A LIGHTROOM

WORKFLOW
FOR BETTER LANDSCAPE PHOTOGRAPHS

ROBERT RHEAD
WHO THIS BOOK IS FOR 3
WHY HAVE A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW 3
OPTIMISING LIGHTROOM 4
BEFORE YOU START 5
REDUCING REPETITIVE EDITS 5
CREATING AN IMPORT PRESET 5
CONFIGURING EXTERNAL EDITORS 6
IMPORTING IMAGES 7
IMPORTING 8
ADDING KEYWORDS 8
SELECTING THE IMPORT DESTINATION 9
APPLYING AN IMPORT PRESET 9
THE LIBRARY MODULE 10
SORTING, RATING AND FILTERING 11
LIGHTROOM’S PICK AND REJECT SYSTEM 12
THE INITIAL IMAGE CULL 13
LIGHTROOM’S STAR RATINGS 14
THE FIRST RATING PASS 15
A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW
THE SECOND RATING PASS 15
LIGHTROOM’S FILTERS 16
LIGHTROOM’S COMPARE VIEW 17
DELETING THE JUNK 18
THE DEVELOP MODULE 19
THE UNEDITED IMAGE 19
LOADING IMAGES TO DEVELOP MODULE 20
CREATE A VIRTUAL COPY 21
EVALUATE THE HISTOGRAM 22
SETTING THE WHITE AND BLACK POINTS 23
ADJUSTING HIGHLIGHTS AND SHADOWS 24
ADJUSTING EXPOSURE AND CONTRAST 25
WHITE BALANCE 25
ADDING CLARITY 26
ADDING VIBRANCE AND SATURATION 26
LIGHTROOM’S TOOL SET 27
THE CROP OVERLAY 28
SPOT REMOVAL 29
ADDING GRADUATED FILTERS 31
ADDING ADJUSTMENT BRUSHES 32
HSL ADJUSTMENTS 35
ALTERING THE TONE CURVE 35
EXTERNAL EDITING IN PHOTOSHOP 36
ADDING EFFECTS 37
NOISE REDUCTION 38
IMAGE SHARPENING 38
THE FINAL STEPS 39
ASSESSING THE IMAGE 39
APPLY THE FINAL RATINGS 39
EXPORTING THE IMAGE 40
EXPORTING THE IMAGE 41
BEFORE / AFTER COMPARISON 43
IMPROVE YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY 44
All rights reserved.
This eBook is available as a free download at
www.robertrheadphotography.co.uk
If you downloaded it from anywhere else please con-
tact studio@robertrhead.com
Adobe, Lightroom and Photoshop are trade marks of
Adobe Systems Inc.
©2015 Robert Rhead Version 1.0
ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 2
WHO THIS BOOK IS FOR

This eBook is written with you in mind, the landscape

photography beginner and enthusiast. It makes some
assumptions from the beginning, the first of which
has been made already - you’re interested in land-
scape photography. Still with me? Great. The second
assumption is that you have Adobe Lightroom
installed on your computer and you’re already
somewhat familiar with the software.

You won’t need a vast prior knowledge of Lightroom but

this eBook is not intended to be a beginners introduc-
tion guide to Lightroom. It won’t describe Lightroom’s
layout and all the functions and tools in detail. Instead
I’ll describe an importing and editing workflow that has
been crafted specifically for landscape photographs.
and sorting of your photographs is much faster and
It is the workflow that I have formulated for
smoother. More importantly the editing process will
myself through years of working in multiple Lightroom
become more intuitive, to the point where it becomes
versions and is the method I use for all of my land-
second nature. From there you’ll be able to invest
scape photographs. It works, it’s simple, it’s effective
much more energy and time into creatively editing your
and it’s consistent.
images instead of thinking about how Lightroom works.

