How to Light Sculpting with mask in Lightroom Classic

hi everyone it's Lori and welcome to my channel in this video I'm going to review several images to show you how to use multiple masks to sculpt the light in your photo I'll show you three images that I previously edited and then I'm going to walk you through this gorgeous nature image from start to finish let's Jump Right In so to get started with this image I want to walk you through and you'll notice over here on my math tools that I have used seven masks to edit this image and this is a technique called light painting with masking where you are applying multiple masks different mask Tools in a very soft way to bring out the details that you want I just recently watched another photographer who edits doing multiple masks in an area to bring out those details contrast and really shape the light in an image and I thought it was really fascinating and I wanted to try it myself so I'm going to get started showing you this image so I will show you the before it's a very flat flat Sky day not much detail not much contrast kind of a throwaway image but once I did some masking um seven masks to be exact I'm really happy with the way the image turned out I think it leads your eye to all this detail in the skyscrapers and the sky above so let me get started in showing showing you all of the masking that I did and we will walk through and edit so when I imported the image I did have to do some just basic adjustments to the image and then I began to start masking so the first mask that I did was the sky so I went in and did a sky mask and then I made changes to dehaze the sky so I wanted to bring out all of that Sky detail so you can see what a difference that makes with the dehaze if I take it back it's gone and I bring out the sky there can also reduce the noise because there is a little bit of noise in the sky so I'm going to go ahead and increase that to reduce that noise while I'm in there okay so that was the sky mask then I decided I wanted to do a radial gradient and so I applied the gradient in the center and then I inverted it that way my mask was outside that was just the quickest way to do it so I've got this gradient here I'll go ahead and click show overlay so you can see it and from there I reduced exposure so I reduced exposure just 0.83 so that I could pretty much do like a vignette um around this outside area of the image to really darken it my vision with this is to lead your eye through the center so I wanted to bring some Darkness to the outside so mass number three was using the brush and what I did here is actually brush in this Center area where the water is up to this Tower and this is where I began to make these light painting adjustments so I added some contrast I reduced the Highlight so that it's not kind of too harsh and blown out and I increase the exposure a little bit so count our balancing the highlights with the exposure gave me a really soft effect I also reduced the amount of the Mask um the things that I did to the mask I reduced it so instead of it being in the center I took it down just a little bit so this was my first first mask using the brush where I enhanced the center of the image so Mass 4 I came in and I did another brush and for this one I just did the buildings the buildings kind of in this line of your middle of the the screen site and so with these I went in again and applied some contrast and a little bit of clarity and just a tiny bit of exposure so I just popped those just a little bit to bring out those details so that was Mass 4. so now we go to mass 5 and with this mask again I'm using the brush so I went in with the brush into similar areas I wanted to continue to work on the water I wanted to brighten this boat a little bit and brighten this darker building so with this mask again use the brush tool and I increase the contrast I reduced the highlights again because I didn't want to blow those out and I gave it a little pop of exposure now this time I kept it at a hundred percent but just bringing in the detail here so now I've worked on this water twice so I've applied a mass twice to just really get the detail that I want in the water so then mass number six I decided I wanted to do a linear gradient on this side of the image and what I did was just reduce the exposure so we'd already done the radial but I felt like it needed to be darkened a little bit more and I wanted to do it with that linear gradient so I came in and applied that and then Mass 7 the last mask I applied a linear gradient to this corner now why did I choose a linear I chose the linear because it's going to be darker fading to light since it's a linear gradient it will soften as it comes around the edges and I felt like that's going to give a nice a nice vignetting in these corners so those are the masks that I applied to the image and then I did make some color adjustments so if we go back to the basic panel I did increase the color orange which was in this tree some of the aqua and some of the blue for the water so it really wasn't too many masks it was just a focus here in the water some darkening around the edges and a little bit of work on this building I think I did add some clarity to the building and of course working on this guy so again I'll show you before and after I think if you look at the water you can really see how it's not over processed but it just really brought out that movement in the water and then all this nice detail in the building okay so let's look at another example and I'll walk you through this edit as well all right so this edit has quite a bit also done to it let me create a snapshot so that I have the original at this point okay so again I'll show you the before of this image this was a quick kind of snapshot as I was walking down the street I just liked the structure and the lines of the city scene but it was of course overcast and I you know there wasn't this much light down here or my camera couldn't capture it so to get started with this image all the way back to the beginning of course did a straighten first um did some cropping to get it lined up from here I did go in and do some basic edits so if we look at the basic panel I opened up the Shadows a whole lot um reduce the highlights added some texture and Clarity to just try to get the image kind of started I then did go ahead and crop