“Photo polish” a.k.a. local contrast enhancement July 3, 2007
Posted by tcbp in : Photography , add a commentThis is a neat trick where you “abuse” the unsharp mask tool in Photoshop to have a small sharpening effect (in other words contrast enhancement) over a large radius around object edges. The result is a subtle bump in edge contrast and if you don’t overdo it, no visible artifacts in the image. The most common misuse of this is an overapplication resulting in a halo around objects in the image.
The image on the right below is the difference image auto-leveled to show just what you get between the original image and an image with the local contrast enhancement applied. Nothing is happening in the broad uniform areas, like the sky, but the edges are affected.
The image on the left is the enhanced image. No CSI enhancement here, but as soon as someone figures out how to do that I’ll probably have something to say about it.
P.S. - If I catch anyone calling this photo polish I’ll beat you with my monopod (the tripod is carbon fiber, I don’t think it’s good for beating)