I'm pretty new to this forum, but I did a search for this on here and came up with ZERO, but I may have searched wrongly...
I'm wondering if sharpen your images for web before you post your wedding pics on here for critiques and show and tell ??
I have a couple of actions that have sharpen slightly for web and Ultra sharpen for web...I'm not sure what I should use, if I need to use it, when I need to use it.
Also do you reccommend sharpening EVERYthing for printing? Or just what you think needs it?
Thanks in advance...I've got a kabillion other questions/situations I'd like opinions on... but it'll take me a year to get through them.
Sharpening images for web is cool because when you down res images they loose sharpness. We do a simple smart sharpen in Photoshop at about 20%. Just a little bit to clear it back to where it was.
Any other sharpening is totally preference. A lot of photographers seem to sharpen as a look (which is not the best because it can look trendy and will be dated in not too long). A good lens will produce very sharp images and does not need sharpening. You can crisp them up a little, but I would not sharpen too much to stay out of the trend. This shot is not sharpened except for the web a little bit.
Zach is absolutely correct. When you good glass you don't really need to sharpen much for prints. However when you downsize for the web you should a little. I found out the hard way when I started using "L" glass. I sharpened like I did in the past and had a few albums made. That cost me a couple hundred dollars to have corrections made to the prints since I had the binder do the printing for me
I use an action to resize for web that resizes to 900px wide and then sharpens about 130/.80... You can look at any wedding photo on my website to see the results of this action. Sharpening for print is entirely different and depends on the resolution of the file, the quality of the capture, and the subject matter.
Cordell, I am having an album made and I too shoot L glass. Are you saying I should not sharpen my images at all? What effect will it have if I sharpen / don't sharpen them?
When using the "image size" window under the "image" menu in photoshop, there is a pretty neat function that aids in sharpening a photo when reducing size. Look at the very bottom drop down and choose "bicubic sharper (best for reduction)." This works well for me.
brandonwong wrote:
Cordell, I am having an album made and I too shoot L glass. Are you saying I should not sharpen my images at all? What effect will it have if I sharpen / don't sharpen them?
Not exactly. It took me a few tries but I discovered later (after I started using more L glass) that I had to reduce the amount of sharpening by half or more. I would suggest getting a few prints made before going forward with the album if you have a binding company print and bind for you. I get my albums from ZookBinders and they do the printing and binding for me. I have had a few books I had to have "repaird"; although I think they should have clearly seen that the damn prints were awful (way too much sharpening). Yes, it was my doing but why not make a simple phone call to give me a heads up Heck, they made a call to me to ask if I wanted to add on a product before!
Heck, they made a call to me to ask if I wanted to add on a product before!