Adjust image sharpness and blur

Zoom the document window to 100% to get an accurate view of the sharpening.

Choose Filter > Sharpen > Smart Sharpen.

Set the controls in the Sharpen tabs:

Sets the amount of sharpening. A higher value increases the contrast between edge pixels, giving the appearance of greater sharpness.

Determines the number of pixels surrounding the edge pixels affected by the sharpening. The greater the radius value, the wider the edge effects and the more obvious the sharpening.

(Photoshop only) Reduce unwanted noise while keeping important edges unaffected.

Sets the sharpening algorithm used to sharpen the image.

• Gaussian Blur is the method used by the Unsharp Mask filter.
• Lens Blur detects the edges and detail in an image, and provides finer sharpening of detail and reduced sharpening halos.
• Motion Blur attempts to reduce the effects of blur due to camera or subject movement. Set the Angle control if you choose Motion Blur.

Sets the direction of motion for the Motion Blur option of the Remove control.

The option gets enabled for use when you are using the legacy option (which dates from CS6) and processes the file slowly for more accurate removal of blurring.

Adjust sharpening of dark and light areas using in the Shadow and Highlight tabs. (Click the Advanced button to display the tabs). If the dark or light sharpening halos appear too strong you can reduce them with these controls, which are only available for 8‑bits and 16‑bits-per-channel images:

Adjusts the amount of sharpening in the highlights or shadows.

Controls the range of tones in the shadows or highlights that are modified. Move the slider to the left or right to decrease or increase the Tonal Width value. Smaller values restrict the adjustments to only the darker regions for shadow correction and only the lighter regions for highlight correction.

Controls the size of the area around each pixel that is used to determine whether a pixel is in the shadows or highlights. Moving the slider to the left specifies a smaller area, and moving it to the right specifies a larger area.

Click OK.

(Optional) If your image is multilayered, select the layer containing the image you want to sharpen. You can apply Unsharp Mask to only one layer at a time, even if layers are linked or grouped. You can merge the layers before applying the Unsharp Mask filter.

Choose Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask. Make sure that the Preview option is selected.

Although there is a preview window in the Unsharp Mask dialog box, it’s best to move the dialog box so you can preview the effects of the filter in the document window.

Drag the Radius slider or enter a value to determine the number of pixels surrounding the edge pixels that affect the sharpening. The greater the radius value, the wider the edge effects. And the wider the edge effects, the more obvious the sharpening.

The Radius value varies according to the subject matter, the size of the final reproduction, and the output method. For high-resolution images, a Radius value between 1 and 2 is recommended. A lower value sharpens only the edge pixels, whereas a higher value sharpens a wider band of pixels. This effect is much less noticeable in print than on‑screen, because a 2‑pixel radius represents a smaller area in a high-resolution printed image.

Drag the Amount slider or enter a value to determine how much to increase the contrast of pixels. For high-resolution printed images, an amount between 150% and 200% is usually recommended.

Drag the Threshold slider or enter a value to determine how different the sharpened pixels must be from the surrounding area before they are considered edge pixels and sharpened by the filter. For example, a threshold of 4 affects all pixels that have tonal values that differ by a value of 4 or more, on a scale of 0 to 255. So, if adjacent pixels have tonal values of 128 and 129, they are not affected. To avoid introducing noise or posterization (in images with flesh tones, for example), use an edge mask or try experimenting with Threshold values between 2 and 20. The default Threshold value (0) sharpens all pixels in the image.

With the image layer selected in the Layers panel, draw a selection.

Choose Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask. Adjust the options and click OK.

Only the selection is sharpened, leaving the rest of the image untouched.

Create a mask to apply sharpening selectively. There are many ways to create an edge mask. Use your favorite method, or try this one:

• Open the Channels panel and select the channel that displays the grayscale image with the greatest contrast in the document window. Often, this is the green or the red channel.

• Duplicate the selected channel.

• With the duplicate channel selected, choose Filter > Stylize > Find Edges.

• Choose Image > Adjustments > Invert to invert the image.

• With the inverted image still selected, choose Filter > Other > Maximum. Set the radius to a low number and click OK to thicken the edges and randomize the pixels.

• Choose Filter > Noise > Median. Set the radius to a low number and click OK. This averages the neighboring pixels.

• Choose Image > Adjustment > Levels and set the black point high to get rid of random pixels. If necessary, you can also paint with black to retouch the final edge mask.

• Choose Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur to feather the edges.

In the Channels panel, Ctrl-click (Windows) or Command-click (Mac OS) the duplicate channel to make the edge mask a selection.

In the Layers panel, select the image layer. Make sure that the selection is still visible on the image.

Choose Select > Inverse.

With the selection active on the image layer, choose Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask. Set the desired options and click OK.

To view your results, select the RGB channel in the Channels panel and deselect the selection in the image.

(Optional) Enable the graphics processor in Photoshop. Choose Edit (Windows) / Photoshop (macOS) > Preferences > Performance, the select Use Graphics Processor in the Preferences dialog.

Beginning with Photoshop 21.0 (November 2019 release), Lens Blur leverages your computer's graphics card to produce faster performance while applying the Lens Blur filters. In Photoshop 21.1 (February 2020 release), the Lens Blur algorithm has been further enhanced to achieve blurrier edges for foreground objects, brighter bokehs, and more realistic specular highlights.

Choose Filter > Blur > Lens Blur.

For Preview, choose one of the following options:

• Faster: Choose this option to generate quicker previews. 
• More Accurate: Choose this option to view the final version of the image. More Accurate previews take longer to generate.

For Depth Map, choose a channel from the Source menu - Transparency or Layer Mask. Select None if you do not have a channel with depth map source.

Drag the Blur Focal Distance slider to set the depth at which pixels are in focus. For example, if you set focal distance to 100, pixels at 1 and at 255 are completely blurred, and pixels closer to 100 are blurred less.

If you click in the preview image, the Blur Focal Distance slider changes to reflect the clicked location and brings the depth of the clicked location into focus.

To invert the selection or alpha channel you’re using as the depth map source, select Invert.

Choose an iris from the Shape menu. Drag the Blade Curvature slider to smoothen the edges of the iris, or drag the Rotation slider to rotate it.

To add more blur, drag the Radius slider.

For Specular Highlights, drag the Threshold slider to select a brightness cutoff; all pixels brighter than the cutoff value are treated as specular highlights.

To increase the brightness of the highlights, drag the Brightness slider.

To add noise to the image, use the Amount slider under the Noise section. Choose a noise distribution option -  Uniform or Gaussian. 

To add gray noise without affecting color, select Monochromatic. 

Click OK to apply the changes to your image.

Select the Blur tool .

Do the following in the options bar:

• Choose a brush tip and set options for the blending mode and strength in the options bar.

• Select Sample All Layers in the options bar to blur using data from all visible layers. Deselect this option and the tool uses data from only the active layer.

Drag over the part of the image you want to blur.

Select the Sharpen tool  . (If the tool isn’t visible, hold down the Blur  tool.)

Do the following in the options bar:

• Choose a brush tip and set options for the blending mode and strength.

• Select Sample All Layers to sharpen using data from all visible layers. If this is deselected, the tool uses data from only the active layer.

• Select Protect Detail to enhance details and minimize pixelated artifacts. Deselect this option if you want to produce more exaggerated sharpening effects.

Drag over the part of the image you want to sharpen.