Sharp Edges on Reduced Images

[mongrel]

Hi All,
Being very new at PS I need some help.
I have an images which I have reduced down by 75 odd percent but I want to get sharper edges on it. I have played with it but am having no luck. Any assistance would be appreciated.

 

[Welles]

Hi mongrel

Welcome to the Photoshop and the forum. What version of Photoshop are you using? I ask because in PS CS (the latest version), when you use the Image Size... dialog, you have several options of the mathematic formulas (algorithms) used to resample the image as it is reduced in size. You might have wished to use Bicubic Sharper. (See image.)

Now if that isn't good enough, I'd suggest trying Filter > Sharpen > Sharpen Edges. While this isn't a particularly sharpening good choice in general, on this particular image it seemed to work well. You can always run the filter twice or more and then back up to a look you like by using the History palette.

Good Luck!

 

[mongrel]

Hi Welles,

Thanks for the reply.

I tried the sharpen edges bit but it looks worse than the original.
I am using PS V6.0

Could You Possibly attack it for me with CS ???

Mongrel

 

[Welles]

First lets try to accomplish your goal within the tools you have at hand. Try this, merge the visible layers. That will give you one layer with transparency still intact. If you flatten the image it will give it a white background.

Next duplicate the one layer which you have in your layers palette by dragging the layer onto the new layer 'button' at the bottom of the layers palette. On this new layer run Filter > Other > High Pass... When the dialog window comes up, try a setting of about 1 pixel. OK

Now you will see the top layer is mostly grey. Set the blend mode at the top of the layers palette for the layer on which you ran the High Pass filter to Overlay. That's it!

I suggested the Sharpen Edges originally because it seemed a tad easier. Here were the results I got when I tried it. Your original is on the left, the Sharpen Edges one is on the right. (I'm not showing a High Pass... image which is the way I'd normally do such a sharpening project.)

Good Luck!