"Smart Sharpening" for Photoshop Elements

[Leah]

"Smart Sharpening" is a useful technique with a helpful tutorial for Photoshop users available at Luminous Landscape. This tutorial explores a variation of the technique suitable for use in Photoshop Elements 1. [details]

[Doug Nelson]

Excellent, Leah. Thanks.

I wish we had a ton more tutorials for Elements users (I think we kinda scare them sometimes, but just about everything translates).

[winwintoo]

Fantastic tutorial Leah!!

I probably won't upgrade to PScs, so the more I can learn the better.

Margaret

[wakeuptom]

Hi Leah, I like your tutorial for smart sharpening in Elements.

If I want to apply this technique to a luminosity channel only, where would "Split Luminosity" be inserted into the procedure?

Should I split luminosity on the original image, or on the duplicated background layer renamed "sharpen"?

Also, how do I position the layers? Does the edge mask go directly over the "sharpen" layer?

Thank you,

Tom

[Leah]

I'm not sure exactly what "Split Luminosity" does (although I presume it splits the luminosity... ).

But if you wanted to apply sharpening to Luminosity channel only you'd replace step 5 with whatever you need to do to end up with the original background image being the bottom layer ("Background") with a copy of the Luminosity channel as the "Sharpened" layer above that (I can think of several long-winded ways of doing this in Elements 1, but assume that "Split Luminosity" gives you a short-winded way), and with the Blending Mode of the "Sharpened" layer set to "Luminosity" (you wouldn't need a duplicate of the background layer in this case). Then proceed with step 6 as normal.

Technically speaking it doesn't matter where the edge mask layer goes, since you use it as a guide for selecting and working on parts the "Sharpened" layer and it doesn't itself get incorporated into the finished image. But so that you can see what you're doing in step 7 it's best to have it as the topmost layer.

[wakeuptom]

Hi Leah,

Thanks for the quick reply. "Split Luminosity" splits luminosity and color out into separate layers.

In the meantime I have done just what you said--I duplicated the luminosity layer instead of the background layer, renamed it "luminosity sharpened", and pulled the edge mask over as normal. I turned off the color layer so I could view the sharpening effect on the luminosity only. It seemed to work great on a scanned Kodachrome 200 image with a really grainy sky and a lot of rock and plant detail.

I used Richard's "reduce color noise" tool last to blur just the color element. Too bad it flattened my image--I'll do that as the first step next time to preserve all of my layers.

My final image has a much smoother sky, sharper details in the rocks, plants, and snow edges, and nice transitions between affected and unaffected areas.

I didn't pay attention to the blending mode so I better go back and change it to "luminosity" as you suggest.

I think I have found a great combination of noise reduction and sharpening tools, with plenty of flexibility in the adjustments, to work with most if not all of my scans.

Thank you again for the great tutorial!

Tom
www.coloradolight.com