New Sharpening Toolkit

[gmitchel]

My new Photoshop sharpening action set makes it easy to obtain professional sharpening of your digital images.

It's free to all and include sophisticated sharpening features. I engineered this toolkit to include the best features of commercial sharpening tools, like Focal Blade and Photokit Sharpener. Features include:

• Sharpen with Highpass Filter or USM sharpening.
• Sharpen edges and surfaces separately (or either alone).
• Sharpen light and dark pixels separately.
• Generate masks using luminosity or color boundaries or a composite of the two.
• Brush in creative sharpening/blurring.
• Blend If settings protect against sharpening highlights and shadows.
• All sharpening is done non-destructively using layers.

Enjoy! Comments are welcome.

http://www.thelightsright.com/DigitalDarkroom/PhotoshopTools/TLRSharpeningToolkit.htm

Also feel free to download my new sharpening tutorial.

http://www.thelightsright.com/DigitalDarkroom/Tutorials/PutAFineEdgeOnYourSharpeningSkills.pdf

A learning gallery should go online this weekend. It will include walk-throughs of the features in the TLR Sharpening Toolkit.

Thanks to all the beta testers!

Cheers,

Mitch

[CyberDyneSystems]

Sounds great.. I'd like to try it.. but currently the Zip won't download?

I did get the .pdf for now.. :)

[slejhamer]

I downloaded the zip, no problem. Thanks Mitch!

Actually the workflow is already very similar to my own, but I've learned a couple of things. :wink:

I may turn off output sharpening in C1 and instead do it with the edge mask as recommended; that seems to make sense. From a workflow perspective this could easily be done in a batch on the processed TIFF folder, assuming one applies the same level of capture sharpening to all images.

The method of defining an "edge" based on color shows much promise. The old "find edges" technique was useful but incomplete. This will be a nice complement.

The other thing that's new for me is the "blend if" option, though I've seen something similar in "midtone sharpening" actions that are available.

All in all, this seems to be a very good all-in-one package that gives the best of many good sharpening techniques. Thank you for putting it together, along with the PDF!

[edmund]

I'd like to try this too - but cannot open the zip. Any clues??

[CyberDyneSystems]

It downloaded fine this time (in about half a second! :shock: )

And it "unzipped" just fine too..

Edmund, do you have a program installed that will "unzip" Zip files?

If so just right click on the Zip file and select "Extract" or whatever the program terminology happens to be.

[edmund]

CDS: I don't know if I've got something to unzip files :oops: I would have thought so but......
What should I do? Or where should I go to get something to unzip?

[CyberDyneSystems]

If you have WinXP it should be built in.. otherwise.. try "WinZip" which offers a free trial version..

[edmund]

yes, I've got XP pro..... still doesn't recognise the file...... :(

[gmitchel]

yes, I've got XP pro..... still doesn't recognise the file...... :(

You can try downloading it again. If that doesn't work, e-mail me or leave me a message via my Web site (you'll find both options on the Information pages), and I'll send it to you via e-mail.

Cheers,

Mitch

[gmitchel]

Wow! What a thoughtful reply, Slej.

The first step in the sharpening actions makes the appropriate mask. You can turn the step off. Run the appropriate mask action. Then use the same mask for some sort of batch action.

I often use both an edge mask and a surface mask with different settings during capture sharpening. Otherwise, I just use edge sharpening.

If you are going to do a round of output sharpening, you will get better results with edge sharpening focused on the middle tones during capture sharpening. I have no idea how sophisticated the sharpening is in C1. If you do use it, I suggest you do no further capture sharpening. That is your round of capture sharpening. ;)

I'm glad you find the ideas interesting. I hope you find the sharpening toolkit helpful. :)

Cheers,

Mitch


I downloaded the zip, no problem. Thanks Mitch!

Actually the workflow is already very similar to my own, but I've learned a couple of things. :wink:

I may turn off output sharpening in C1 and instead do it with the edge mask as recommended; that seems to make sense. From a workflow perspective this could easily be done in a batch on the processed TIFF folder, assuming one applies the same level of capture sharpening to all images.

The method of defining an "edge" based on color shows much promise. The old "find edges" technique was useful but incomplete. This will be a nice complement.

The other thing that's new for me is the "blend if" option, though I've seen something similar in "midtone sharpening" actions that are available.

All in all, this seems to be a very good all-in-one package that gives the best of many good sharpening techniques. Thank you for putting it together, along with the PDF!

[edmund]

pheww.... got it Mitch. Thanks. Looks really interesting. A lot of thought and work has gone into this. Kudos!

[gmitchel]

pheww.... got it Mitch. Thanks. Looks really interesting. A lot of thought and work has gone into this. Kudos!

I'm glad you were able to get it, Edmund. I hope you find the tutorial and the action set helpful.

