, etc.), a truly knowledgable and professional user makes all processing decisions fully cognizant of the other methods available and the trade-offs involved in each. <br /> <br /> -----------<br /> <br /> <br /> <em>[PL]:"...and i didtn say that you should applied this<br /> effect all over in one pass... have you take the time to read the free tutorial<br /> i post once in while? it is clearly explain that you should do a 3 step<br /> sharpening on all your images, with different setting and by applying mask at<br /> least in the second step...."</em> <br /> <br /> I did read your tutorial, and I did see your statements on this. I have absolutely no disagreement with you on spreading the sharpening out over more than one step (as per Bruce Fraser's recommendations). Rather, my concern is about an undue emphasis on using only one algorithm (and to a lesser extent, a small range of parameters) for all photographic sharpening tasks, not on dividing the sharpening over several steps. <br /> <br /> ------------<br /> <br /> <br /> <em>[PL]: " ... What i believe is that when you have found a amount that work well, and i discover than 225-250 was that number at least for my taste from a Canon G9 to a Phase One P45, and that if you use a radius of 1 or 1.1 you will not get halo and still keep the file as nautral as possible ..." </em> <br /> <br /> You are absolutely correct that when some particular technique works for a person, as long as the nature of the work doesn't change, that person should stick with the tried-and-true method. My disagreement is that you seem to completely dismiss the legitimacy of people who, for some reason, are forced to work with lower quality images, and hence Smart Sharpen at a radius of around 1 pixel is very likely inappropriate or certainly inadequate. Examples of your statements in this direction include: <br /> <br /> <br /> <em>[PL]:"..but i like to start with good original not try to<br /> salvage all the time my poor shot.. and by learning how to properly shoot at<br /> first i achieve that most of the time. ..."</em> <br /> <br /> <em>[PL]: "...And whats the idea behind you dont use this or that on bad exposure file, out of focus one, or other problem file..why imply that because you are not a pro you have the *rigth* to shoot badly? i dont understand that point of view at all and ear it a lot from amateur... If you end up having bad exposed / out of focus / cheap lens or else, well just buy better equipment or learn to use what you have.. but please stop with the i shoot badly so your technique wont work.."</em> <br /> <em><br /> [PL]: "...You cant be disapoint with something you dont fully understand, can you? ; ) ..."<br /> </em> <br /> <br /> Although I'm sure it was entirely unintentional, can you see how such statments might easily be taken as serious insults by the large numbers of professional photographers who, on a daily basis have to prepare important images for publication, but these images are far from technically perfect. Would you tell such pros to learn their craft and buy better equipment when even the best of them can't guarantee pin-sharp images? You only mention amateurs in this regard, but may I remind you that photojournalists, shooters who specialize in sports or street photography, microscopists, photo-restoration experts, underwater photographers, and many other photographic specialties often can not produce in-camera pin sharp pictures because of because of light scatter, abberations in their optical system that studio photographers would consider bizarre, abberations because the subject is near the edge of the frame, specimen vibration or motion (in microscopy), slight focus error in following the quarterback, etc. <br /> <br /> As a joke, I might ask that if SS is good for any problem, why did the Hubble Space Telescope team once spend months perfecting a sharpening algorithm and not just use SS? Oh, sorry, at that time, I guess the Hubble optical system wasn't at a pro-level sufficient for SS to be applicable. Sorry, couldn't resist the joke. ;-) <br /> <br /> Rather, one should teach specialists in these areas about tools which will help them overcome the problems they face in their individual specialties. Appropriate tools for such problems include large R USM, anisotropic blur reduction (e.g., focus magic), local contrast enhancement based on different length scales (ie, Topaz Details), luminosity dependent local contrast enhancement (ie, NIK Tonal Contrast), etc. <br /> <br /> Hopefully, I am wrong and you have given appropriate weight to these relatively new tools in some other forum, but because I have not seen this, I feel compelled to point out what seems to be a glaring omission from your many posts on sharpening. <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> <em>[PL]: "...I dont say that if you dont use SS you dont know nothing about quality, but i could say that if you dont think after this post that its not a good alternative you dont know much about quality for sure. ..."</em> <br /> <br /> Of course Smart Sharpen is a very reasonable method for many images, BUT, it should be only one of many tools in the toolbox of a true, broadly educated and broadly experienced pro.<br /> <br /> <em>[PL]: " ...hope this post doestn sound too arrogant.. im just passionate ; ) ..."<br /> </em> <br /> Me, too!.!.!.<br /> <br /> <br /> Best regards,<br /> <br /> <br /> Tom M<br /> <br /> <br /> PS - I just noticed your message in which you said that you liked the way I sharpened your image using Focus Magic, and said that you would look into it as another tool to have in your toolbox for sharpening. Give it a try, I think you'll find it useful for some applications. For example, I find it to be particularly good for single step sharpening after bi-cubic downsizing a full rez dSLR image to a 700px wide image for photo.net. A setting of r=1 generally works quite well this task, but for sharpening of full rez images larger values of R are often useful. In addition, I'll often split the right (ie, bright) "blend if" slider to fade out the focusing effect on the brightest tones in the image.<br /> <br /> <br /> <br /> <br /></p>

