How Can You Avoid Adding Visual Artifacts When Sharpening Your Images?

Texture Management Part 2: Selectively Using Sharpen, Midtone Detail, and LAB (using DaVinci Resolve)

In my previous Insight in this series, you learned about the concept of texture control & management.

In Part 2 of this series we start talking about node based color management and working on the L channel of the Lab color space. Our goal is to overcome the color artifacts created by RGB sharpening (a type of chromatic abberation).

Digging Deeper on L*a*b

Though briefly mentioned in this video, this is a point worth elaborating upon: Sharpening and manipulating textures on the L channel is a well established practice coming from still photography practices and dating back to the late 90’s-early 2000’s. Dan Margulis’s 2005 influential book “Photoshop LAB Color: The Canyon Conundrum and Other Adventures in the Most Powerful Colorspace”  (try to find a first edition 😉 ) helped entrench this technique.

Lab is an interesting color space – also known as CIELAB or L*a*b. It’s a perceptual color space (mimicking our visual system) and its gamut matches the entire gamut of human photopic (daylight) vision.