Photoshop unsharp mask - Help !

[Beyblade]

Dear all, when u go to filter->unsharp mask, a window will pop up showing a seemingly magnified view of some part of the picture, and then u willbe able to input radius, etc, and when u click the preview, u will be able to see the effect of the sharpening. Right ? My problem is sometimes, that little window does NOT show anything ( just blank ! ), and the unsharp mask does not seem to have any effect at all, inspite of how I slide the values around ? I cannot understand why sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Can someone pls help ? Thank you.

[Gamut Labs]

Originally Posted by Beyblade Dear all, when u go to filter->unsharp mask, a window will pop up showing a seemingly magnified view of some part of the picture, and then u willbe able to input radius, etc, and when u click the preview, u will be able to see the effect of the sharpening. Right ? My problem is sometimes, that little window does NOT show anything ( just blank ! ), and the unsharp mask does not seem to have any effect at all, inspite of how I slide the values around ? I cannot understand why sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Can someone pls help ? Thank you.

More RAM usually helps.

Cheers,
nic

[tomcat]

Can it be that the magnified area is over a portion of the photo that has no objects? If so, just put the cursor in the window and drag to another portion.

[philliptan]

When you select USM, is the proper layer selected?

If you have used adjustment layers, you may have inadvertently left one adjustment layer selected instead of the main picture layer. Click on the layer with the main picture before running USM.

This should solve your problem.

[jOhO]

Originally Posted by philliptan When you select USM, is the proper layer selected? If you have used adjustment layers, you may have inadvertently left one adjustment layer selected instead of the main picture layer. Click on the layer with the main picture before running USM. This should solve your problem.

best advise so far, that would be my first guess. wrong layer.

[solarii]

Agreed. That's usually the case. Happen to me a couple of times... best way to avoid that is to always flatten before sharpening.

[~Arcanic~]

Originally Posted by philliptan When you select USM, is the proper layer selected? If you have used adjustment layers, you may have inadvertently left one adjustment layer selected instead of the main picture layer. Click on the layer with the main picture before running USM. This should solve your problem.

same as joho, when i first read the qn, thats the first guess that came to my mind too...

cos it happened to me before..

[theRBK]

always make sure correct layer is selected...if in doubt, use the "move" cursor, and alt-leftclick on the area you want to sharpen to select the layer...

yeah, sharpen, add noise, should preferably be done after the final crop or resize, just before output, on a flattened file...but sometimes, there is a need to sharpen before final crop

[wiz23]

Originally Posted by ~Arcanic~ same as joho, when i first read the qn, thats the first guess that came to my mind too... cos it happened to me before..

Yep, same thing came to my mind ... it happened to me as well

[photobum]

Mac: Option+click, PC: Right click to select the correct working layer.

And make sure you rename all layers. This way, you will not confuse.

[theRBK]

Originally Posted by photobum And make sure you rename all layers. This way, you will not confuse.

especially for very complex files...better still if you group related layers and minimise those you are not using at the moment in the layers window...makes for a neater screen environment and more efficient re-retouching in the future (won't forget which layer is what)