Increase Blur to Sharpen Better?

With all the sharpening techniques available to you in Photoshop, sometimes, it can be hard to find the right one for you to use. And I am always amazed when someone finds a new way of doing something that we all thought we understood.

If you have ever thought that your Photoshop sharpening skills could use a little clever hacking or if you thought you knew everything there was to know about sharpening, watching this video is sure to enlighten you as it did me.

In this video by everyone's favorite Adobe hack-smith, Unmesh Dinda of PIXImperfect describes how global blurring coupled with blend modes can actually be more advantageous at sharpening than some of the more traditional methods like high-pass and others that you might already be familiar with. As a bonus, he also includes a free action in the video description to help speed you along in your processing. Without sounding like too much of a PIXImperfect fanboy, I honestly enjoy how polished his tutorials are and how the explanations of the techniques he describes are so fluid and engaging. 

Just when I thought I understood how to best sharpen my images with the handful of techniques I know, along comes this tutorial, and now, I have to rethink my whole process. I especially like the way this method enhances more of the details where the high-pass filter method would be lacking. And although this technique isn’t perfect for every situation, it is definitely worth playing around with. You’ll be surprised by the results.

Scott Donschikowski's picture

Scott Donschikowski is a professional photographer and educator with over 11 years of experience leading a variety of photo workshops around the world. He specializes mainly in landscape, wildlife, and astrophotography. He is also active on YouTube where he makes tutorials sharing his photographic knowledge.

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2 Comments

Brilliant! I made an action with these steps so that I can run it when needed. I don't go into Photoshop often anymore, so, for me, it's good to have a few of these special tricks handy as actions.

Nice Marinos! I did it to, I dont like using Photoshop when I can avoid it, so any quick action is totally worth it.