WHY HAVE A The workflow should become the basis for your
LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW editing, helping you to quickly improve your landscape
photographs. Once you have tried and tested it, feel
There are many advantages to editing each image with free to experiment with it, to bend it and evolve it to suit
a consistent workflow. The initial import, evaluation your needs, to embody your growing creative style.
A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 3
OPTIMISING
LIGHTROOM

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 4

BEFORE YOU START
Striving to create the best quality images ‘in camera’
should be the ideal that every photographer strives
for. It not only saves time later during editing but also
provides more image detail to work with, making the
final image stronger and more interesting. The first step
to capturing the best quality images is to shoot in the
RAW format instead of JPEG.
You may already be familiar with the JPEG format,
which was designed to give us good quality images
combined with smaller file sizes. To achieve these small
file sizes the format discards much of the data during
saving, data which contains image detail, and losing
image detail is exactly what we want to avoid.
RAW on the other hand is a format you can
select in your camera, a file format which saves all
the un-processed data the cameras sensor records
without loss of detail. If you’re not already shooting in
RAW, go and get your camera and set it to RAW now.
A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW
REDUCING REPETITIVE EDITS CREATING AN IMPORT PRESET
Correcting lens distortions and removing chromatic Steps to creating an import preset:
aberrations are edits I make to every single image in • Select an new image with no previous edits
Lightroom. Both being common optical problems
• Open the Develop module
caused in varying degrees by the lenses of almost all
• Open the Lens Corrections section
cameras. Whilst easy to correct in Lightroom, each of
• Add a tick to Enable Profile Corrections
these edits need typically two or three mouse clicks
• Add a tick to Remove Chromatic Aberration
per image, which might not seem like much …but if
you have 1000 images to edit, the time and hand • On the Presets section click the ‘Plus’ icon
movements involved multiply greatly, causing fatigue • In the New Develop Preset section ensure only
and mouse hand strain. Lens Profile Corrections, Chromatic Aberration,
Lens Vignetting, Process Version and Calibration
To speed things up Lightroom allows the creation of
are selected.
Presets, groups of edits that can be customised,
• Add the Preset Name “Lens correction and
saved and then applied to an image with one click. You
aberration” then click “Create”
can even create complex Presets adding a complete
finished edit to an image at the click of a mouse. Adding the custom preset to images will be covered in
More importantly for us, presets can be applied to the “Importing the Images” section.
images during their initial import into Lightroom and
removing the need to manually add repetitive adjust-
ments to each image when editing.
ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 5
CONFIGURING Bit Depth is a mathematical way in which colour

EXTERNAL EDITORS information is stored electronically. Choosing 16bit

over 8bit allows for a greater variety of colours and
Lightroom is a powerful software application designed makes the files more malleable and more forgiving
to cover specific editing requirements. There are how- during editing.
ever times when images require advanced editing tech- Resolution refers to how many pixels per inch (ppi
niques which are not offered by Lightroom. or dpi - dots per inch) the image will be printed at. If
Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom have both been de- you chose to print your image (and you should) then a
veloped to work harmoniously together, allowing im- resolution between 240 and 360 is recommended.
ages to be passed between the two applications with A smaller resolution will give poor print results. I use
ease. Depending on how you plan to use your pho- an Epson R3000 printer which has a native print
tographs, Lightroom allows some configurations to be resolution of 360 ppi, therefore I use a consistent
set which affects how the images are passed back to resolution of 360 throughout my entire workflow.
Lightroom once editing in Photoshop is complete. If you use any other brand of printer a resolution of 300
should be fine.
Photoshop is a bitmap image editor and not a RAW
ZIP compression is a method of reducing the file
image editor like Lightroom. Therefore as the images
Colour Space is a complex subject and refers to the size when transferring the data back to Lightroom,
that get passed back to Lightroom won’t be in RAW
amount of colours that can be stored in the digital file. speeding up the transfer process. It uses a ‘lossless’
format anymore, we need to specify what file format
ProPhotoRGB contains the largest amount of colours, compression system which does not lose or discard
Photoshop should use. There are two options, TIFF
sRGB the smallest and as Lightroom works natively in image data.
and PSD. PSD being Photoshop’s native file format
ProPhoto RGB it’s the one I prefer to use.
and TIFF which is very similar to PSD but is supported
by many more applications. As TIFF files can be used
almost everywhere it’s my preferred format.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 6

IMPORTING IMAGES
INTO LIGHTROOM

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 7

IMPORTING This creates JPEG preview versions of each file
during import which are used to display images within
Before any images can be managed or Lightroom’s interface. Building previews during import
edited they must be imported into Lightroom. increases the overall speed of Lightroom later during
image management and editing.
Connect your memory card to the computer and from
Lightroom’s Library module click the “Import” button at
ADDING KEYWORDS
the bottom left corner.

