I’m very much a beginner at Raw Therapee. Ive watched a number of youtube tutorials and one of the interesting tips I learned was to select ‘Sharpen edges only’ when sharpening in the Details section. This seemed to work well with the first Raw image that I processed with Raw Therapee. However, ‘Sharpen edges only’ seems to be causing some issues with the second Raw file that I am working on right now. There are some details in the paintwork on a sign that turn soft and mushy when I select ‘Sharpen edges only.’ Also, the edges of the text on this sign go a little soft with this selection. And there is a noticeable loss of detail on the road behind the sign as it is softened too.
Out of curiosity, are there many people here who select ‘Sharpen edges only’ for every Raw image that you process? Or do you do it on a case by case basis (depending on the particular image?) One great thing about this option is that it significantly reduces noise. Though on the other hand, it seems to be very destructive on certain elements in some images. You end up losing a fair bit of detail.
I’m tempted to turn it off for this particular image I’m working on right now in order to preserve the fine details. However, turning this option off does introduce a ton of noise. Obviously, I could reduce some of that noise with the luminance slider but I know I can only do so much before I start losing detail again.
I don’t have much practice with that setting in RT , one thing to be sure is that you are assessing it at 100% only …at any other level of zoom you are not seeing the true impact of the setting…
@Eagle Welcome to the forum! If you are a beginner, the best way to learn is by reading RawPedia and join in on the #processing:playraw fun where you can examine others’ *.pp3 sidecar files to see what they do.
One thing to note is that many people use the dev version of RT because the release version is kind of out of date. You could start by telling us what version and system you are using and where you got RT.
Todd, I was zoomed in at 100%. I wouldn’t have been able to see the changes if I wasn’t.
Afre, I have read some of Rawpedia but not the whole thing. Though I’m not familiar with the #processing:playraw or sidecar files.
I had to download a rather old version of Raw Therapee because I’m using an old computer running 32bit, Windows 7. I think I probably downloaded it from the Raw Therapee site but I can’t recall exactly. I downloaded Raw Therapee 5.0-r1-gtk2 which is a 32bit version.
If there are ways of sharpening Raw images in Raw Therapee while preserving fine detail and without introducing huge amounts of noise, I’m open to suggestions.
I also use Adobe Lightroom for processing some of my Raw files. And with that particular software, I would use an amount of 50 for the sharpening and set Detail to 48. Obviously, there would have been some increase in noise sharpening in Lightroom but I don’t think it’s as severe as what I see when I turn off the ‘Sharpen only edges’ option in RT.
Since it is an older version, it is difficult to understand what your issues are. The main thing about RT and other open-source raw processors is you have to understand this article first: Eek! My Raw Photo Looks Different than the Camera JPEG. By default, the raw processors from this community (except for maybe Filmulator), unlike commercial software, do very little to beautify the image. What you see is closer what the camera sees on the inside of raw files. This is a different paradigm than your typical approach but allows for a wider breadth of options, at least for one who is skilled in raw image processing.
As such, I am guessing that the sharpening module does not in fact soften the textures. It just sharpens the edges around them. So, you actually need to work on the textures next with another module or other parameters… does that make sense to you?
Like I mentioned above, my previous experience with processing Raw files is with Adobe Lightroom 5.0 (which is also quite old now.) That’s what Ive been using for the past ten years or so with my Raw files. And as far as I’m aware, there’s no automatic settings or quick fixes with that software. I adjust everything manually until the image looks right to my eye.
The sharpening module in Raw Therapee is very clearly softening textures within my image. This is very apparent when I’m zoomed in 100%. It would be nice if this wasn’t the case. What you are suggesting in that this setting only sharpens the edges and leaves everything else intact sounds like a logical approach and it would be awesome if this was implemented in the software.
With the ‘Sharpen edges only’ option, there is a checkbox that can be ticked. When I’m zoomed in 100%, I can check and uncheck that checkbox repeatedly and the difference is very clear. When it’s checked, the edges are reasonably sharp but with a very slight amount of softening. Other areas of the image are soft and mushy with a lack of detail. When the box is unchecked, edges become crisper and fine detail is restored. There is also a significant increase in noise. I can go back and forth between checking and unchecking this box and the results are the same.
Well I guess there could be something odd with this old version of the software. I’ll do some screen captures of the changes I’m describing when I’m zoomed in 100% and try and post those.
There is another computer here which is more contemporary (a laptop that is running Windows 10, 64bit.) I could download the latest version on that and see if there’s a difference with the ‘Sharpen edges only’ option.
i think, this is the intended behaviour. I dont know the version you are using. In later versions,
under the checkbox activated there will appear two aditional sliders, called radius and edge-tolerance. With those you can do some fine tuning between either more details ore more softening.
Please post screenshots, and, of possible, the raw file so others can see if they experience the same.
Unfortunately, 5.0 is very old, so it there’s a bug, your only option will be to upgrade.
If you post the raw file, please add a note saying it’s released under a licence that allows others to modify it (so they can load it into their RawTherapee and change settings) and upload the results here (so you can see what they were able to achieve). Creative Commons — Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 is such a licence, I think.