Altering sharpness in a Canon 7D

[John D]

Originally Posted by Jim Ford

It's not just an 'opinion', it's a fact and an unavoidable consequence of the physics of digital image capture.

Jim

Exactly Jim, I cannot understand why so many insist that the use of 'software' is completely unnecessary and that they see it's use to be some kind of 'cheating'.
The quality of digital images would improve dramatically even if the 'software' was only used for adjusting the sharpness.

The point that Roger makes of course is also 100% correct. The image as taken has to include the required detail in the first place.

However I accept that sharpness to some degree is subjective. What appears really sharp to some may just not be to others. You just have to view images and comments on various websites and you can see this to be the case.

Digital editing is certainly a very interesting topic!

John D
Zenfolio | John's Wild World

[Jim Ford]

Originally Posted by John D

Exactly Jim, I cannot understand why so many insist that the use of 'software' is completely unnecessary and that they see it's use to be some kind of 'cheating'.

What they also don't understand is that sharpening was also chemically carried out when developing film, albeit 'transparently' (by which I mean automatically, without intervention by the person developing the film).

Patterson's 'Acutol' was one such developer:

Paterson 'Acu' Range

A quote from the above web page:

"Acutol is not a "Beutler" type developer, but like other developers designed for acutance Acutol has as part of its action the function of increasing "edge" sharpness by producing adjacency effects which heighten the contrast at the edge of fine detail."

Sound familiar? Yes, it's an ancestor of our digital so-called unsharp masking!

Jim