Portrait eye sharpening: readable, not radioactive
Eyes anchor portrait attention: gentle sharpening can restore iris rims and lash separation, but excess turns lashes into wire, injects noise into sclera, and paints fake micro-texture inside pupils. `sharpen-portrait-eyes` suits LinkedIn crops, event quick edits, and small web avatars—not a substitute for proper focus and lighting. If the file is only a few hundred pixels wide, sharpening just magnifies JPEG blocks; decide output size first. Unlike global deblur, local work lives or dies on mask edges—watch hairlines, spectacle rims, and lash roots for halos. Skin is sensitive to high-frequency boosts; overcooking kills subsurface softness and reads as cheap HDR. When batching one event, lock similar parameters but still sample across skin tones and lighting so one preset does not gray out deep skin edges or clip fair highlights. When clients ask for “natural,” a touch of softness often sells better than razor micro-contrast.
Portrait sharpening workflow
- In `sharpen-portrait-eyes`, decide whether the deliverable is a tiny avatar or a print bust—radius and strength scale with pixel pitch.
- Check lower lashes, lower lids, and inner spectacle rims for white outlines and zipper aliasing.
- A/B against the untouched master; if it “pops” at first glance but tires the eye in ten seconds, dial back.