Super Resolution in LR: Pix of honeybee taken with SONY A7r4, 18-135 mm lens at 135 mm. ISO 320, 1/500, f 7.1, cropped in LR. No sharpening other than standard LR output on RAW file.

hjkarten Loc: San Diego, California

Pix of honeybee taken with SONY A7r4, 18-135 mm lens at 135 mm.
ISO 320, 1/500, f 7.1, cropped in LR. No sharpening other than standard LR output on RAW file. AWB.
Ran Super Resolution (Enhance) tool.
Had to send as JPG as file was too large in TIFF and DNG formats.
Not as crisp as with TIFF or DNG.
Shot either with Monopod or Handheld - didn't record that info.
Enhance function provides striking results.

(Download)

R.G. Loc: Scotland

To put this in context it would help if there was a before as well as the after shot.

hjkarten Loc: San Diego, California

R.G. wrote:

To put this in context it would help if there was a before as well as the after shot.

Right you are. I will try to post the before photo in the morning. I was having so many problems because of the large file size of the enhanced photo that I forgot to include the "Before".

hjkarten Loc: San Diego, California

R.G. wrote:

To put this in context it would help if there was a before as well as the after shot.

Right you are. I was having so much trouble posting the large original enhanced file that I failed to show the pre-enhanced version. Here is the original version.

(Download)

R.G. Loc: Scotland

hjkarten wrote:

Right you are. I was having so much trouble posting the large original enhanced file that I failed to show the pre-enhanced version. Here is the original version.

Thanks for posting. Comparing the two shows that the small hairs on the bee's body are clearer. I get the impression that's the macro photographer's dream.

hjkarten Loc: San Diego, California

As I stare at the two images, I am a bit hard pressed to see a big benefit of the Super Res mode, but perhaps our members have sharper vision than I do. What is your opinion?

R.G. Loc: Scotland

hjkarten wrote:

As I stare at the two images, I am a bit hard pressed to see a big benefit of the Super Res mode, but perhaps our members have sharper vision than I do. What is your opinion?

The enhanced version seems a bit brighter. Was that you or Lightroom? The small detail does seem to be slightly clearer - whether it's better or worse than basic sharpening is another issue. But what can't be argued with is the extra pixels. Presumably the enhanced version would continue to look sharp (and not pixelated) as you increase the print size.

hjkarten Loc: San Diego, California

Finally managed to grab a screen shot of the two images, side-by-side. The enhanced version is on the left.

(Download)

R.G. Loc: Scotland

hjkarten wrote:

Finally managed to grab a screen shot of the two images, side-by-side. The enhanced version is on the left.

The difference in fine detail is very slight. But the enhanced version has four times the pixels, so you could do more enlarging and/or cropping before softness and pixelation become a problem. Those are the main problems associated with enlarging.

hjkarten Loc: San Diego, California

Good eyes! In the process of trying to line up the two photos, I inadvertently changed the brightness and HSL values.
Many thanks for your helpful comments. I agree with your interpretation. The enhancement process does provide a bit sharper image, and is preferable to the results produced by using the Sharpening tool in LR. The sharpening tool often produces an artificial diffraction -like effect with fringes on sharp borders. For critical macro shots, I would probably prefer to use a proper Macro lens, such as the Sigma 105mm Macro. Considering that it was done with a relatively inexpensive APS-C lens, the results were OK. But other than telling users that it employs AI software, the Adobe staff don't inform us what the algorithm is actually doing (and I'm not sure I would undestand it, even if they did tell me!). The Super Resolution tool is included at no extra cost in the routine updates to LightRoom.

R.G. Loc: Scotland

hjkarten wrote:

...the Adobe staff don't inform us what the algorithm is actually doing....

The main problem with printing or viewing a large version of a photo is that the sharp edges may become pixelated. Just a straight multiplication of the pixels wouldn't avoid that problem, so enlargement software has to employ methods that help to keep the edges smooth. I suspect that the methods centre around interpolation, but it probably doesn't stop there.

R.G. Loc: Scotland

hjkarten wrote:

....The sharpening tool often produces an artificial diffraction -like effect with fringes on sharp borders.....

I've long suspected that the fringing you refer to (also referred to as haloing, or tight haloing to differentiate it from diffuse haloing) is caused by software sharpening at some point in the process. Even so-called raw files can suffer from it, which suggests that it's happening either in-camera or during raw conversion. When I started using NX Studio I noticed that in the case of raw files, sharpening was one of the things that are applied as a result of the Picture Control settings in the camera, and NX Studio gives the option of setting that sharpening to zero (under the Picture Control tab). I looked closely at the sort of sharpening that was being applied and it was indeed the sort of sharpening that produces tight haloing. I looked for the same effect in raw files converted by Lightroom and I didn't see it.

In the case of in-camera jpegs, I suspect that's the sort of sharpening that is applied to every jpeg, which is why jpegs tend to be more susceptible to tight haloing.

nimbushopper Loc: Tampa, FL

Architect1776 Loc: In my mind

hjkarten wrote:

Pix of honeybee taken with SONY A7r4, 18-135 mm lens at 135 mm.
ISO 320, 1/500, f 7.1, cropped in LR. No sharpening other than standard LR output on RAW file. AWB.
Ran Super Resolution (Enhance) tool.
Had to send as JPG as file was too large in TIFF and DNG formats.
Not as crisp as with TIFF or DNG.
Shot either with Monopod or Handheld - didn't record that info.
Enhance function provides striking results.

JRiepe Loc: Southern Illinois

Great shot.