You do have a choice, to an extent, of how far you want to go by varying the degree of sharpening. Had I been bothered about saving the shot I would have probably noticed that the default settings turned a lovely couple into a pair of zombies. I guess the difference is, I'm making those choices rather than the software.The example I'd posted was somewhat extreme - take a fuzzy noisy crop, accept all the defaults and see what happens. which is a little hypocritical in my case, since I'd not think twice about cloning out an unwanted element in a scene, removing dust spots or distant birds in the sky, etc. I do appreciate that Topaz allows me to try various AI models, and if I can add more Topaz tools to my kit during the next sale, I will do so. I am a neophyte when it comes to post processing beyond some small tweaks, so I have no bias towards "the way I've always done it". IT is great that we photographers get to put a bit of that AI to work for oursleves. The complexity of the problem is immense, but some of the solutions and enhancements made possible by well trained AI are very impressive. I am not an AI expert, but I have worked with a variety of AI specialists and I have attended quite a few presentations on the subject of using AI for image enhancement.
I'll have to find the original RAW of this image and run it through Topaz to see if the results are different. I do have an image I made using a K-1 and FA 77mm, and is the result of heavy cropping, but thankfully the K-1 allowed that without grain or noise, it's an image I am pleased with for sentimental reasons, though I am sure an impartial viewer would find some flaws. I need to use Topaz more in a wider variety of photos before I feel I've gotten the right sequence. This speaks to developing the proper workflow sequence when using the Topaz suite. That is also true if one takes an image and enlarges it using other methods. What I have seen is that Gigapixel will make a small flaw much more noticeable. Gigapixel AII have only limited experience with using Gigapixel AI so far, but in the image I posted about I did not see any artefacts in the image I enlarged.