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There's a sharpening technique that's really gaining popularity that works especially well on images with lots of well-defined edges (such as buildings, cars, furniture, etc.). It's actually a layer technique combined with a filter, but it's very easy (and often very effective) to apply. Start by duplicating the Background layer of the image you want to sharpen by pressing Command-J (PC: Control-J). Then, go under the Filter menu, under Other, and choose High Pass. When the High Pass dialog appears, enter a Radius of 1.5 pixels (a good starting point) and click OK to apply the filter. It will change your image into a gray mess, but don't sweat it (yet). To bring the sharpening into your image, change the blend mode of this layer to Soft Light. The gray will disappear, and the edges of your image will appear sharper. You can also try the Hard Light mode to increase the sharpening effect. Still not enough? Make a copy of the layer for a multiplying effect. Is one copy not enough sharpening, but two are too much? You can control the sharpening amount in two ways: (1) Switch between Soft Light and Hard Light, or (2) lower the Opacity setting of the layer to dial in just the right amount of sharpening. |
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