Lightroom CC Tutorial 2019 2 PDF

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Adobe Lightroom CC Tutorial

G ET T I N G S T ART ED Adobe Lightroom CC is a photo editing program which can be used to manipulate and edit large quantities of photos at once. It has great exporting and metadata features and is an industry standard in professional photography editing.

T ABL E O F C O N T EN T S In this tutorial, you will learn the following: 1. Getting Started

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2. Creating a New Catalog

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3. Library

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4. Importing

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5. Metadata

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6. Develop

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7. Develop Tools

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8. Developing Panels

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9. Basic Correction

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10. Tone Curve

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11. Hue Saturation Luminance (HSL)

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12. Detail

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13. Effects

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14. Presets

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15. Watermarks

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16. Exporting

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1 . G ET T I N G S T ART ED 1. Begin by opening Adobe Lightroom Classic CC. On a PC, click Start > Programs > Adobe > Lightroom Classic CC , or click on the Lightroom short cut on the desktop.

On a Mac, click Macintosh HD > Applications > Adobe Lightroom Classic CC , or click the Lightroom icon in the Dock. (Figure 1)

Figure 1. Navigation to Lightroom Classic CC on a Mac.

2 . C REAT I N G A N EW C AT AL O G Every time you start a new project, you can create a new catalog which will hold all of your photos and

files for that project. You can later optimize each catalog so that it runs smoother if you so choose. You can come back and edit in each catalog, and import more photos in each time. You could use one catalog for everything, but it might cause organizational and file management problems.

Figures 2 & 3. Creating a new catalogue in Lightroom

3 . L I BRARY The Library is where all of your photos within the catalog are stored, old or new. When you import new

photos into the catalog, they go to the Library. Within the library you can organize and pick photos to develop, and you can view various aspects of the images like metadata.

Figure 4. The Librar y Panel

4 . I MPO RT I N G Importing is the process of bringing your photos into the Lightroom catalog so that they can be edited.

Import” button in the lower left of the screen or File>Import.

1. To begin the process, click the “

2. Navigate to wherever your photos are within the menu, or drag and drop on Mac.

Add” the files, do not “Copy” or “Move” (Figure 7).

3. When Importing, “

Figure 5. The Import Button

Figure 6. The Import Panel

4 . I MPO RT I N G C O N T . After you have brought all of your photos into the Import window by “adding” them, make sure the check marks of the photos you would like to import are checked. If there are any you don’t want, unclick the check marks. Click “Import”

on the lower right one final time to bring all of the photos into your

Library.

Figure 7. Make sure the “Add” option is selected

Figure 8. The Library with photos.

5 . MET AD AT A To the right of the main window in the Library workspace, there is a window where you can open

Metadata (Figure 9). This can be used to change the name of the file, the title of the file, the caption, and other aspects of Metadata which could be important when publishing a file or photo online. Metadata can be used to determine original ownership of an image. If you choose to get more advanced, there is the option to use the Maps workspace to geotag your images (Figure 10).

Figure 9. The Metadata panel Figure 10. The Maps workspace

6 . D EVEL O P The main power of Lightroom comes in the Developing Workspace. This tutorial will not cover every aspect in great detail, but it will cover the main points necessary for photo editing/retouching within

Lightroom. The first part of this workspace is the Navigator panel in the upper left. This is used to zoom into various parts of the image, and also acts as a preview for presets before they are applied.

Figure 11. The Develop workspace

Below the Navigator panel is the Preset panel. In here you can add or edit presets and apply them to your images.

Under the Preset panel is the film strip at the bottom of the window (Figure 12). This is a small preview of each photo in your catalog. This film strip can be used to organize and filter the photos within the catalog and rate or flag the photos for further editing or analysis (Figure 13).

Figure 12. The Film Strip

Figure 13. Organization Filters

6 . D EVEL O P C O N T . The middle of the Develop Workspace is the image preview window itself. This is where you see all of your changes happen in real time. There are several different views for this window (Figure 14). These include “Loupe View” which is the default and the left most option. The middle option is for using a

reference image to work off of next to your image. The final option is “Before and After” (Figure 15).

