Sharpness

The Sharpness stage controls fine detail and texture in your image. Push it one way to crisp up texture, or pull it the other way to gently soften the picture.

What it’s for

Use Sharpness late in the grade to add bite to footage that looks a touch soft, to bring out texture in skin, fabric, foliage and architectural detail, or to calm an image that feels overly crisp. It works by frequency separation: the image is split into a base layer — the broad structure of the picture — and a detail layer holding the fine variation, and the Amount slider enhances or reduces the detail layer only. The base layer is left untouched, so nothing gains unnecessary contrast and no halos appear; and because it operates on brightness alone, image colours are never affected. A little still goes a long way: small moves read clearly, large moves start to exaggerate texture.

Controls

Amount

A single slider that sets the strength and direction of the effect.

• Default: 0 (no change)
• Range: -1 to +1
• Positive values sharpen — the detail layer is enhanced: texture gains presence with no halos or colour shifts.
• Negative values soften — the detail layer is reduced: the picture softens while the base structure stays intact. A soften, not a blur.

At 0 the image passes through untouched, so the slider doubles as a quick A/B: drag away from centre to taste, snap back to compare.

tip

Sharpening amplifies whatever is already in the picture, including noise and compression artefacts. On grainy or heavily compressed clips, add sharpness sparingly and keep an eye on flat areas like skies and skin. If they start to crawl, ease the Amount back.

tip

For a soft, romantic or vintage feel, a small negative Amount diffuses harsh detail without blurring the whole frame. Pair it with a gentle bloom or grain elsewhere in your look for a filmic finish.

Resetting

Hover over the Amount row to reveal its reset control and return it to the default in one click. Sharpness is a static stage — the amount holds across the whole clip.