sharpen using brush?

[bartonlew]

I have started to sharpen areas of my images where things are not very sharp, mindful that sharpening works best when a little is required - not a lot.  The question I have is, I have been converting the file to a smart object and using ACR filter - but there are 6 options for sharpening in the Sharpen filter.  I am only familair with Unsharp Mask.  What I would like to do is use a brush to apply sharpening, creating a kind of feather for the areas where I am sharpening and those where I am not.  Is this possible?  As far as I know, you can either sharpen an entire image or create a selection, which you would then turn into a smart object (or not) and sharpen the selection.  Is there a way to create a feather with the sharpening you apply, so there is not a hard line separating sharpened areas?  Thanks.  

[c.pfaffenbichler · Accepted solution]

You can use the Mask of the Smart Filter or use multipple instances of the Smart Object, apply different Filters/Settings and Layer Masks to them. 

[bartonlew]

Thank you.  Can you please share the steps of what you did in your screenshot?  I tried to figure it out, and turned my layer into a smart object.  Then I addded a mask.  Then I filled it with black, and painted with white to reveal pixels.  But this exposed pixels against a checkerboard.  So I saw that you had a white background layer and I added a Layer using Convert to Background.  This turned the checkerboard white.  What am I doing wrong?  Masks still trip me up a little (or a lot).  Thanks.  

[c.pfaffenbichler]

Duplicate the SO (cmd-J) before applying the Filter and Layer Mask. 

This works out if the SO covers the whole Canvas anyway, if the SO itself contains transparency there are other options. 

[bartonlew]

Awesome.  This is exactly what I was looking for.  Thank you.  

[bartonlew]

Follow up to the discussion from the other day:  I am trying to add another Smart Object Layer with Unmask-Sharpen Filter to refine my sharpening.  In the screenshot below, my Layer 0 Copy 2 has my initial, lesser shrpening for most of the left side and portion of the right middle side.  I copied the SO and bumped up the sharpen and started painting on the right side - but it's not showing up in the mask.  Any idea why?  Thank you.

[c.pfaffenbichler]

The Layer Masks of the two SO instances look pretty much identical; maybe fill the Layer Mask of the top one with black and start painting again. 

[bartonlew]

Thanks.  I'm not sure what I did here, but I tried again with a diffrent document; I created a duplicate SO and used a sharpen value of X; then I duped the bottom SO (without the filter/mask) and created another SO with a sharpen value of Y.  All worked well.  My assumption is that this is the right worklow - dupe subsequent SOs using other sharpen vlaues based on the bottom SO without the filter/mask; and it shouldn't matter the stacking order of the different SOs with different values.

[c.pfaffenbichler]

and it shouldn't matter the stacking order of the different SOs with different values.

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The Layer Stack positions do matter, the top Layer would cover the lower ones. 

[bartonlew]

Right, of course, thank you.  

[Stephen Marsh]

Another option is to use the history brush, however, for flexibility and a non-destructive workflow I prefer the smart object/smart filter + layer mask method as suggested by  c.pfaffenbichler.

P.S. I'd personally stay clear of the sharpen/blur tool.

Some basic info here:

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/adjusting-image-sharpness-blur.html