From Lightroom’s Source column on the left screen Adding Keywords during import applies specific
side, select the memory card where your photographs reference words to every imported image. They
are currently stored. provide a very powerful method of finding specific
images or groups of related within the Lightroom
Select “Copy as DNG” from at the top of the import
catalog. Add keywords for shoot location, such as
section. DNG or ‘Digital NeGative’ is a universal file
Buttermere, Lake District and also subjects such as
format that will be usable in many years to come. Your
Waterfall, Boat etc. With a well key worded image
cameras brand specific format (e.g. NEF for Nikon,
catalog it is very easy at any time in the future to
CRW or CR2 for Canon) may become obsolete . Con-
search for all images with the keyword “Buttermere” or
verting now to DNG will ensure you can open your files
“Waterfall”. Lightroom will then display only images
in the future, even in twenty or more years.
containing the specified keyword, regardless of where
Select the photographs you want to import into Light- they are stored in the file system. I strongly recommend
room. Each image can be selected individually if there you learn to keyword efficiently, it will save you heaps
are only a handful, otherwise use the SHIFT keyboard of time on future image searches.
key and click to select groups of photos or use the
Command keyboard key (CTRL on Windows) and se-
lect multiple single images.

Under “File Handling” in Lightroom’s right hand

import column select “Build Smart Previews”.
A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 8
 SELECTING THE
IMPORT DESTINATION

You’ll need to specify the location where Lightroom

is going to import the images to, the physical place
on your hard drive where the files will be stored.
Typically I have one main folder on my computer’s hard
drive for all my photographs. Within that folder I have
sub folders for every year and within those sub folders
I have theme specific sub folders such as Landscapes,
Portraits etc.

Select your chosen destination folder on the right side

of the Import section. You can get Lightroom to cre-
ate a sub folder in the folder you specify, Lightroom
can then automatically create a folder for “Isle of Skye”
within the Landscapes folder.

APPLYING AN IMPORT PRESET

Earlier on we created a Preset which applies some

repetitive corrections to all images during import. Now
is the time to select that Preset. Under “Apply during
Import” in the right column, select the Preset we made,
you’ll find it under “User Presets”.

Click the “Import” button and sit back while Lightroom

does its thing.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 9

THE LIBRARY
MODULE

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 10

SORTING, RATING
AND FILTERING

All photographers return from a shoot with images

that just don’t make the grade. Some will have bad
exposure or poor composition, others may be simply
test images that were made whilst deciding on the
composition. Now is the time to get rid of those
images, the worst of the worst, the initial image
cull. Lightroom’s sorting and filtering tools are most
powerful after the images have been imported into the
catalog and hard drive. Trying to select and filter which
images you want to keep prior to import can be a much
more tedious task.

To slightly enhance the sorting and rating process

Lightroom offers an Auto Advance feature, which as the
name implies automatically skips to the next image in
succession after a rating is applied. It’s an effective way
of cutting down on mouse clicks, hand movements and
therefore time during image appraisal and sorting.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 11

 LIGHTROOM’S PICK
AND REJECT SYSTEM

Lightroom offers a powerful method to mark a photo

as either a Pick or Reject. It’s a fast way to quickly sort
out the keepers from the junk.

With an image selected you can simply click the “P”

keyboard key and that selected image will be marked
as “Pick”. Alternatively clicking the “X” keyboard key
marks the selected image as a “Reject”.

This system works at it’s most effective when

Lightroom’s “Auto Advance” feature is configured.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 12

THE INITIAL IMAGE CULL

The initial cull is intended to very quickly remove the

very worst images, the ones where things clearly didn’t
work. Don’t think too hard about each image at this
stage, instead use your gut feeling as to whether the
image has at least some potential or whether it’s a
complete fail. The process should be quick, even when
processing one thousand images.

Beginning at the first image in the newly imported

series click either “P” for “Pick” or “X” for “Reject.

With all the rejects now marked, click “Photo” from

Lightroom’s menu and select “Delete rejected photos”.

This action will delete all the images that were

marked as rejected, completely removing them from
Lightroom’s catalog and from the hard drive.