Figure 14. The various view options

Figure 15. Before and After View

To the right of the main preview window are all of the main tools for developing. In the upper right is the Histogram. This displays the tonal range throughout the image from high to low values. This also displays the technical info for the photo below the graph. The exposure, shadows, and highlights can be adjusted by pushing and pulling various parts of the Histogram. Typically, the values should be spread

evenly throughout the whole graph, if not, parts can be stretched out to fill in the values.

Figure 16. Histogram

Under the Histogram are all of the Developing tools and panels. These will be covered in the next section.

7 . D EVEL O P T O O L S The Develop Tools are powerful and can be used in many editing contexts. The tool bar is found under the Histogram on the right side of the screen (Figure 17).

Figure 17. Develop Tools and Brushes

Crop & Straighten (Shortcut “R”)

This tool will resize your image and what is within the borders. This can also change the angle of your image and the orientation of it.

Figure 18. Crop & Straighten Tool

Clone / Heal (Shortcut “Q”) This tool will help to remove blemishes in the image. Simple use the tool to “paint” what you want to remove and pick a “target” spot as a reference. This will remove the blemish and replace it with something similar to the reference area (Figure 19 & 20).

You can adjust the size of the brush as well as the feathering and the opacity of the brush to adjust how strong the change is. Figure 19. Clone / Heal Tool

Figure 20. Removing something with the Clone / Heal Tool

7 . D EVEL O P T O O L S C O N T . Red Eye Correction This tool removes red eye from photos. Just drag the cursor around the pupil to darken the pupil and remove the red eye. This also works to remove bright pet eyes (Figure 21).

Figure 21. Red Eye Correction Tool

Graduated Filter (Shortcut “M”) The Graduated Filter tool can make large, sweeping gradations of edits across an image.

1. Either select an effect for a new graduated effect, or adjust the parameters for a custom effect (Figure 23). 2. Drag the tool to where you want the gradient edit to begin.

Figure 22. The Graduated Filter tool in action

3. Push or pull the lines of the tool closer together or further apart to make the edit more or less gradual. 4. Click

“Done” to finish the action.

Figure 23. Parameters for a custom effect

Figure 24. Before and After Graduated Filter

7 . D EVEL O P T O O L S C O N T . Radial Filter (Shortcut “Shift +M”) The Radial Filter tool is the same concept of the Graduated Filter tool, except that it is in a circular

fashion, as opposed to linear. The filter can be inverted in the parameters to edit everything inside the circle, or everything outside of the circle. All of the parameters, options, and steps for this filter are the same as or similar to the Graduated Filter.

Figure 25. Using the Radial Filter

Adjustment Brush (Shortcut “K”)

The Adjustment brush can make more specific and controlled edits to images. The parameters are the same as the other developing tools, except the size, feather, flow, and density controls (Figure 26).The brush can be used to edit big or small areas more precisely than the other tools (Figure 27).

Figure 26. Adjustment Brush controls

Figure 27. Adjustment Brush Example

8 . D EVEL O PI N G PAN EL S The Develop Workspace has many different panels for photo editing on the right hand side of the page (Figure 28). These are very powerful and intricate adjustment controls, and a lot of them can be used to achieve the same effects. This tutorial will not discuss every section within these panels, nor every control. This tutorial will cover Basic Correction, Tone Curve, HSL, Detail, and Effects.

Figure 28. Develop Adjustment Panels

9 . B AS I C C O RREC T I O N The Basic Correction panel is a very powerful section of tools where you can do most of your corrections and editing on a photo. Most

problems or looks can be fixed or attained within this panel. The main adjustments that can be made within this panel are White Balance, Tones and Values, and Presence.