it some more and then I began using the mask so let's click on the mask to see um what I did with this image I'm going to go all the way up to the top and now we can see let me enlarge these for this image I did six masks all right so for the first mask I went right here mask one use the brush and I started we'll show the overlay I started in these windows you can barely see the mask so I reduced the amount all the way down um I just wanted a little bit of light in these windows you can see I increased the exposure and I opened up the Shadows so that was the first thing that I wanted to do um with this with this particular mask so then with mass 2 I wanted to enhance the building in the back so I actually did an object mask and I'll show you that in just a minute so if you haven't used the new object Mass it's very very handy so basically if you go create new mask and we do objects we can go and make a square around and it will find the building for us which is just fantastic so that's what I did on mass number two so I did an object and from there I increased the contrast I increase some texture Clarity and dehaze so I wanted to just make this building Pop I wanted your eye to go through the frame to the building so that was the first the second mask for The Third Mask I wanted to impact that walking area and so I used the brush and with the brush I kept the amount the same my flow in density isn't all the way up to 100 so it's a little softer and again I increase contrast exposure and a little texture so I'm trying to just make this area open up a little bit more and that is where I had that mask so Mass 4 I wanted to impact this top area so I did an object and I just selected this area and then I came in and I added contrast and I darkened it also added some texture and clarity now I decided I had done too much right here it got really dark so later I'm going to come in with the Eraser and actually erase that so mask five I went back over this key area so I felt like it wasn't enough so I went over it some more and added some additional texture and clarity um and then for Mass six I wanted to work on this bottom area again because again I'm doing this in soft phases so I'm just taking my time and kind of layering the masking so I did a radial gradient in this area and this time I just gave it a little bump of exposure so I could have gone back to the other mask but what I'm trying to do is layer the effects so that they appear soft and natural versus you know overdoing it one time so it it's pretty interesting the concept of layering the mass to get that soft kind of natural look and then mass number seven I went back to the building oh this was the mask that we just did so I'm going to delete I'm going to delete this one um let's go to the mask and delete the mask so this is where I've stopped with this image I did go in and erase this part I'm not sure why it's not coming up but I can show you what I would do um let's go here and I'm going to subtract with the brush and I'm just going to come over now and I can remove it there we go so that's the easiest way if you make a mistake on your mask don't delete the mask just come in I can even take my flow and density down on my brush and I can even reduce it right here where it's just a little bit dark see how I'm kind of just smudging that now such the beauty of these new mask tools and how you can just really customize you can go over it multiple times just coming in and kind of softening that that edge that I created yeah I like that much better so at this point I could I'm pretty pretty comfortable with this image um you know I could add more lightness to these areas if I wanted but I really wanted the scene to just pull your eye in and um take you through through that Archway and that building so again this was the before and this was the after so just thinking about light and masking and how to bring out details as you're editing so another image that I worked on with light and light kind of painting was this image this is the before I'm going to take a minute and this is how I ended up finishing the image I actually opened up this side of the image and kind of darkened over here so you can see I did lots of masking with this image to get it where it needed to be I started with a brush up in this corner to darken this area um Mask two let's get our overlay on I worked on this little Edge right here but I ended up using the Clone tool to fix that then I came down to this bottom area and here I added some exposure and just kind of opened up those Shadows then I did a radial gradient in this book area and again I reduced the highlights because it was really bright so I wanted to get that toned down a little bit now I came over to this side of the image and here I did a linear gradient and I really worked to reduce the clarity open up the exposure the shadows and the contrast so this is where I started opening up this side of the image then I came over to the other side that was bright and actually darkened it so I did the opposite effects on either side I came back and added another linear gradient here and just wide open open the Shadows now I'll show you turn off the overlay this is where you kind of have an artistic decision so I could leave it um you know a little darker which is also fine or again I could open it up so you've kind of got a couple options there I also had opened up the exposure now I kind of also like it like that gives a little Moody light here and this was more how the scene was shot so you've got those options but this was the second linear gradient that I had done to work on this area of the image because remember this part was really dark I was shooting through a door and there were there were no lights on over there so to balance my image I needed to do a couple linear gradients to really work on this part of the image and then mass number eight I worked on this corner because it was just it's it's got where the Reflection from the windows coming in the door and I just needed to reduce the exposure a little bit and reduce texture and Clarity to soften it there just were some lines there um that I needed to work with so eight masks in total it goes pretty quick when you're when you're used to using the mask features and um you know just a fun way to think about light and how to impact light in your images so I am going to