Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
Adjust Sharpness
The Unsharp Mask technique was around long before digital imaging, and a lot of people
(including the folks at Adobe) have been thinking that, in the computer age, there's
got
to be
a better way to sharpen. Happily, there is. The latest tool in the war on poor focus is Adjust
Sharpness. In Elements 13, this feature is completely new under the hood and it gives you
even more control over sharpening than you had in previous versions of Elements.
Unsharp Mask (described in the previous section) helps boost a photo's sharpness by using a
process something like reducing Gaussian blur (
Gaussian Blur: Drawing Attention to an Ob-
ject
). Problem is, Gaussian blurring is rarely the cause of a picture's poor focus, so there's
only so much Unsharp Mask can do. In real life, blurry photos are usually caused by one of
two things:
▪
Lens blur
. Your camera's prime focal point isn't directly over your subject, or your lens
isn't quite as sharp as you'd like it to be.
▪
Motion blur
. You moved the camera—or your subject moved—while you pressed the
shutter button.
Adjust Sharpness is as easy to use as Unsharp Mask, and it gives you settings to correct all
three kinds of blur—Gaussian, lens, and motion. And in Elements 13, you get some new set-
tings to help you sharpen your photos even more accurately.
When you first open the Adjust Sharpness dialog box, its settings are almost identical to
those of Unsharp Mask. It's the
extra
things Adjust Sharpness can do that make it a more
versatile feature. Here's how to use it:
1.
Make sure the layer you want to sharpen is the active layer
.
See
Chapter 6
if you need a refresher on layers.
2.
Go to Enhance
→
Adjust Sharpness
.
You can reach this menu item from either Expert mode or Quick Fix.
3.
In the Adjust Sharpness dialog box, tweak the various settings
.
As shown in
Figure 7-23
,
the dialog box gives you a decently sized preview. It's usu-
ally best to stick with 50 or 100 percent zoom (use the + and - buttons below the pre-
view to zoom) for the most accurate view. The other settings are explained in detail
after this list.
