I've only been here for 4 years, so you would think I figured this out by now....
So I just realized that I've been resizing images in photoshop wrong. Normally I just go to Image size...change resolution to 72 and then sharpen.
Well CS3 has an image size option called Bicubic Sharper (Best for reductions). I switched to mode, changed resolution to 72 and put pixels to 800. But when I sharpened, the photos look a tad bit TOO SHARP. Does anyone else use the Bicubic Sharper(best for reductions)...and do you sharpen after you do so?
Bicubic Sharper (best for reductions) is not the same as Bicubic (best for gradients)
I tend to just use bicubic and then sharpen to taste for DPC, but I do use bicubic sharper for shrinking photos for print (and conversely bicubic smoother for enlarging photos).
So no one else uses this method of reducing. I'm afraid to enter a challenge because I know the comments are going to be "too sharp" (can you really have an image that is too sharp..ARGH!!!!)
When I am done processing, but before sharpening, I go to Image Size and make the longest side 800 pixels. I then sharpen as needed and use Save for Web keeping it just under 300 Kb.
(can you really have an image that is too sharp..ARGH!!!!)
Maybe not "too sharp" but you can definitely have a picture which is "oversharpened" to the extent that you get artifacts or halos at the detail edges. You can see some examples here.
