How to Sharpen in Lightroom
Adobe Lightroom is a powerful tool for image manipulation. It is designed to enhance a digital imaging workflow through simplicity and a new, user friendly interface. Using Lightroom for post processing of images speeds up the post processing workflow; it is designed with professional photographers in mind and caters to the common functions used in a post processing workflow, such as color balance, exposure, and the ever essential function of sharpening. There are several simple steps to using the Sharpening features in Adobe Lightroom.
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Instructions
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Open your image in Adobe Lightroom by going to "File," "Open," and selecting your image.
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Click the tab marked "Detail" to expand it. This will open the Sharpening menu, with the Sharpening, Noise Reduction, and Chromatic Aberration sliders visible.
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Adjust the slider marked "Strength." This tool manages the intensity of the sharpening, and can be quite a blunt instrument. Strength increases the contrast between neighboring areas of color on the photograph. This increases the definition of edges in the photograph--helping to separate the subject from the background, and intensifying the details of the photo. Strength must be set before the other tools are used, as they are based on the settings selected here.
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Adjust the "Radius" slider. This slider takes the contrast which was created in the strength slider and determines how far from the edges of objects this contrast will extend. The range of application is anywhere from .5 pixels to 3 pixels. Overadjustment of this setting can produce undesired areas of interference, known as artifacts.
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Adjust the "Detail" slider. This slider controls how much of the minute detail of the image will be sharpened, on a scale of 0 to 100. A lower setting will apply the sharpening to major edges only, where a setting of 100 will apply the detail to every edge. This may not be desirable in an image such as a portrait, as it can magnify the subject's imperfections.
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Adjust the "Masking" slider. By adjusting this setting, the photographer can determine which areas of the image will have sharpening applied and which will not. Adjust the slider, and then hold down the option/alt key to show a preview. This preview changes the image to black and white to show the areas which will be sharpened. Areas that appear in black in the preview will have no sharpening applied; areas which appear in white will be sharpened. The slider runs on a scale of 0 to 100, with 0 having the most areas sharpened and 100 having the most areas masked.
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