White Balance The idea behind white balance is to get the most accurate color cast, of the image, by making sure that your whites are as close to accurate white. This can be manually adjusted with the sliders shown in Figure 29, or with the presets right above them, or with the eyedropper tool (Figure 30). To use the eyedropper tool, simply

Figure 29. Basic Correction Parameters

1. Select the eyedropper and drag it to the image. 2. Hover over various parts of the image to see them in detail. 3. Click a spot that has a neutral gray tone. 4. Adjust the sliders accordingly after it automatically adjusts, if necessary.

Figure 30. White Balance Eyedropper

9 . BAS I C C O RREC T I O N C O N T . Within the Tones section, you can control the exposure or overall brightness of the image, and the contrast. Contrast makes the darks of the image darker and the highlights of the image brighter, creating more visual interest (Figure 31). A common mistake is to add too much contrast since it can enhance a photo by a lot.

The Highlights, Whites, Shadows, and Blacks, sliders (Figure 29) can brighten or darken a certain range of tones within the image. If the white parts of the image are bright enough but the darker parts are not bright enough, then you could raise the shadows. Lowering the blacks of the image and

Figure 31. Before and After use of Contrast

raising the whites is a common technique to add interest.

The presence section can be used to bring the image to life. The clarity slider controls the texture of the

image, whether it is hazier or grittier. Putting the slider to the left will make it hazy, and putting it to the right will make it gritty and rough (Figure 33). Using these effects in small amounts can do a lot for the image.

Vibrance controls how much each hue will be saturated in comparison to each other. The higher the vibrance slider, the more saturated each color will be with comparatively, making a more even saturation. The Saturation slider will add color to every hue in the image, raising each color up regardless of the other

Figure 32. Presence Controls

hues in the image (Figure 34). These sliders can also go negative to remove color from the image.

Figure 33. Negative Clarity (left) VS. Positive Clarity (right)

Figure 34. High Vibrance (left) VS. High Saturation (right)

1 0 . T O N E C URVE The Tone Curve is an advanced and powerful tool to help add

contrast and color in specific tonal ranges of the image. It lets you control contrast a lot more deliberately and intricately. To switch from the default to Point Curve Editing, click the button in the lower right corner of the panel.

The Tone Curve starts out at a straight diagonal line, with a light histogram displayed in the background. The lower left of the line controls the darks, and the upper right controls the lights. Moving a part of the line above the dotted line brings that tone up, or makes it brighter. Lowering below the dotted line does the opposite.

The channel can be changed from RGB to each individual Color of Red, Green, or Blue, each with their own Tone Curve. This controls the lights and darks of each individual color.

Figure 35. Tone Curve

A general rule if you don’t have something specific in mind, is to create a sort of “S-Curve” by bringing the darks down and the lights up, to create contrast.

Figure 36. Channel Selector

Figure 37. Example of Before and After Curves

1 1 . HUE S AT URAT I O N L UMI N AN C E (HS L ) The Hue Saturation and Luminance adjuster or HSL is a tool designed

to have precise control over specific tones and values of color within an image.

Hue changes the color cast of a specific tonal range of colors, such as changing what type of orange is displayed within the image. The sliders can be used to adjust colors, or the dragging tool in the upper left of the panel can be used (Figure 39). 1. Click on the circle within a circle in the upper left of the panel 2. Move the tool over the image to the color or tone you would like to edit. 3. Drag up or down depending on how you would like to change the

Figure 38. HSL Panel with Hue Sliders

hue. See Figure 40 for an example of changing the hue of the orange to stand out more.

Figure 39. Dragging Tool

Figure 40. Before and After adjusting the Hue of the orange Figure 41. Saturation Sliders

Saturation changes how much of a tone or color comes through in the image. In a way, it changes the power

of each color specifically. This is very similar to Saturation and Vibrance discussed in Basic Correction. The Saturation adjustment works exactly like the Hue adjustment described above. When moving the sliders to the left or dragging the tool down, it will de-saturate a color or tone, this can be used to cut out distractions or highlight a certain color (Figure 41).

Figure 42. Selectively de-saturating a blue color

1 1 . HS L C O N T . Luminance is the lightness or darkness of a certain color or tone within an image. It is like adjusting the Shade of an image.

