Nikon D300 Complete Manual page 417

switching back to RGB or CYMK mode (Adjust/Mode/RGB
or Adjust/Mode/CYMK). This method also tends to color shift
images, though not by as much as the regular method, as
Photoshop rounds pixel values during mode conversions. I've
seen some colors drift by 2 or 3 values (out of 256) making
this conversion. (For a fuller discussion of sharpening, see
http://www.bythom.com/sharpening.htm.)
Tip: In most recent versions of Photoshop, you can run your
Unsharp Mask filter as usual, then select Fade Unsharp
Mask from the Edit menu (select Luminosity in the Mode
pop-up) to achieve the same effect as the Color Lab
luminosity trick. This avoids the color shift.
It makes sense to use in-camera sharpening when you're
working under tight deadlines and know how the image is
likely to be rendered. For example, photographers shooting
on deadline for Web sites or newspapers often fall into this
category, and should probably select something between 3
and 6 for the sharpening setting, depending upon whether the
scene is normal contrast or low contrast, respectively). But be
careful if you venture above ISO 1600, as sharpening interacts
with noise and can create unusable images. Note also that
high levels of sharpening also tend to increase the size of
JPEG files, as sharpening increases detail that's difficult to
compress.
My recommendation for most users who aren't shooting on
deadline is that you set Sharpening to 0 when shooting with
a D300 in the JPEG or TIFF file format. This gives you slightly
unsharp images for direct view that can be re-sharpened as
necessary for other output formats. It also helps with masking
noise in the image (yes, even after you apply sharpening later
in post processing, the noise is better masked).
Tip: On the other hand, setting sharpening to a high value allows
you to use the camera's zoom review function to better
assess focus, and the high sharpening values aren't bad on
the D300 at the low ISO values. I'll often use a value of 7 or
higher when I'm trying to assess focus in the field.
Thom Hogan's Complete Guide to the Nikon D300
V1.02
Page 417