Today were going to discuss a tool that many experienced landscape shooters consider the pound-for-pound champion of photographic accessories, and it's the dollar-for-dollar champ too. If your guess is the affordable polarizing filter, you just scored a knockout.
Yesterday we featured a straightforward guide to using Selective Exposure adjustments to get the light right in complicated images with a wide range of brightness levels throughout the frame. Today's tutorial from another image-editing expert demonstrates how to take a similar approach with Lightroom's powerful Selective Color tools.
Most beginning photographers are enthusiastic about their new creative pursuit, but sheer passion alone is not enough to get the job done. That's because practice, a firm understanding of the fundamentals, and appropriate gear are essential if one is to develop their skills.
Correct technique is essential for fast and precise focus, and sometimes it's necessary to give your camera some help. That's because if you focus on the wrong spot within the frame, all is lost before you snap the shutter—even if you use a high-end pro camera with a premium lens.
We regularly preach the importance of taking a selective, rather than a global, approach to processing your images. This simply means limiting your adjustments to specific portions of a scene that really need work, instead of making enhancements to the image as a whole.
The quick video below is one of those "I wish I knew this before" tutorials with a super-simple technique for enhancing photos in a way that's almost too good to believe. It works in both Lightroom and Photoshop, takes barely 10 minutes to learn, and you can start using it today.
Last week we posted an overview of making nighttime the right time for shooting after the sun drops below the horizon. That tutorial was designed for those new to the technique, and today we're following up with a deeper dive on one compelling aspect of this style of photography that's of particular interest to cityscape and street photographers.
Every so often we come across a Lightroom tutorial that reveals a quick trick that you absolutely shouldn't miss. In this case it's what one expert calls a "secret Lightroom feature that that can really supercharge your workflow." Best yet, it takes less than two minutes to explain and can dramatically enhance just about any image you capture.
Nailing exposure is a critical aspect of all genres of photography as you refine your skills, and this can be difficult when shooting outdoors under varied illumination. This is a particularly challenging task when the light is everchanging as clouds pass through a scene, or when subjects in motion move in and out of sunlight and shadow.
Object removal is one of the staples of editing images for simplicity and maximum impact. Maybe you want to eliminate the proverbial fence post emanating from a subject's head, or get rid of other equally distracting elements that detract from a shot.
Something magical tends to happen once the sun drops below the horizon: scenes that were dull and unimpressive during the day are often transformed into sparkling tableaus full of interesting light, vivid colors, and captivating reflections—while all the boring stuff disappears into the shadows.
Cropping images to refine composition is a no brainer, right? Well not exactly, because Photoshop's easy-to-use Crop tool provides more creative capabilities than you likely realize. You probably use this tool almost every time you process an image, so it's important to understand everything it can do.
Lightroom's recently updated Tone Curve is a powerful component of what Adobe enables you to achieve when processing photos. Unfortunately, this versatile tool is frequently avoided because some users find it rather intimidating.
Wouldn't it be nice to monetize the love of photography without quitting your day job? Even if you don't cash in big, a few easy sales here and there will help you afford upgrading your gear while receiving some well-earned recognition in the process.
Too many photographers make the mistake of restricting their workflow by employing global adjustments to edit their photos. The problem is that these enhancements affect the image as a whole—thereby greatly limiting the results they achieve. That's because certain areas within the frame often require one approach while others call for totally different enhancements to create photos with balanced exposures and realistic colors.