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Sharpening comparison

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areidjr said:
ozdean said:
I think Ben's might have the edge Al
--
Regards Dean - Capturing Creation
Click to expand...
I believe that it does have a slight edge. I've been accused of
oversharpening so I'm still unsure which is best.
Click to expand...
It can only be oversharpened if you think it is, not someone else. If you like the look you get then that is all that really matters, unless of course you are selling the photos and the person who wants to buy them thinks they are oversharpened, but that is a different story.
areidjr said:
I have actions for
both of them now so I can easily pick and choose.
--
Al

My Photo Gallery: http://photoweb.reid-home.com
Pentax Photo Gallery: http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/albertreid

Click to expand...
--
Lance B

Originator of the term 'LBA'.

http://www.pbase.com/lance_b
GMT +11hours

 
Edited Al because the variance between Kevins wasn't enough maybe should have been even 65-70%
Monitor is Dell 2408WFP Ultra Sharp
--
Regards Dean - Capturing Creation
 
Lance B said:
It can only be oversharpened if you think it is, not someone else.
If you like the look you get then that is all that really matters,
unless of course you are selling the photos and the person who wants
to buy them thinks they are oversharpened, but that is a different
story.
Click to expand...
I guess that's all true, but I think that the opinions of others are still valid. I like my photos better now that I've backed off on the sharpening a bit. I just don't want to swing too far back in the other direction.
Lance B said:
--
Lance B

Originator of the term 'LBA'.

http://www.pbase.com/lance_b
GMT +11hours

Click to expand...
--
Al

My Photo Gallery: http://photoweb.reid-home.com
Pentax Photo Gallery: http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/albertreid

 
Would rate Jocelyn's same as Kevin's at 90% from what I see here.

Please note this is what I am seeing here at these reduced file sizes, full size files could be different, sometimes downsampling can do funny things
--
Regards Dean - Capturing Creation
 
Now this is really interesting, the head feathers of your image are more distinct than Jocelyn's Al but it is the other way round with the breast feathers.

You know we have to remember that Kevin & Jocelyn didn't have the original file to work from did they?
--
Regards Dean - Capturing Creation
 
ozdean said:
Now this is really interesting, the head feathers of your image are
more distinct than Jocelyn's Al but it is the other way round with
the breast feathers.
You know we have to remember that Kevin & Jocelyn didn't have the
original file to work from did they?
--
Regards Dean - Capturing Creation
Click to expand...
Keven worked from the posted image and I did Jocelyn's myself from the original Raw file. I have Kevin's method so I guess I could run it and add it to the comparison.

--
Al

My Photo Gallery: http://photoweb.reid-home.com
Pentax Photo Gallery: http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/albertreid

 
Well, I guess I'll have to be the first to say that I think all of the sharpened images are a touch overdone. On my monitor, an uncalibrated but very colour accurate Samsung Syncmaster 740n, I see pixellation in the fine feathers. Could also be jpeg artifacts but there's something there that puts me off. I used to consistently oversharpen images when processing and I finally realized that I liked them better with less.

In the end, as said earlier, it's largely a matter of personal preference, at least for those of us who shoot for ourselves. Some photogs will have customers or bosses to satisfy but the rest of us can do as we please. Still, I like to present images that most people will like right off the bat...
--
Too many subjects, not enough time...

http://lkeithr.zenfolio.com
 
LKeithR said:
Well, I guess I'll have to be the first to say that I think all of
the sharpened images are a touch overdone. On my monitor, an
uncalibrated but very colour accurate Samsung Syncmaster 740n, I see
pixellation in the fine feathers. Could also be jpeg artifacts but
there's something there that puts me off. I used to consistently
oversharpen images when processing and I finally realized that I
liked them better with less.

