HAL From United States of America, joined Jan 2002, 2467 posts, RR: 53 Posted (3 years 9 months 2 days 21 hours ago) and read 3049 times:
I've taken a look through this forum, and couldn't find anything related to this. Is there really a difference between sharpening the image before the size reduction vs. after? Which method do you use and why? Thanks for any input.
HAL
One smooth landing is skill. Two in a row is luck. Three in a row and someone is lying.
Clickhappy From United States of America, joined Sep 2001, 9444 posts, RR: 72 Reply 1, posted (3 years 9 months 2 days 21 hours ago) and read 3040 times:
AIRLINERS.NET CREW PHOTO SCREENER
HAL - sharpening is a topic that will draw many opinions - most of them different.
My workflow is very simple - sharpening is that last step I do before saving.
Aussie18 From Australia, joined Jun 2005, 1610 posts, RR: 10 Reply 2, posted (3 years 9 months 2 days 20 hours ago) and read 3028 times:
AIRLINERS.NET CREW PHOTO SCREENER
My method is to resize to 1600pixels and add 100% @ 0.2 USM than resize to final size ie 1024pixels and add the final amount of USM @ 0.2,touch up soft areas with some selective sharpening and erase noticable jaggies.
Sluger020889 From United States of America, joined Mar 2005, 456 posts, RR: 2 Reply 3, posted (3 years 9 months 2 days 19 hours ago) and read 3027 times:
Quoting Clickhappy (Reply 1): My workflow is very simple - sharpening is that last step I do before saving.
As is mine.
Joey
I would love to fly a cargo plane full of rubber dog shit out of Hong Kong!
Cpd From Australia, joined Jun 2008, 4879 posts, RR: 44 Reply 5, posted (3 years 9 months 2 days 19 hours ago) and read 3022 times:
Quoting Aussie18 (Reply 2): My method is to resize to 1600pixels and add 100% @ 0.2 USM than resize to final size ie 1024pixels and add the final amount of USM @ 0.2,touch up soft areas with some selective sharpening and erase noticable jaggies.
Cheers Mark.
I remember a book by Martin Evening (Photoshop CS3) who advocated using different radius settings for different MP class cameras. For 12mp, he advocated 0.4 radius (on the 100% size image - not the scaled down version), but otherwise mirrored your process.
What he also did - which I also have adopted is using masks on the sharpen layer (created using find-edges feature) to make sure that only edges were sharpened and nothing else. This is a superb method that can be very useful on images with complicated backgrounds, it is a speedy way to avoid needing to mask out the plane itself. You can use a similar idea and create a noise-reduction layer that avoids losing edge detail.
He also advocated setting the sharpen layer as a smart layer. This means that filters like the smart sharpen work more like layer adjustments and can be readily changed as needed. This I don't feel is so critical, but someone might consider it useful.
He also mentioned the high-pass filter / soft-light layer sharpening method too. I would actually suggest that all the methods are useful in different circumstances, and you use whichever method is most suitable for the image you have.
I personally don't like multi-pass sharpening - I've tended to use a similar method to Clickhappy and others, but sometimes in bad conditions there is no other way - you need to sharpen the image in stages to get the desired results.
GPHOTO From United Kingdom, joined Aug 2004, 818 posts, RR: 27 Reply 6, posted (3 years 9 months 2 days 19 hours ago) and read 3011 times:
AIRLINERS.NET CREW DATABASE EDITOR
Quoting Clickhappy (Reply 1): My workflow is very simple - sharpening is that last step I do before saving.
Same here. I've tried a few variations of when to sharpen, but this is the way I always return to. Sharpen last, using a layer.
Quoting Cpd (Reply 5): I remember a book by Martin Evening (Photoshop CS3) who advocated using different radius settings for different MP class cameras. For 12mp, he advocated 0.4 radius, but otherwise mirrored your process.
I recall when I moved from a 5 MP point-and-shoot to an 8 MP DSLR, I had to make significant changes to parts of my workflow. The reduction in the need for noise reduction was very welcome, but it was quite a while before I found a satisfactory group of settings for sharpening. My old settings produced images that were too soft. I tried increasing the amount of sharpening , but ultimately I also had to adjust the radius setting as well.
Jid From Barbados, joined Dec 2004, 960 posts, RR: 35 Reply 7, posted (3 years 9 months 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 2995 times:
HAL you have to remember that as part of the re-sizing process your graphic package will apply some form of sharpening. So unless you have a really soft image to start off with do your sharpening at the end of your workflow.
Jid
G7EPN is back after 15 years! Operating all Bands 80mtrs -> 70cms QRZ DX
Sponsor Message: 
From United States of America, joined Jan 2002, 2467 posts, 
From Australia, joined Jun 2005, 1610 posts, 
From Colombia, joined Sep 2004, 1753 posts, 
From United Kingdom, joined Aug 2004, 818 posts, 
From Barbados, joined Dec 2004, 960 posts, 
Printer friendly format 