pull up another image and walk you through a full edit from start to finish of course a nature image that I took actually in Chicago but out in the one of the gardens so my vision for this image I'm working on a winter garden series and my vision is to really give this a moody look and then really paint the light on these parts of the um texture of the image that I want to bring out so let's get started editing this one together so the first thing I'm going to go ahead and do is bring down the highlights and I am going to open up the Shadows just a little bit and I'm going to do a tone curve in the mid-tones to just bring that down because that's already going to help get the look that I'm wanting I'm wanting this to be pretty moody and a little bit darker so I think the next thing I'll do is go ahead and I'll start with my mask and I'm going to select the background and it did it did okay but it did capture some of the leaves so instead of that I'm going to go ahead and delete this mask and let's try selecting the subject and see what it does it's probably not going to catch these parts yeah that's what I was afraid of okay so I'm going to delete I'm going to delete that mask as well okay so instead I'm going to go ahead and do a radial gradient and I'm going to do an oval one right here and then I'm going to invert it so you click invert at the top and that is a little bit softer and better than what I wanted now I'm going to darken pretty much you know most of the image so we've got that a little bit darker all right so the next thing I'm going to do is grab the brush tool and I want my flow and density to be maybe about you know in the 70 range and the first thing I'm going to do is I want to reduce the highlights in this bright area so I'm just going to brush that on and I may even bring down the exposure a little bit so what I'm trying to do is just balance the light there we go all right so at this point I have a dark in the background I've gotten the mood kind of created so that was before and this is already after so the next thing I want to do is start shaping the light where I want it to hit so I'm going to grab the mask and I'm going to do another brush and this time I'm going to keep the feather High flowing density about where it is and I want to increase the temperature the exposure and maybe play with some texture and clarity so what I'm going to do is use the brush I'm going to start with this one here I'm just going to come along this area and maybe a little bit right on this line and down through here and maybe a little bit on this corner and so what I'm going to do now is go ahead and increase the exposure just a tiny bit I am going to increase contrast and I'm going to go ahead and add some texture and clarity so very very subtle in that area now I'm also going to add just a little bit here you may wonder I already you know darken this but what I wanted to do was control the light myself I didn't want that harsh light where it was I wanted to really control where it's going okay and then I think I'm going to go ahead and also take the brush and add some along this line really soft and maybe around this Edge okay so that's my first go at it again let's look at before and after but let's also turn this mask on and off so there's off and there's on so while I'm doing it you may not really notice it but then after the effect you can really see where that light's hitting now I'd like to add a little bit more here and I want to work with some more texture so I'm going to go ahead and do another brush and I'm going to keep my flow and density still really soft and this time I want to make the brush a little bit bigger I'm going to come in right through this area and I'm just going to kind of paint that on let's try bumping the exposure just a little bit and then I'm also going to add some warmth just a tiny bit now we can also reduce the amount of the intensity which I like to use that slider a lot I'm just going to kind of come around that edge and now I want to add some texture here maybe a little bit of clarity just to make that pop now if you like the effect and you think it would work somewhere else you can go ahead and continue working with your brush or you can stop and um so I could come in and do just a little bit in that area maybe a little bit more down there um you pop just a little right through there so I can do before and after and now let's turn off this mask so you can see before and after so I'm just really painting that brightness in with the light and then I would just you know stand back and kind of look at it is there any part of this kind of story that I feel like needs some more um strength and I do would like to see a little bit more texture here so I'm going to grab the brush and I'm going to come down and I'm just going to come in here just really kind of make this one pop a little bit more so adding some more texture maybe a little Clarity a little sharpness maybe even some saturation and also maybe some contrast I'm just really really popping that one so it looks like it's coming off the page so let's look at it now without that mask and before it's very subtle now I can increase the amount of it and let's see what that does yeah it's very very subtle I like it so that's an example of using your mask to really paint the light control the story change the mood now you could do the opposite effect so this image was kind of bright I could also let's say these leaves were really dark I could use it to brighten them as well so when you think about maybe an image that is dark to begin with like these I could come in and paint some light to brighten so it doesn't have to be the dark side like I did you can also add light to brighten so think about doing it with the mask and really working slowly gently making adjustments as you go and just continue layering your mask to get the effect that you want overall to your image can't wait to see what you create be sure to tag me on Instagram if you use the tips in this video and please subscribe um I appreciate any comments and thanks for watching

Channel: Creative Photography with Lori Lankford

Views: 8,328

Keywords: lightroom, masking, masking with lightroom, editing, photoediting, creative editing, digital editing

Id: Le_wRLnYvaA

Length: 23min 11sec (1391 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 12 2022