In-camera sharpening

[roddersdad]

Wonder if anyone could enlighten me with regards to the above,I 99% of the time shoot in raw,but am been told to do all the sharpening after i have tweeked the end product in say photoshop etc,as any sharpening done in camera at time of picture been taken tends not to be as good and possibly introduces problems,noise or whatever.

If this is the case should I then be really setting the factory setting in the picture styles for sharpening down to zero before I start,

many thanks in advance,Clive.

[Colin Southern]

Hi Clive,

I wrote a bit about this recently - you might like to have a read of this, and come back for more info afterwards?

[AlexB]

Clive,
If you are shooting in raw the in camera sharpening don't matter since they work only for jpg.
If you are talking about factory settings for the raw conversion program, is best to see the effect by yourself, instead of leaving some automatic setting on. There is three kinds of sharpening:
1-Sharpening for source- When you counteract the anti aliasing filter, is a very soft sharpening.
2-Sharpening for detail- When you sharpen to enhance the detail of your photos, thats is dependent of photo content.
3-Sharpening for output- This is the final sharpening and is dependent of the output that your photo will go.
best,
Alex

[Colin Southern]

If you are shooting in raw the in camera sharpening don't matter since they work only for jpg

It's possibly also worth mentioning that even when shooting RAW, the camera still creates and applies picture styles to an in-camera JPEG which is what's displayed on the review screen ...

... so altering parameters such as sharpness & saturation on the camera may give the appearance of making a difference, but as Alex said, the RAW file remains unaffected.

[larsjames]

I've referenced the linked sources for sharpening in this post and I didn't see any mention of using the Lightness channel in LAB Color mode to sharpen images in Photoshop. If this has been covered before, sorry for the redundancy.

1. Image menu > Mode > Lab Color (you'll be prompted to have your image flattened or not).

2. Channels palette: Turn off the A and B channels and select the Lightness channel; utilize USM to taste. The A and B channels are color information, the Lightness channel in simply monochromatic information.

3. By sharpening the Lightness channel, color artifacts via sharpening can be avoided as the color information is left untouched.

4. Convert back to RGB. This is a lossless conversion method, as opposed to converting RGB to CMYK.

[dennis campbell]

i use the nik filters ......graduated netutral density....and after go into tonal contrast ........works very well and keeps some of the agencies happy.....also so allows selective
focusing within the shot kinda like what andrew wyeth did with his water colors no lines ......with larger prints

[Colin Southern]

I've referenced the linked sources for sharpening in this post and I didn't see any mention of using the Lightness channel in LAB Color mode to sharpen images in Photoshop. If this has been covered before, sorry for the redundancy.

Hi Lars,

It's a technique that - personally - I like (I like to work in LAB colour anyway); I often find that I can get away with more agressive sharpening on problem images this way.

The downside for many though is the flattening of the image - so you either have to get the "L" channel sharpening out of the way early and then flick back to RGB, or go with LAB all the way if you want to retain the ability to tweak layers later on.

The "equivalent" in RGB mode is to use the "Fade Unsharp Mask" command with the control set to luminocity (or so I've been told - I don't use it personally).

[AlexB]

You can go to smart filters and set the blend mode to luminosity to acquire the same effect, or, after apply the filter in normal mode go to "edit" and change the blend mode to luminosity. Is easier than convert to lab.
Best,
Alex

[roddersdad]

Blimey this looks like an uphill struggle, but many thanks for all your replies and help, but I am sure that I will enjoy the journey getting there

Many thanks,

Clive.

[Geoff F]

The basic answer is quite easy. If you are editing your photos with suitable software before printing, leave the sharpness, saturation and colour adjustments at zero, even when shooting jpeg.

The difficult question is which is the best programme and method for editing.

[crisscross]

The basic answer is quite easy. If you are editing your photos with suitable software before printing, leave the sharpness, saturation and colour adjustments at zero, even when shooting jpeg.

The difficult question is which is the best programme and method for editing.

May be right for Canon, but disagree for Nikon. The best setting for general purpose seems to be Medium High, but if you know you want a soft effect on a whole shoot, set lower. It can be readjusted in processing .nef, but wastes time. Forget shooting jpg.

No question as to best prog for at least 75% of the work, Nikon Capture NX2. May need PS or PSE for clever stuff later, but I estimate that for me that means about 1 in 500 images.

If you have a Canon (or other) camera, as an alternative to the Adobe stuff and all those horrid numbers, try DxO for the early stages.