Any questions or comments, just give me a yell!

Cheers,

Mitch

[maderito]

Thanks for a superb set of actions. I'm a great fan of Bruce Fraser's "two-pass" approach to sharpening. It's good to see some of his ideas combined with your skills and insights to produce a very flexible set of sharpening techniques. I've several of the actions and, so far, they run flawlessly.

I recently shifted my approach to sharpening based on reading many opinions on how to handle what you call "capture sharpening." The argument goes that the anti-aliasing filter in front of the CMOS sensor is a low-pass filter which predictably softens the captured image. To offset this in-camera softening, one can apply a low amount of USM (e.g. amount=150, r=0.3, threshold=0-2). For out-of-the-camera sharp images (excluding portraits and high-noise images) I find that I don't need to do any more shaprening until preparing the image for final printing. Do you have any thoughts on this very simple and time-saving approach?

Some images definitely benefit from "creative sharpening" with masks and selective editing. Images that require aggressive sharpening can be fined tuned by your implementation of "dual contour" and "blend-if" techniques to control the degree of lightening and darkening at edge boundaries. For these type of approaches, your actions are really indespensable.

The color edge mask is new to me. I like the approach - although the additional time/effort needs to be considered, especially during batch processing. As you note, the color mask edges overlap considerably with edges found more traditionally via the "find edges" filter.

I've enjoyed all your tutorials. Thanks. :)

[gmitchel]

Thanks for the kind and thoughtful feedback, Woody.

The anti-alising filter is part of the reason for softness. The resolution of CCD/CMOS imaging arrays is another. Bayer interpolation of RGB pixels is a third. Etc.

My thinking about three-pass sharpening owes a lot to Bruce Fraser. There's no doubt about that. I was skeptical about capture sharpening. Bruce's tutorials and his discussion along with Blattner in their book persuaded me to try it. Then I experimented.

How much benefit you will derive from capture sharpening will vary. Each digital device is different and different image details will also make for different experiences.

I'm not religious about sharpening philosophy. So, I suggest you choose one-, two-, or three-pass after some experimentation. Certainly, you need to consider your workflow. Mine is based on fine art production. So, I'm painstaking. But I sure recognize others need quicker and more automated solutions. The nice thing is that my sharpening actions should work well whether you use one pass or multiple passes.

You should feel free to modify them for automated work. As they are written, they assume someone is making individual decisions for each image. I left the call to generate masks at the beginning so you could automate stuff easier.

If you or anyone else does automate them and wants to share the technique, I'd be interested to see the result. We can even add the automated versions to my site with all due credit given to person who writes the automation code! ;)

Cheers,

Mitch

[gmitchel]

I added a second PS action set to the .ZIP file for my TLR Sharpening Toolkit. The new action set supports sharpening of monochrome images.

Enjoy! The new Learning Gallery is on the way!

Mitch

[samckitt]

Is there anything like this for PS Elements?

[gmitchel]

It's a good question. I wish I had a more positive answer.

The actions in my masking and sharpening action sets make wide use of layers and channels. So they are not compatible with PS Elements, which includes one but not the other or with PS7 and earlier because layers and selections are supported in 8-bits only.

Sorry. :(

The reason for making wide use of layers and channels, especially layers, is to work nondestructively on images.

Mitch

Is there anything like this for PS Elements?

[petermorell]

The CrispImage (http://www.softwhile.com/product_cipi.html) plug-in should work in Elements. The approach to sharpening is different, but I've had great results.

[gmitchel]

I added a Learning Gallery to my site today. It is a walk through for my sharpening action set.

http://www.thelightsright.com/DigitalDarkroom/LearningGalleries.htm

Enjoy!

Cheers,

Mitch

[PhotosGuy]

Mitch, Re: the "Learning Gallery"
Great info! I have some students who are still using PS 7 & can't afford to upgrade to CS soon. I wondered if you have any plans to post to the site previous PS 7 versions that they could use? I'm sure that a lot of people would be happy to see it.
Thanks either way.

[gmitchel]

I'm pleased you find the resources helpful. :)

I do not even have PS7 loaded anymore. If I was going to work with something other than PS CS, I'd do PS Elements. The problem is time and energy. There are so many topics I want to cover. And, since I give away my Photoshop knowledge, I have to keep my day job as a research professor and university administrator. ;)

The good news is that most of my PS CS resources will work in PS7, if you work with 8-bit images! The limiting factor for most is my preference to work non-destructively and use layers as much as possible.

I have no prejudice against PS7. It's really just a practical consideration. So much to do and limited time for it. ;)

Thanks again for the encouragement.

Best wishes to you and your students. Feel free to share any of the resources with them, including my new video tutorials.

Cheers,

Mitch