When shooting with high iso what is best filter then sharpen or sharpen then filter ?
Thanks for looking
Gaz

Originally Posted by gsgary When shooting with high iso what is best filter then sharpen or sharpen then filter ? Thanks for looking Gaz

Sharpen is always best at the end of your PP.

I filter for noise early after RAW conversion, and then sharpen late, just prior to printing typically.

Some folks filter early and then sharpen lightly before futher processing, and then finally sharpen for printing.

Thanks for your help

The theory behind this is that typical workflow tends to accentuate detail. "Filtering", by which I think you mean some sort of noise reduction and/or blurring, supresses unwanted detail and sharpening emphasizes desireable detailss. This implies that you want to get rid of the unwelcome details before your workflow makes the problem worse. And since sharpening requires some tuning by eye, it should come last so that subsequent moves don't throw off this tuning.

This is not a hard and fast rule. For example, I often sharpen the L channel in LAB and then convert to CMYK to make black channel changes. In this situtation, though, it's worth considering sharpening the black channel in CMYK instead of the L channel in LAB. Another example, I often use RGB curves for simple cast removal before anything else.