Selective sharpening to make pictures pop

1 Duplicate and blend

Open high_pass_before into Photoshop CC. Go to the Layers panel (Window>Layers) and hit Cmd/Ctrl+J to duplicate the ‘Background’ layer. Double-click the layer name of the duplicate and rename it ‘Sharpen’. Next right-click the layer and Convert to Smart Object.

3 Apply High Pass

Then go, Filter>Other >High Pass. Experiment with differing radius strengths, judging how they affect the details in the image. The right amount will depend on the resolution of your image and the subject matter. We’ve used a radius of 3.7 here. When you’re happy hit OK.

5 Use Focus Area

Highlight the ‘Background’ layer in the Layers panel then go to Select >Focus Area. Click the view drop-down and choose Overlay. Drag the In-focus range slider all the way to 0 and slowly slide to the right until the sharp parts of the image are selected. Once suitably sharp, click Ok.

2 Change to Overlay

Go to the Blend Mode drop-down at the top of the Layers panel and change it from Normal to Overlay. This increases contrast, but we’ll fix that. Next double-click the Zoom tool. This’ll jump your view to 100% (viewing 100% is better when judging sharpening strength).

4 Tweak the sharpening

The Smart Objects can edit the filter strength if needed. Click the eye icon to toggle the layer on and off and assess the effect. If you think it needs tweaking, doubleclick the Smart Filter attached to the layer to redo the High Pass radius settings. We increased it to 4.2.

6 Make a mask

Highlight the top layer, click the Add Layer Mask icon in the Layers panel to convert the selection to a layer mask. We can refine the area affected by painting on the layer mask. Grab the brush tool, press D then X to set the colour to black and paint to hide parts of the layer.