Sharpening - The Enhancement Technique

Sharpening, is an enhancement technique that is easily overdone and this is true even when applying the changes at the time of raw conversion. The best approach is to remember that sharpening should be applied to photos as the very last step in the editing/enhancement process and that the settings used need to match the type of output the photo is destined for. In practice this means images that are not going to be edited after raw conversion should be sharpened within ACR, but those pictures that are going to be enhanced further should have a small amount of subtle sharpening applied in ACR and specific output sharpening applied later using the specialist filters in Photoshop. Sharpening is also required to apply clipping path or deep etching because images must have good visible edge to apply perfect clipping path.

When a picture is first opened into the ACR the program sets the sharpening and noise values based on the camera type and model used to capture the image. For many photographers making further adjustments here is an exception rather than a rule as they prefer to address sharpening in the Editor after cropping, straightening, enhancing, resizing and going to print.

Sharpening control – Two new controls have been added to the Detail section of the Camera Raw dialog in recent versions of ACR. These new controls contribute substantially to the user’s ability to fine-tune the sharpening in their images. Added to the existing Amount (strength of the effect) and Radius (number of pixels from an edge that will be changed in the sharpening process) sliders is the Detail and Masking controls. Both sliders are designed to control what parts of the image the sharpening effect is applied to. As with all sharpening techniques ensure that the preview is set to 100% before playing with the new controls. In fact, this magnification level is essential if you are to see the masking previews mentioned below.

Detail – Moving the Detail slider to the right increases the local contrast surrounding edge areas and therefore enhances the appearance of details. Moving the slider to the left decreases the effect and also reduces the appearance of halos.

Sharpening examples: The sharpening slider controls affect the strength and type of sharpening applied to the image.
1. Detail of original.
2. No sharpening.
3. Amount + 90.
4. Amount + 150.
5. Radius + 3.0.
6. Detail + 150.

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