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Smart Sharpen with Photoshop CS6 for Windows 7

Edited by Freya, priya, Eng

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Steps

Video: Smart Sharpen with Photoshop CS6 for Windows 7

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You're watching VisiHow. In this video, we're going to show you how to use Smart Sharpen on an image in Photoshop CS6 on Windows 7. As you can see, we already have an image open. You can either create a new document or open an existing one, which we can find out how to do in other videos available on this website.

Smart sharpen in Photoshop CS6.mp4-canvas40 447812.jpg

Steps

1
As we can see, our document will be in a tab along the top
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2
Then we should check our layers on the right-hand side, and ensure that we have selected the layer we want to be working with if we have more than one layer
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3
Then come up to "Filter" in the menu bar along the top of the screen
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4
Find "Sharpen", which is there in alphabetical order
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5
Then come down to "Smart Sharpen"
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6
It brings up a pop up window with a preview as well
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This is where we can smart sharpen, which focuses on the contrast areas, the highlight and the shadow. There is a "Basic" and an "Advanced" option. In this demonstration, we will just cover "Basic" for now. If we want "Advanced", that's when we can specify between the shadow and highlight as well.

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7
If we're looking for "Basic" make sure it's the one chosen on the left-hand side
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8
We can change the "Amount" by dragging the scroller to the right
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We can see it updates the preview.

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9
When we drag the scroller to the left, it softens the edges
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10
Alternatively, we can type a number in the box
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11
We can also change the "Radius"
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"1.0" is the default setting. If we go to the left, it's less.
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12
Of course, come to the right, and it's much more
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This can make a dramatic difference.
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13
Again, we can just type a number in
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14
We can also select the "Remove" scroll down menu if we want to remove one of the blurs, if that makes any difference to our image
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Sometimes it won't, and sometimes it will.
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15
We can go up to "Advanced" if we would like to specify between "Shadow" and "Highlights"
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16
The "Sharpen" tab is pretty much what we just did
.
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17
Then we have the "Shadow" tab
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18
Let's zoom out using the "-" on the left, below the image preview
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19
We can also zoom in with the "+" on the right
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20
We can also drag our image around if we want to see different areas
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21
In this image, we have some highlight
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22
We also have some shadow
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23
If we're in the "Shadow" tab, the "Fade Amount" can be increased or decreased by moving along the scroller
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Again, we can just type a number.
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24
There is also the "Tonal Width"
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25
Then, there is the "Radius"
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Depending on our image, these might make quite a bit of a difference. For image we're using in this demonstration, we can't see much of a difference happening. It's useful to experiment anyway.
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26
We will find the same settings under the "Highlights" tab, so adjust accordingly
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This will focus on sharpening within the highlights, or focusing the sharpening on the shadow instead. We can continue playing around with this until we're happy. Most likely, we're going to get a much more professional looking image if we use the "Advanced" settings.
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27
Once we're happy with our preview, click "OK" to apply it to the image
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28
Alternatively, we can press "Cancel" if we decide we don't want to change anything
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As we can see, it updates the canvas image.
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29
This is a VisiHow video, and we've just shown you how to use "Smart Sharpen" on Photoshop CS6 on Windows 7
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If you have any questions or comments, feel free to add them to the section below, and we'll do our best to get back to you.
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