Topaz Sharpening: I had an old copy of Topaz Sharpen AI (2021) and just sprung for Topaz Photo AI. Thought I'd see what the differences are. So I took a crop of an old photo that...

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

I had an old copy of Topaz Sharpen AI (2021) and just sprung for Topaz Photo AI. Thought I'd see what the differences are. So I took a crop of an old photo that wasn't too sharp and ran it through the programs. Created a blink gif to run through the three examples, 5 seconds each.

There are some UI differences. The Photo AI selects criteria automatically but you can change things a bit. One thing it did was increase the image size 4X so I turned that off. Both programs were run using the motion blur model which seems to make the hair sharper. The Photo AI program makes the skin smoother and the Sharpen AI makes the hair stand out more. The hair has more sharp highlights so it looks sharper in both programs, a bit more pronounced in the old Sharpen AI program than in the Photo AI.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Nice!!

Jimmy T Loc: Virginia

DirtFarmer wrote:

I had an old copy of Topaz Sharpen AI (2021) and j... (show quote)

Wow, I Love your "Show & Tell", it is Very Effective.

Thanks for sharing . . .
JimmyT Sends
Bravo Zulu

Edit:
For each category (Remove Noise, Sharpen, Recovering Face, Preserve Text, Adjust Lighting (Beta), Balance Color (Beta), found in Topaz Photo AI, there are many individual adjustments that can be made.
Most importantly, you may also select a specific portion of a pic using a Mask in auto, or a Brush (+/-), to manually direct the program's AI to attack.
Yes, for some, I know that I am stating the obvious.

DL Loc: St. Petersburg, Fl and Island Park, Idaho

Damn! Now there is something else I have to buy!

Delderby Loc: Derby UK

DirtFarmer wrote:

I had an old copy of Topaz Sharpen AI (2021) and j... (show quote)

I am having much trouble trying to download and install Topaz Sharpen AI. It seems to take several hours for download and install, which they do not warn about, and then there were problems installing, which meant aborting after wasting a couple of hours. My Toshiba laptop is otherwise fast and furious with plenty of ram and storage space. Please advise - how was your experience with download and install?

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

Delderby wrote:

I am having much trouble trying to download and install Topaz Sharpen AI. It seems to take several hours for download and install, which they do not warn about, and then there were problems installing, which meant aborting after wasting a couple of hours. My Toshiba laptop is otherwise fast and furious with plenty of ram and storage space. Please advise - how was your experience with download and install?

Sharpen AI was a couple years ago, but I don't recall any problems. Win10 laptop about 6 years old at the time. Showing its age now but no problem installing Topaz Photo AI.

Delderby Loc: Derby UK

DirtFarmer wrote:

Sharpen AI was a couple years ago, but I don't recall any problems. Win10 laptop about 6 years old at the time. Showing its age now but no problem installing Topaz Photo AI.

Thanks
Del

David Martin Loc: Cary, NC

Photo AI has face recognition and, in my experience, often produces a cartoon-like effect. Some details are over-sharpened, while other details -- for example, skin texture in your example -- are lost. Probably due to de-noising that Photo AI also does. The overall effect needs to be dialed back to create more realistic images.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Delderby wrote:

I am having much trouble trying to download and install Topaz Sharpen AI. It seems to take several hours for download and install, which they do not warn about, and then there were problems installing, which meant aborting after wasting a couple of hours. My Toshiba laptop is otherwise fast and furious with plenty of ram and storage space. Please advise - how was your experience with download and install?

Considering that Toshiba has not made consumer laptops in years (to my dismay), and last year I replaced a 12 year old Toshiba laptop, maybe the computer can't handle it?

Delderby Loc: Derby UK

Hi Longshaow
Thanks for input - yes, I hear you, but it has so far never failed me, and I have apps like Affinity that have caused no probs. I think that until a hardware component fails firmware and software should work ok. For what should be a straight forward download I am still blaming Topaz.
Thanks again, Del.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

Delderby wrote:

Hi Longshaow
Thanks for input - yes, I hear you, but it has so far never failed me, and I have apps like Affinity that have caused no probs. I think that until a hardware component fails firmware and software should work ok. For what should be a straight forward download I am still blaming Topaz.
Thanks again, Del.

Yes, quite possible.

SalvageDiver Loc: Huntington Beach CA

DirtFarmer wrote:

I had an old copy of Topaz Sharpen AI (2021) and j... (show quote)

I've been using the Topaz products for many years, going back to the early Topaz Denoise days. PhotoAI includes Face Recovery as one of the tools, which the older apps do not. If you just use the default settings, PhotoAI will reconstruct the face and sharpen it more than the surrounding scene. I've found that, in many cases, you need to manually reduce the Face Recovery strength to better match the overall scene. Both, SharpenAI and DenoiseAI are no longer being actively supported. While I still have SharpenAI and DenoiseAI active in PS along with PhotoAI, I find that I no longer revert back to the older versions. I now use PhotoAI exclusively, but I rarely rely on just the default settings. Each image is unique and the amount of correction is also unique.

Jimmy T Loc: Virginia

SalvageDiver wrote:

I've been using the Topaz products for many years,... (show quote)

tcthome Loc: NJ

SuperflyTNT Loc: Manassas VA

I’d like to see it on a full face image, but from what I can see the Sharpen image still has a lot of noise and the Photo AI image has way too much smoothing. In my experience, if I’m using those products on a portrait I usually restrict sharpening to the eyes. Sharpening is not friendly to skin, especially when shooting older folks.