Adobe Lightroom has been continually improving as various tools in the software have become more sophisticated. One area in Lightroom where tremendous progress has been made is masking. But are you maximizing the masking options in your photo editing to take advantage of these impressive features?
Over the past few years, the ability to use Adobe Lightroom for more photo editing has improved. One area that Adobe has continually improved is masking, the ability to make targeted adjustments to your images to create more subtle and precise effects.
In this video, Brian Matiash walks the viewer through a very subtle but transformative edit of a pair of photos using the precision of the masking tools in Lightroom. Matiash demonstrates how to use a general mask to specifically target an area, and then apply several other options to the mask to further refine the selection and apply it to exactly what you want to target.
Using these techniques, Matiash cleverly combines the precision of the masks and adds a little shine behind a subject to make it stand out from an otherwise dimly lit scene. The shine technique alone is a handy trick for a subtle but effective editing technique for landscape and portrait photographers alike.
Although I’m fairly familiar with the masking options in Lightroom, Matiash’s video shows me just how effective and powerful masking can be in Lightroom. I’m also excited to try out an old tool in a new way for the subtle glow effect he demonstrates in the video.
