Monday, February 21, 2011

Web Sharpening for Photoshop CS5 and Saving for the Web


Jamie Solorio Photography is now up and running!  Please stop by and see my latest work.

Okay, I have been having issues since I got CS5 with my web files.  In the past when I upload to the web I notice that I lose a lot of color and contrast from what I actually saw while editing my image in either Camera Raw or Photoshop.  Well, I came across a tutorial on I Heart Faces this has really helped my images.  I will just document what I have learned and how I sharpen my images for the web below:

1. Edit my image the way I want in Photoshop/Camera Raw

2. Re-size my image for the net by pressing (Alt + Control + i) and where it says 300 pixels/inch, change it to 72 pixels/inch.  This will make your image a lot smaller.

3. Next go to "Filter" and scroll down until you see "Sharpen" and click that, which brings a fly out that says "unsharp mask" click "unsharp mask".

4. In the dialog box type in these values Amount:200%, Radius:0.3, Threshold:0.  Now, per Scott Kelby of The Adobe Photoshop CS5 Book, which is where these values came from, the Amount slider can be pushed up all the way to 400% if you need more sharpening.

5. Now go to "File" and click on "Save for Web and Devices".  This brings up a dialog box and there you need to make sure that you have the tab clicked above your picture to either "Optimized" for the modified picture or to "2 UP" which is what I have mine set for.  I like to see the comparison of the original verses the web file.

6. In that same dialog box as step five, go to the right where it says "Presets" and you will be able to click down on "GIF" drop down box and select "JPEG".

7. Now click on the drop box below "JPEG" and click on "Maximum".

8. Now save your image to where you would like it for good.

I couldn't believe the difference between the old way I was doing this and the new way.  As I was doing some of my research for this web/sharpening issue of mine...I saw tons of other ways to do it.  This was the most simple, and for now that is what I am looking for.

8 comments:

  1. LOVE THIS. thank you so much for posting. i do some of these steps but not all. i can't wait to try it out on my next post!

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  2. Oh good! So glad that it might help! It really made a difference in my Flickr postings, they used to be so much lighter. Thanks for stopping by!

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  3. thanks for this! I am much more well-versed in Lightroom so on the rare occasion that I bring things into CS5, I export them back to LR3 where I have my export sharpening in place. Now that you've explained how to do it, hopefully I can skip that step :)

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  4. jamie, i know how frustrated you've been about this...so glad you were able to find a solution! thanks for sharing. :0)

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  5. would you believe i'm still in photoshop cs2? i have not had the money to upgrade... ughhh. in fact, i did not even purchase the version i have. it was given to me {legally} when i bought the used computer i have. i've worked in more recent versions, but that was at jobs i had. i miss having the latest, greatest version!

    i did know about the resizing for web and saving as a jpeg. but not the unsharp mask tip.

    i think i can still use that feature, even though i am in an ancient version.

    thanks for the tips! i'll have to try this out.

    looking forward to seeing you on picture inspiration!

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  6. So, I have tried it out and am some what happy with the results....so still on the search! REALLY annoying! Let me know if any of you happen to come across something that works better please! :) Thanks for your comments!

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  7. Love the tutorial. Love the photo even more. My favorite of late! (glad to see you at Picture Inspiration!) DebraP

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