Higher Image Quality

Step 1 - Increasing image quality

Before I start, I'm going to tell you this is a very, very, very easy tutorial. It's not that hard to do, but it's very useful in many cases when designing. All i'll be showing is how to sharpen a layer and then add more depth to it. Also, i added a small bonus step on how to make a neat effect.

Step 2 - Original Picture

Easy step, go find the image that you want to practice on or just take one of your own pictures outside. As you can see, the image above is pretty good quality. Don't find some crummy picture and try to prove me wrong with this tutorial. Once you got your image, move onto the next step. Also, resizing it down about 100 pixels or more will also have a small increase of quality.

Step 3 - Adding some depth

First we need some kind of contrast / brightness added to it without doing all those other options. Duplicate the current layer you have and go to Filter > Sharpen > Sharpen. Now go to the layer's blending options and change it from Normal to Overlay. Also, change the opacity from 100% to 50%.

Step 4 - Finishing it off

It might look pretty good now with just that one sharpen and blending options, but how about we increase it even more?! Now go back to the original bottom layer and use the Filter > Sharpen > Sharpen. Now the image should look surperb like the one below. If it looks kinda pixelly and messed up, try lowering the opacity on the top layer or change the blending options.

Now follow onto the next step for a little neat trick i got after the high quality image.

Step 5 - Mosaic shut out

Alright, you got the image quality increase on the image, what next? Well, click the image to find out what the result will look like! Go back up to your overlaying layer and go to Filters > Pixelate > Mosaic. Change the cell size to 12. Now to finish it off, stay on that layer and go to Filter > Brush Strokes > Accented Edges. Now use the following settings:

Width: 1
Brightness: 45
Smoothness: 1

Now your finished, if it looks too bright, lower the opacity on the top layer that you just edited until it's fixed just right. Hope this tutorial will be used in the future and that it will help!

Congratulations, your finished! Here's a copy of the .psd file. Enjoy!