Strongly intensity‐dependent photobleaching was observed in polymethyl methacrylate films doped with acridine and irradiated by a KrF laser. The transmission of low intensity pulses (<2 MW/cm2) increased from <0.01% to 60% as the intensity of a single prior bleaching pulse increased from 3 to 4 MW/cm2. The implications of this result for image enhancement in excimer laser projection photolithography are discussed: features in the region of 0.2–0.3 &mgr;m may be printable by such techniques.