[patricklavoie]

<p>i agree with you, having differents tool for different need are the best avenue. I had use many of them, and for my workflow i end up using most of the time SS as i find it work well, or the sharpen function in Ligthroom when for my personal image i dont need any photoshop other than darkroom.</p>

<p>I still think that SS give a more natural feeling vs HighPass or USM, and im agree that different setting can be use depending of the problems. Since i cant create a tutorial with all the different problem shot in the world i go with one good shot to show how 2 technique compare between them..what you have seen in my different post.</p>

<p>Some find USM acceptable, i dont. Some find PK Sharpener the best plugin, i agree with them that its one of the simpliest one, and that it give good result, but nothing i cant do with a free included filter in Photoshop..And some use HighPass, i have use it and find many flaws, so again i decide to stick with one good alternative. Im not close to other filter (if they work on a mac) if they can give me a better result in less time or same time, thats why i will when i ca have a look at your plugin ; )</p>

<p>I have the chance to work with pro and you are right by saying that even them dont give me super sharp pin point focus all the time, but they and i dont always use this as a excuse... on those problem case i use sometime high pass to emphasize some details more agresively or a stronger setting in SS... but this is on problem shot only. Also, i think that the digital have bring the pixel piping to a new level, because most of the time, even a not so sharp image look great at a regular size like 8x10, in a magazine for example.. if you remember it, not so long ago whe where use to see smoothness on film shot in the magazine, now everything need to be more than sharp..unaturally sharp.. im sure they will create a plugin soon that gave the smooth film look to digital file .. wait is here, its call Alien Skin Exposure ; )</p>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<p>Below is an example of the type of stairstep pixel edge sharpness I look for when sharpening without kicking up halo's. The samples are from screenshots viewed at 400% in ACR and CS3.</p>

<p>I've included the sharpening settings for ACR vs Smart Sharpening's setting applied to the ACR default sharpness version. As you can see I arrived at identical results using both methods. This is as sharp as I could get it without amplifying noise and halo's. ACR Luminance Smoothing was set at 20 and<br>

Color Smoothing set at 2.</p><div></div>

[mirek_elsner1]

<blockquote>

<p>Some find PK Sharpener the best plugin, i agree with them that its one of the simpliest one, and that it give good result, but nothing i cant do with a free included filter in Photoshop.</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>I like SS better than PK Sharpener for <strong>web </strong> sharpening. I think the SS sharpened web size jpegs look better. I think though that PK Sharpener is a great tool for sharpening for different types of <strong>print </strong> output.</p>

[jacopo_brembati]

<p>Smart Sharpen is an improvement of Adobe USM.<br /> But, a good USM can produce results that are similar to SS.<br /> <br /> In any case with a good USM or SS you get halos or too shining elements producing a "digital sharpness look".<br /> To have a "natural sharpness look", you need a sharpen tool that can adapt to the edge strength, preventing halos or too shining elements.<br /></p><div></div>

[Tim_Lookingbill]

<p>That's pretty darn good, jacopo. I compared it to Patrick's original version above and yours is noticeably sharper but without the halo's.</p>

<p>What was your workflow and tool settings?</p>