Depends on the pic. Try 55-5-5Don't wait for the Nikon D-whatever, have fun now!http://www.flickr.com/photos/j_wijnands/..

Stemcell wrote:.

I have Photoshop CS2 and rarely use the unsharped mask feature to"sharpen" my pleasure photographs. Are there some rules of thumbconcerning the settings for Amount %, Radius pixels and Thresholdlevels. I have tried to read about these settings but to my addled(read aging) brain they do not make much sense. I greatlyappreciate any help..

Stemcell.

Depends on the picture AND the camera, but more importantly the camera. Keep this in mind, in your program there is a preview function that gives real time viewing changes to the image. So you can make a setting and actually see in advance what the result will be..

Keep the image on screen as either 25, 50, or 100 percent or you will not see an accurate preview..

One example of how varied this can be:.

With my D1x, I use a radius of 1.5 to 2 and an amont of 80 to 120.

With my D2x these settings would produce garbage and noise, and I use a radius of 7.2 to 12 and an amount of 40..

With small thumbnails that I wish to display here, it might be .5 and an amount of 100..

The threshold setting is important depending on the image, not the camera..

There's a lot more about this subject and if I recall Steven Bingham, who posts here has a number of online tutorials..

Finally, even good settings might produce objectionable noise, and I use a good noise removal program as well..

Dave..

I read some advice once regarding USM and it seems to work alright for me..

DuplicateImage- change to lab modeopen up channels and select the lightness channelDo your USM adjustments on this layer and then change back to RGB mode.Can't remember my settings as I'm at work and don't have PS on this PC...

Simon 17 wrote:.

I read some advice once regarding USM and it seems to work alrightfor me..

DuplicateImage- change to lab modeopen up channels and select the lightness channelDo your USM adjustments on this layer and then change back to RGBmode.Can't remember my settings as I'm at work and don't have PS on thisPC..

That's from Steve Bingham..

Here's a link to his Photoshop tips page, which contains a link to his unsharp mask tutorial..

Http://www.dustylens.com/photoshop_tips.htm.

Dave..

Here's an article that I found very helpful, check it out at.

Http://www.creativepro.com/story/feature/11242.html..

I think there are two different approaches of using the USM..

First one works like Chato already mentioned above. Which means using higher radius and low amount values..

Personally, I found another approach to give me good results. Works like this: Radius from 0.2 to 0.6 pixel, amount 300-500 %, treshold 0 levels. To find an appropriate setting I start like this:.

1. First of all: set View to 100% (actual pixels).

2. Now start USM settings: set Amount to 500%.

3. Next is Radius: start with 0.1 and step up 0.1 wise. You'll see the difference easily due to the high amount of 500%. Often you'll recognize progress until 0.4 or 0.5 and after that no much change..

4. Have a look for the whole picture - if it looks a little artificial you may reduce radius (0.1 less) and the amount (set to 400%, 300% or even less)..

What I like with this approach: You see what you set. And you'll learn easily what USM does.regards, eric..