Defogging and USM

[Breezy]

How do you determine the #s that you use?
I know i have read many different #s and everyone says that no # works for everyone, so how do you determine where to start etc..?

[my3peas]

:) here, on tpf, they'll most likely call defog Local Contrast Enhancement.

I have 4 values for that

20/50/0
14/40/0
13/30/0
10/20/0

I mostly use 10/20/0 (thanks to someone here, but can't remember who), and sometimes 14/40/0. 20/50/0 is too strong.

I have them as actions and just play them. If I don't like it, I step backwards and choose another :) I shared the actions I made a while back. You can see them here:

http://www.texasphotoforum.com/forum...ht=USM+actions

[Breezy]

Thanks Christie, I just can't run actions in PSE3 :(
Do you only run it one time? Or do you "enhance" it one time and then sharpen it at the end?
My baby shoot didn't turn out as well as I had hoped and trying to pop a few just a bit. The baby was wide awake and then got cranky but since they live across the street she didn't bring a bottle, so I didn't get any of the "peaceful" shots :(

[Duffy Pratt]

There are three controls to play with. For the high radius, low amount sharpening you are talking about, the threshold will typically be very low. Try setting it to zero.

Now slide the Amount all the way to 500. The picture will look terrible, but you will only keep it there for a little bit. You want to see what size the radius halos are.

Now move the slider on the Radius. Move it as large as you can without losing critical detail. This will vary from picture to picture depending on how fine the detail is in the picture. For a sky that is almost like a gradient, you can tolerate a very high radius (maybe as high as 50 or more). For headshots, a lower radius will do, I typically will use something between 14 and 24. The key in a headshot is to prevent the halos from wiping out important facial details. A longer shot of people would use a smaller radius.

Once the radius is where you want it, dial back the amount to somewhere pretty low. It can go as low as 10 (uncommon for me), up to about 75 or so.

Play around with the sliders some and you will get a feel for what they do.

Duffy

[Breezy]

Thanks Duffy,
I was just wondering how some people use the same #s every time. I have played with them and sometimes they look ok and other times they don't lol.
I will keep playing