The Luminance Adjustor works exactly like the Hue and Saturation adjusters, with the sliders and the dragging tool. Moving the slider to the right makes it brighter, and to the left makes it darker,. Dragging up makes the tone brighter, and dragging down makes it darker.

Figure 42. Luminance Sliders

1 2 . D ET AI L The Detail Panel is used to increase sharpness and texture in the detail of the image. The sharpening section is used to make the image more crisp and sharp (Figure 44). The noise reduction section is used to remove noise from an image that is too grainy, possibly due to improper exposure.

All of the sliders within each section are codependent upon each other, play around with different combinations of the sliders to achieve various effects.

Figure 43. Detail Panel

Figure 44. Before and After Sharpening

1 3 . EFFEC T S The Effects panel can be the final touches that you put on your image. Within these effects, you can create Vignettes, add Grain, and Dehaze the image.

Vignette’s can be used to draw the viewer’s attention to the center of the image, or block out the edges of a frame. Subtle vignette’s are used all of the time, especially in portraits and head shots. There are several different parameters that can be adjusted within Vignetting, but the important parts are Amount, Roundness, and Feather.

The Amount slider can create a dark vignette around the image, or a light one, depending on if you move it left or right, respectively. It also controls how strong and large the vignette is. The roundness of the vignette

Figure 45. Effects Panel

adjusts the shape of it, and therefore what parts are included or excluded. Feathering adjusts how gradual the vignette is and how soft it is.

Figure 46. Before and After Vignetting with dark and light amounts

Grain can add texture to an image when used in small

amounts, or can be used to make an image look like film. This effect is often used to make an image look older or

Figure 47. Example of subtle grain

“vintage.” The Amount changes how much grain is in the image,

and size changes each individual speck of grain, and roughness changes the fineness of the grain. Subtle grain usually uses a decent amount, but little size and roughness. Bigger size grain will make the image less sharp.

Figure 48. Example of grain in an image

1 3 . EFFEC T S C O N T . The final section within the Effects Panel is Dehaze. Dehaze can be used within a hazy or out of focus image to help fix it, but it can also create some cool effects. Dehaze is like Contrast and Clarity in one, but is slightly different. It can be used to make an image look like it is glowing when the slider is moved to

the left, or can add significant contrast when moved to the right.

Figure 49. Negative Dehaze (left) VS Positive Dehaze (right)

1 4 . PRES ET S One of Lightroom’s most powerful features is the ability to import, create, and apply presets to your image. This can help you work through large batches of pictures much quicker, and can help you explore techniques and styles used by other photographers and editors. Lightroom already comes prepackaged with several Presets. To use a preset: 1. Open the folder it is held in within the Preset Panel 2. Hover over each preset to see a preview in the upper left navigator panel (Figure 51). 3. Click on the preset you would like to apply to your image 4. Adjust various develop settings as addressed earlier, if necessary

Figure 50. Preset Panel

If you have edited a photo and would like to save all of your develop settings for similar photos, or to replicate the effect elsewhere, you can make your own preset. 1. Click the small “+” in the upper right corner 2. A dialog box will appear, click what develop settings you would like to apply to the preset 3. Name your preset, and decide where it will be kept 4. Click

“Create” (Figure 52)

Figure 51. Preset Preview

Figure 52. New Preset Dialog Box

1 4 . PRES ET S C O N T . Importing Presets There is no dedicated function within Lightroom to import presets from an outside

source. You must bring them into the source folder where Lightroom stores all of the presets. This is simple to do. 1. Go to Lightroom>Preferences, the dialog box will pop up 2. Within the dialog box, go to Presets

Figure 53. Lightroom>Preferences...

Figure 55. Show Lightroom Presets Folder Figure 54. Preferences Dialog Box

3. Click on “Show Lightroom Presets Folder...” 4. Open the “Develop Presets” folder 5. Place your new downloaded presets in this folder. ...