UPDATE: A groundbreaking video has just been released that could revolutionize your landscape photography workflow in Lightroom. Renowned photographer Scott presents a practical guide that emphasizes how to bring your landscape images to life without overwhelming them with artificial edits.
This video, released earlier today, showcases the essential steps in the Develop panel of Lightroom, starting with the often-overlooked camera profile and the Auto button. Scott explains why the Adobe Landscape profile can significantly enhance shadows and colors, providing a strong foundation for your edits.
Understanding the importance of initial adjustments, Scott taps Auto to set a tonal baseline, allowing Lightroom to guide the editing process based on the image’s natural tendencies. He emphasizes the importance of trusting your own perception, adjusting the white balance according to your memory of the scene rather than the camera’s settings.
Throughout the video, Scott provides a simple yet crucial rule: avoid pushing any slider to 100% unless absolutely necessary. He efficiently sets white and black points using Lightroom’s shortcuts and keeps an eye out for clipping, ensuring a polished yet natural look.
The video delves into advanced techniques, including the use of texture, clarity, and dehaze. Scott explains how these should be applied sparingly and often targeted with masks rather than applied globally. He clarifies the difference between vibrance and saturation, illustrating how to achieve a balanced, appealing look without making landscapes appear overly processed.
Scott advocates for using the tone curve as the primary source of contrast, employing a gentle S-curve to enhance depth without compromising the integrity of the image. Color adjustments are approached subtly, ensuring the final image reflects the scene as the photographer remembers it.
Sharpening techniques are also addressed. Scott emphasizes that sharpening is not a fix for missed focus in the field but rather a way to enhance existing details. He demonstrates the process of applying sharpening only to edges and textures while avoiding smoother areas like the sky.
As the video progresses, Scott introduces essential tools that distinguish quick edits from thoughtful ones, such as lens corrections, transformations, and particularly, the use of masks and filters. He enables chromatic aberration removal and profile corrections to eliminate unwanted fringing and vignetting, laying the groundwork for a polished final product.
The tutorial also covers how to effectively create a custom vignette using a radial filter, allowing complete control over the darkening effect and its transition. Scott employs sky masks combined with linear gradients to achieve a natural look, ensuring the foreground remains distinct without muddiness.
After completing the main edits, he carefully reviews the image at 100%, checking for distractions, sensor dust, and other imperfections. Using Lightroom’s advanced removal tools, he combines automation with a manual check to ensure a flawless final image.
For those eager to elevate their landscape photography skills, this tutorial is a must-watch. Check out Scott’s full video for a comprehensive breakdown of these techniques. Don’t miss out on the opportunity to transform your photography with this innovative workflow!
For more insights, also explore the latest tutorial by Alex Cooke, a Cleveland-based photographer and meteorologist, who shares his passion for capturing nature’s beauty.
