When soft proofing an image, it’s best to use a black background to surround both your working file and your reference image. In Photoshop, the only way to do this is to change the color of your desktop to black, and use the standard window mode to position your work and reference images side by side.

Here’s a cool Photoshop trick I learned from Jeff Schewe, for increasing contrast only in the midtones of an image. This adjustment really makes images POP!

1. Duplicate your main image layer.
2. Apply a Filter > Other > High Pass. Try starting with a radius of around 40.
3. Double click the layer to open the Layer Styles box. At the bottom of the first screen, look for the “Blend If…” sliders. For “This Layer”, move the black point to around 70, and the white point to around 200. Don’t change the settings for the Underlying Layer. Click OK to apply the layer style.
4. Adjust the opacity of the layer to taste.

You can fine tune this effect by adjusting the High Pass radius, the Blend If points, and the layer opacity.

Whether you’re using built-in sharpening tools or third-party sharpening solutions, you will get the best quality if you sharpen in several lesser amounts than if you do the full sharpening in one operation.

Try stacking layers of different sharpening effects for different areas of the images and adjusting transparency and layer blending modes to get perfect sharpening.