Increase profits by improving your digital imaging process

By Susan McIntyre

Problem: “Back when we shot film, all our shots were sharp. Now that we’ve switched to all-digital, our shots all look ‘soft’ or ‘unfocused.’ Do I have to give up sharp, crisp images?”

The Doctor’s Remedy: No, you don’t. But you do have to take steps to regain sharpness in your digital imaging process. Research has shown that the human eye doesn’t just passively capture an image on the rods and cones of the retina — our brains actually enhance the retina’s images by elevating all contrast differences. And that’s exactly what the strangely named “unsharp masking” function does in PhotoShop and other digital image processing programs.