With the development of digital image collections, comes the opportunity to capture and manipulate captured object information not previously available with photographic methods. With this advantage, however, come a host of choices beyond selection of image capture hardware, and acquisition software. In establishing imaging practice for a particular institution or project, it is important to understand the influence of the various choices on imaging performance. While this need is well understood for color management, it is less often considered in the capture of image detail. Captured image detail, and the related visual impression of image sharpness are commonly manipulated during image capture by image processing aimed at ‘sharpening’ the digital images. We propose an approach for sharpening management within the framework of existing ISO standards by use of the spatial frequency response (SFR) as referred to a known or implied SFR aim.