In the end, as said earlier, it's largely a matter of personal
preference, at least for those of us who shoot for ourselves. Some
photogs will have customers or bosses to satisfy but the rest of us
can do as we please. Still, I like to present images that most
people will like right off the bat...
--
Too many subjects, not enough time...

http://lkeithr.zenfolio.com
Click to expand...
Well, somebode had to say it. I'm surprised it took so long :o)
--
Al

My Photo Gallery: http://photoweb.reid-home.com
Pentax Photo Gallery: http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/albertreid

 
Final results IMO here in Aus
Raw 70%
Al 95%
Ben 100%
Jocelyn 92%
Kev K 90%
Kev L 88%
No correspondence will be entered into LOL
But who am I to judge, I shoot Jpeg.
--
Regards Dean - Capturing Creation
 
I change my sharpening based on the subject, for airliners.net it has to be sharp but there can be no sign of sharpening artifacts, halos, jaggies or stuff like that, for macros i do i stronger sharpening to make sure all the detail is accounted for, if its a tight crop its hard to sharpen too much without it looking over-sharp and it also depends on the noise, on people you want find detail to be sharp but you don't want halos around the body edges... for your bird either of the 2 look fine, do whatever you can to make sure halos and jaggies don't exist as they ruin images IMO... unless its meant as art.
--
Mike from Canada

'I like to think so far outside the box that it would require a telephoto lens just to see the box!' ~ 'My Quote :)'



http://www.airliners.net/search/photo.search?sort_order=views%20DESC&first_this_page=0&page_limit=121&&emailsearch=mighty_mike88%40hotmail.com&thumbnails=
 
What about Silkypix sharpening engine? How best to use Outline Emphasis, Detail Emphasis and False Outline Control? Can anyone do a comparison from a RAW file example?

--
Roger
 
I agree - they all get to pretty much the same place.

I think the approach to chose depends as much on the image at hand and personal choice as anything else. And, if the ultimate destination for the image is print, then i say sharpen like crazy as the dot gain on the paper will often take back quite a bit of the sharpening anyway.

Also - I think that one major difference between my approach and the others discussed has little to do with the sharpening values (even though they are different). That is, by sharpening on layers and using blending, layer masks and smart filters and actions, you get a rapid, non-destructive workflow that makes it easy to try out differing combinations. Indeed, you could use this approach with any variation of sequential sharpening techniques and get the benefits as long as the top layer was masked somehow only to those areas that need it.
areidjr said:
There are subtle difference apparent in each approach and I'm having
a hard time deciding which one I like the best. At a quick glance
there doesn't seem to be a drastic difference in any of them.
--
Al
Click to expand...
 
areidjr said:
The results are pretty similar. What do you think?

--
Al
Click to expand...
Al,

I see a significant difference between the first one and the other two.

Number three is just a smidge sharper than number two.

I like the sharper images better on a visual level. But if I had the ability to pick up any one of the birds (yes I know they are the same bird), I would pick up number one. Just something about the softer look attracts me on a touchy feely level.

The sharper images almost make the feathers seem like bristles when compared next to number one.

Kevin's second pass with sharpened eyes and beak while maintaining softer body is an appealing compromise for me.

That said it is a very nice image and I think any rendition would stand on its own.

Dave...
 
I should note that the K channel mask won't sharpen the feathers on the breast since CMYK images won't have anything in the K channel for white areas, and as such the entire breast area will be masked from the 500,1,8 USM.

This, of course, is exactly what you would want in a portrait or headshot. The K channel would block all sharpening from normal skin tones, but allow for aggressive sharpening of eyes, eyebrows, lashes, etc,.

The L channel on the other hand has more structure in the white areas, but it needs to be backed off with a levels command to allow for more detail to come through in this case.

One final thought - I think far too much about sharpening :-) I should get back to my taxes. Tax day in the US is coming up soon!
areidjr said:
Here I've added Kevin's 2 methods (2-pass USM L & K channels). Now
all of the comparisons have been processed against the same Raw image.



How does Kevin's stack up now?
--
Al
Click to expand...
 
The wing feathers on the left side of the photos look coarse on the sharpened images and more natural on the original.

Greg
 
LKeithR said:
Well, I guess I'll have to be the first to say that I think all of
the sharpened images are a touch overdone. On my monitor, an
uncalibrated but very colour accurate Samsung Syncmaster 740n, I see
pixellation in the fine feathers. Could also be jpeg artifacts but
there's something there that puts me off. I used to consistently
oversharpen images when processing and I finally realized that I
liked them better with less.

In the end, as said earlier, it's largely a matter of personal
preference, at least for those of us who shoot for ourselves. Some
photogs will have customers or bosses to satisfy but the rest of us
can do as we please. Still, I like to present images that most
people will like right off the bat...
--
Too many subjects, not enough time...

http://lkeithr.zenfolio.com
Click to expand...
Agreed completely!

Steve
--
artphoto
 
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