Should I how much sharpening Photoshop for beginners - a photo for the Internet?

What is Unsharp masking USM?

The most commonly used method of the sharpness of an image in Photoshop is to use the USM or unsharp mask filter. The Unsharp Mask filter has its roots in the traditional darkroom printing and involves increasing the contrast at the edges of the detail. On the other hand, this increase produced a perceived increase in sharpness.

How much USM should I use?

Before taking too much we just set up that it group no "one-stop" settings for all occasions. Many beginners think you can only an amount of USM for all images, but this is not usually possible. The amount of sharpening must be done on the basis of image.

Of course, if you regularly create images of the same basic size, for example for your Internet Gallery, you can find that a lot of focus works in most cases; for the size of the image! To determine the amount of USM required, it is best to consider how we want to use the image.

In the Internet

We change size for the Internet, where you show your picture on the screen, typically the image so that it produces a reasonable size on the computer monitor. For the screen display the 'resolution' of the image in the Photoshop image size dialog displayed is irrelevant (this is used only for the pressure); the only important information is the actual pixel dimension of the image. Now the most monitors are at a screen resolution of 96ppi (pixels per inch) and the most common are screens pixels 1024 x 768 or higher. So if you thumbnail half screen should make 768 screen 1024 x on one must be 612 pixels to the width. This would be a picture of something more than six inches wide on the screen to produce.

So, we our finished image size (and save you a copy!) to 612 pixels wide. Now we apply the USM. By viewing this image only on a computer screen, you can simply use your eyes to determine how much to raise is intended. Match the settings of USM visually verified with preview box. If you return halons to edges, you have gone too far!

This is easy, as you can see the result immediately, use only your judgment. If greater than 1024 x 768 the numbers adjust your screen size for your screen, because you absolutely no control over other people's screens have. Just keep thinking about how big you want the image appear ON SCREEN and pixel sizes (or 96ppi calculate screen inch) use to get there. All of this is dialogue for you in PS with the image size, so you need not the mathematics.

If you submit your photos to online libraries or for use on printed products you follow the guidelines of the particular site you sent to the images. Most commercial Web sites have very detailed help guide you.

As a result, you all should learn some simple tests, thinking about how much do you know about USM for Internet photos without or must use little. By the way, this is to know your Visual settings for your Internet-based photos!

Now on other features in Photoshop me and other like-minded folk, free of charge on Zone2Tone members learn by joining and after you get us kostenloses professional quality video tutorial.

Copyright (c) Les Meehan 2010.

Les Meehan is the author of seven books published digital photography and as a qualified teacher workshops taught for over 20 years.