This is a particularly instructive and lucid discussion of sharpening, with a handy focus on the common problem of oversharpening. Coming from Robin, I didn't expect it to be anything less.
Helpful and clear as usual, Robin. For creative sharpening on landscapes I often use James Ritson’s suggested method of using a grouped stack of High Pass filters, with the filter radius setting increasing through the stack. As you note, with all sharpening methods there isn’t a definitive set of values to use, but I generally start with a stack of 3, 5 and 15 pixels (a lower value set may work better for lower amounts of sharpening) and check with both Overlay and Soft Light blending. Fine tuning can be done by turning of fthe highest radius adjustment, examining the result for the effect and tweaking, etc., etc. Often a two layer stack is sufficient. The results are pleasingly smooth, I find and a much better explanation with demonstration can be found in James’ video on the subjuct in the Affinity Photo channel.
Yes, this is a very old school method and is good for sharpening grainy film images as well. It's funny how the old methods keep cropping up again and again. I have another video that's scheduled for the future doing something similar to this with the Unsharp filter.
@ I’ll look forward to the new video, Robin, and thanks for the reply. Full disclosure, I’m definitely old school. In the 1980s when I started in photography autofocus lenses weren’t a thing, computers had only just acquired mice and Photoshop came on a stack of floppy disks that were loaded into ROM on the computers before launching the program.
Hi Robin, a great video, mate! I made a video about sharpening on my channel, some time ago, which matches quite well with some of your points. Especially in landscape scenes, wrong sharpening kills even the mood. And that's sad, as the right amount of sharpness and softness can even enhance the mood. And I completely agree with your point not trying to rescue a blurry image by sharpening it. Getting the image in focus out in the field is much better 😊 Thank you for the video and nice greetings, Christian
Thanks Christian, I appreciate your thoughts. I'm also pleased to see that you agree it's best to get the focus right in the field. You also have some great landscapes on your channel. Keep up the good work.
Very helpful, Robin! Very challenging issue for many of us. Software now can push sharpness very high, and at first, many think, wow, that looks so much better! (while more skilled editors say, no it doesn't!). I'm a work in progress in this area, but I have learned to watch for and avoid the halos, and also, if adding creative sharpening at all, to apply it to limited elements in an image where I want the viewer eye to go, not overall. A video on your preferred ways to handle slightly missed focus would also be helpful.
Thank you and I'm glad you found it helpful. As for slightly missed focus, the best solution is to shoot multiple images and keep checking. It's always better to get it right in camera. If there is no other option, something like Topaz Sharpen AI can usually fix things if they aren't too severe.
Use the Undo command in the Edit Menu. You can also press Cmd + Z on a Mac keyboard which is Ctrl + Z on a Windows PC. You may find my introductory course videos on TH-cam helpful. Here's the first on in the series th-cam.com/video/RChxuWyjaYc/w-d-xo.html
@@RobinWhalleyHi there, I have tried to undo the image uploaded on the pretest but it doesn't work. What might be a problem? Or this doesn't work for images? I am using Window..
This is a particularly instructive and lucid discussion of sharpening, with a handy focus on the common problem of oversharpening. Coming from Robin, I didn't expect it to be anything less.
Thank you. I'm glad that you liked it.
Helpful and clear as usual, Robin. For creative sharpening on landscapes I often use James Ritson’s suggested method of using a grouped stack of High Pass filters, with the filter radius setting increasing through the stack.
As you note, with all sharpening methods there isn’t a definitive set of values to use, but I generally start with a stack of 3, 5 and 15 pixels (a lower value set may work better for lower amounts of sharpening) and check with both Overlay and Soft Light blending.
Fine tuning can be done by turning of fthe highest radius adjustment, examining the result for the effect and tweaking, etc., etc. Often a two layer stack is sufficient.
The results are pleasingly smooth, I find and a much better explanation with demonstration can be found in James’ video on the subjuct in the Affinity Photo channel.
Yes, this is a very old school method and is good for sharpening grainy film images as well. It's funny how the old methods keep cropping up again and again. I have another video that's scheduled for the future doing something similar to this with the Unsharp filter.
@ I’ll look forward to the new video, Robin, and thanks for the reply.
Full disclosure, I’m definitely old school. In the 1980s when I started in photography autofocus lenses weren’t a thing, computers had only just acquired mice and Photoshop came on a stack of floppy disks that were loaded into ROM on the computers before launching the program.
Hi Robin, a great video, mate! I made a video about sharpening on my channel, some time ago, which matches quite well with some of your points. Especially in landscape scenes, wrong sharpening kills even the mood. And that's sad, as the right amount of sharpness and softness can even enhance the mood. And I completely agree with your point not trying to rescue a blurry image by sharpening it. Getting the image in focus out in the field is much better 😊
Thank you for the video and nice greetings,
Christian
Thanks Christian, I appreciate your thoughts. I'm also pleased to see that you agree it's best to get the focus right in the field.
You also have some great landscapes on your channel. Keep up the good work.
Thanks for this.
Very clearly conveyed.
Glad it was helpful! Tnank you
Very helpful, Robin! Very challenging issue for many of us. Software now can push sharpness very high, and at first, many think, wow, that looks so much better! (while more skilled editors say, no it doesn't!). I'm a work in progress in this area, but I have learned to watch for and avoid the halos, and also, if adding creative sharpening at all, to apply it to limited elements in an image where I want the viewer eye to go, not overall. A video on your preferred ways to handle slightly missed focus would also be helpful.
Thank you and I'm glad you found it helpful. As for slightly missed focus, the best solution is to shoot multiple images and keep checking. It's always better to get it right in camera. If there is no other option, something like Topaz Sharpen AI can usually fix things if they aren't too severe.
Thanks so much. I was not aware of the 3 types of sharpening. Ah ha moment!
Thank yiu. I'm glad you had an Ah ha moment.
Hi Robin, I am new to Affinity photo. How to "undo"?.Thanks
Use the Undo command in the Edit Menu. You can also press Cmd + Z on a Mac keyboard which is Ctrl + Z on a Windows PC.
You may find my introductory course videos on TH-cam helpful. Here's the first on in the series th-cam.com/video/RChxuWyjaYc/w-d-xo.html
@@RobinWhalleyHi there, I have tried to undo the image uploaded on the pretest but it doesn't work. What might be a problem? Or this doesn't work for images?
I am using Window..