STEP BY STEP SHARPEN UP WORKFLOWS

Understand sharpening workflow and learn how to round-trip images with Lightroom and Photoshop

01 PREPARE THE VIEW

Get the shot into Lightroom Classic, then go to the Develop Module. After making some tweaks in the Basic panel, go to the Detail panel. Click the Before/ After view at bottom left, then zoom in close to the image. A 100% view is best for judging sharpening.

02 APPLY CAPTURE SHARPENING

Begin in the Detail panel by upping the Sharpening Amount. Next, Adjust the Radius, which sets the distance from edges in which the sharpening occurs. A low radius is usually better for high-frequency detail like the lizard skin. We’ve set Amount 90, Radius 0.9.

03 SET DETAIL AND MASKING

The Sharpening Detail slider controls how much fine edges are sharpened. High amounts can amplify noise. Masking lets us correct this. Hold Alt and drag Masking for a black and white view. Softer bits show in black as you drag and are masked from sharpening.

04 FIX THE NOISE

We could reduce noise using the sliders in the Detail panel, but we only want to correct the softer areas, so selective adjustments may be better. Get the Adjustment Brush, check Auto Mask, set Noise to 80 and paint the blurred areas to reduce noise.

05 ROUND-TRIP WITH PHOTOSHOP

Next, take the image into Photoshop for retouching. Right-click the shot and ‘Edit in Photoshop’, choose ‘Edit a Copy with Lightroom Adjustments’, hit OK. In Photoshop, use the Patch tool to remove the leaf by the lizard’s head, close the image to go to Lightroom.

06 FINAL OUTPUT SHARPENING

Finally, export the image for a print size and use Output Sharpening. Go File>export, set Image Format to JPEG. In Image Sizing check Resize to fit: Long Edge, set 18cm at 300 pixels per inch. In Output Sharpening pick Sharpen for Matte Paper, Amount Standard and hit OK.