Luminosity Sharpen with Smart Sharpen
Steve Weinrebe
Sharpening images in Photoshop CS3 is a pleasure because we can apply sharpening with a Smart Filter, giving the ability to save the sharpening filter into the image file, to be adjusted later on.Better yet, the ability to change the blending mode of Smart Filters gives the added advantage of using Luminosity mode for sharpening, sharpening the lightness values and not the color values of the image.
This technique shows steps to do just that, and with the added feature of viewing the image itself in Luminosity mode while applying the sharpening.
Convert to Smart Object
Step 1:
Open the photograph you want to sharpen, into Photoshop. Then convert the image to a Smart Object by choosing "Convert for Smart Filters" from the Filters menu. Better yet, right-mouse-click on the Background layer in the Layers palette just to the right of the layer icon, and choos "Convert to Smart Object" from the contextual pop-up menu.
Make a new layer filled with white
Step 2:
Command (Mac), or Control (Windows) + click on the "Create a new layer" icon (the little dog-eared document icon) at the bottom of the Layers palette to add a new layer below the Smart Object layer. If you created a new layer and didn't hold any keys down, just drag the new layer below the Smart Object layer.Then make white the foreground color, easily done by pressing the D key (to make the foreground/background colors black and white), and then the X key (to flop the colors so that white is the foreground color). Then press Option + Delete (Mac), or Alt + Backspace (Windows), to fill the new layer with white pixels. (Tip: black or a graytone works just as well as white here.)
Change Smart Object layer mode to Luminosity
Step 3:
Click once on the Smart Object layer in the Layers palette to make it the active, highlighted, layer. Now change the blending mode of the Smart Object layer to Luminosity, from the mode menu at the top of the Layers palette. Zoom in to the image at least 100% to be ready to preview the sharpening filter.
Apply the sharpening filter
Step 4:
Now you're ready to apply the sharpening filter. Unsharp Mask works well, but Smart Sharpen allows us to dampen the so-called halo effect, the light and dark bands that can appear along edges of contrast when applying sharpening to an image. From the Filter menu choose Sharpen > Smart Sharpen.
In this photograph, the extreme contrast of the marble fountain rim against the water would be the most likely culprit for edge halos, and that's just the sort of area to pay special attention to when previewing sharpening effects.
Step 5:
Set the sharpening Amount and Radius. Generally working with an amount between 50 to 100 works well, though with this method you may exceed 100 a bit and still be happy with the results. Pay attention to those edges(!) and use the steps that follow.A Radius of 1 works well for most images. Choose Lens Blur from the Remove menu, and click the More Accurate checkbox.
Dampen the Shadows and Highlights
The great feature of Smart Sharpen is the ability to dampen the intensity of the shadow and highlights produced by increased contrast along edges in the image. Click on the Shadow tab and choose an amount to dampen the shadows. From 10% to 20% works well. Then do the same for the Highlight tab. Leave the Tonal Width and Radius at the default settings.
While applying the filter, the preview in the Smart Filter dialog box is in color, but because of our previous steps you can view your image window in Luminosity mode, as seen below at right. It's generally easier to see how well the sharpening is working in the image when viewing the lightness values of the image this way. Click the Preview button in the filter dialog box to toggle the sharpening effect in the image window on and off. The original, with no sharpening, is below on the left.
When finished, click OK to accept your changes and close the Smart Sharpen dialog box. Your layers palette will look like the image below, with the Smart filter applied.
Change the Layer blending mode back to Normal, and the Filter blending mode to Luminosity
Step 6:
Now that you've applied the Smart Sharpen filter as a Smart Filter, you can change the image layer's blending mode back to Normal, and the filter's blending mode to Luminosity. First click on the Smart Object layer, Layer 0, and choose Normal from the blend mode drop-down menu at the top of the Layers palette.
The finishing touch for the filter is to change the Smart Sharpen filter's blending mode to Luminosity by double-clicking on the icon to the right of the filter's name, in the Layers palette (the two tiny triangles under parallel lines, circled below).
Double clicking on that icon brings up the Blending Options dialog box for the filter. At the top of the dialog box is a Mode drop-down menu; click on that menu and choose Luminosity for the blending mode. Click OK, and the Smart Sharpen filter will be applied only to the lightness values of the image.
If, later on, you want to change the intensity of the filter, you can do it two ways: either double-click on the filter's name in the Layers palette and reduce the Amount in the Smart Sharpen filter's dialog box, or use this Blending Options dialog box to reduce the opacity of the filter. I like the latter as a quick and easy way to adjust the intensity of the filter.
Step 7:
Finally, delete the new layer that you created, Layer 1 with the white fill, by dragging that layer to the trash can icon at the bottom of the Layers palette, and save your file.An Action turns this technique into a one-click button, and you can download the action from my web site here.
Steve Weinrebe:
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Photography © Steve Weinrebe, Getty Images
