software question

kdotaylor

http://usa.novadevelopment.com/photofocus/?rs4=NO_US_EM_PF_STD_0115_BUY

Has anyone tried this? Is this even possible?

ziggy53

kdotaylor wrote: »

http://usa.novadevelopment.com/photofocus/?rs4=NO_US_EM_PF_STD_0115_BUY

Has anyone tried this? Is this even possible?

No, I have not tried this software. It looks to be mostly a deconvolution filter, probably similar to the "Smart Sharpen" filter in Photoshop and Focus Magic. (Focus Magic is arguably perhaps the gold standard deconvolution engine for photography.)

If you want to try some open source/freeware, I strongly suggest Raw Therapee and their "RL Deconvolution" sharpening. This advanced version of a "Richardson–Lucy deconvolution" algorithm works nicely on a modern multi-core, 64 bit computer with lots of RAM. Raw Therapee is also a great RAW processing software (which also processes other raster images) with some really awesome features like their noise reduction and sharpening suite and frequency based contrast capabilities.

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A common example of a "convolution" filter would be a "Gaussian Blur". A "deconvolution" filter attempts to undue or reverse a Gaussian blur.

Unfortunately, photographic images are 2-dimension representations and lack a spacial element (depth). Until camera manufacturers incorporate 3-dimensional data for the image (a "bump map", for instance), deconvolution filters will only work correctly with two dimensional subjects which fill the frame.

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The Lytro Light Field Digital Cameras are an exception in that they "do" record depth information and can literally refocus to any plane, or zone of planes, within the image data field. Unfortunately the Lytro cameras have not been well received (IMO) and they appear to be in financial difficulty with some sources claiming that Lytro will abandon still image products and possibly produce video acquisition products instead.

kdotaylor

Thanks, Ziggy.
I really had no idea that this sort of thing was available. Nice!