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 LIGHTROOM’S STAR RATINGS

Lightroom’s star rating system is a great way to

give each image a rating from 1 to 5 and offers the
photographer a powerful way to quickly categorise
each image during the review process.

Apply star ratings using the 1 to 5 keyboard keys.

My 5 star rating system:

The image has no major faults

The image is worth editing

Edited images

Favourite edited images

Portfolio worthy images

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 14
THE FIRST RATING PASS
With the rejects deleted return to the first image in the
series. The first rating pass builds on top of the reject
process, if you think an image has at least some merit
it is worthy of one star. Clicking the 1 keyboard key
awards the selected image with one star (a keeper),
images that you don’t like remain starless, by-pass
them with the keyboard right arrow key. Again use a
quick gut feeling.
A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW
THE SECOND RATING PASS
With the keepers now rated with one star, apply a filter
to display only images with a one star rating. Then run
through the evaluation process again, this time being
much more critical, taking time to evaluate each image
individually, deciding whether it’s an image worthy of
further editing.
Images worthy of editing receive a rating of two with
the number 2 keyboard key while images that don’t cut
it get by-passed with the arrow key.
Sometimes it is useful to retain images of a lower
overall standard as material for creative image
compositing in Photoshop. Maybe a small section of
sky or water is worthy of cloning into another image.
If I notice such a picture at this stage I apply two star
rating together with a relevant keyword, allowing them
to be located easily in the future.
ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 15
 LIGHTROOM’S FILTERS

Lightroom’s powerful filter system gives you the tools

to display only images that pass a certain criteria, such
as star rating, flagged (picks and rejects) or un-flagged
and colour rating. Even combinations of rating systems
can be used.

As an example, to display only images with a two star

or greater rating, click on the second star from the left
on the Star Rating Filter. Lightroom will automatically
display only two star and greater rated images. With
the “Greater than or equal to” icon to the left of the
stars you can refine further and filter for images with
only two star ratings, or images with less than two star
ratings.

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 LIGHTROOM’S COMPARE VIEW

Evaluating two very similar images is made easy

in Lightroom with the Compare View. With this
feature two images can be displayed side by side for
easier evaluation.

Tip: Select multiple candidate images and cycle

through them with the keyboard arrow keys.

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DELETING THE JUNK

With the image series now rated with either

no stars, one star or two stars a filter can be
applied to display images that received no stars.
With the “Rating is less than or equal to” filter and
de-selecting one star, Lightroom will display only
images without a star rating. I prefer to select and
delete all images with no stars to keep my hard drive
clean. To delete the images you first need to select
them all individually or click Command + A (CTRL
+ A on Windows). Right click and select “Remove
Photos”. You’ll be presented with the option to
remove the images from Lightroom or to delete them
from disk. I prefer to delete them from disk, which
completely destroys the files.

Selecting to remove them only from Lightroom

simply takes the images out of Lightroom’s catalog
without deleting them from the hard drive. You might
not be brave enough to delete from the hard drive
so choose which option is best for you.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 18

THE DEVELOP
MODULE

THE UNEDITED IMAGE

Nikon D800, Nikon 16-35mm

f/16 - 18mm - 0.5sec - ISO100
A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 19
LOADING IMAGES TO
THE DEVELOP MODULE

Opening an image in Lightroom’s Develop module is

easy, simply select your chosen image in the Library
module, click “Develop” in Lightroom’s menu and the
image will open with the develop tools to the left and
right. You can select other images from within the
Develop module by selecting images from the film
strip at the bottom of the screen. In many screen shots
used in this eBook the Film Strip and left column are
blended out. Clicking the small arrows at each screen
edge will blend in or out that screen section. Use it to
maximise image size while editing.

The right column in the Develop module is populated

with the Lightroom image editing tools. Generally the
most commonly used tools are closer to the top of the
column. The Histogram is always present at the top of
the column so you can keep an eye on highlight and
clipping warnings.

Below are Lightroom’s tool set which are used to apply

localised adjustments to the image. Under the tools are
the global editing sections beginning with the Basic
edits. All edits made within these sections affect the
whole image.

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CREATE A VIRTUAL COPY

Unlike other photo editing applications Lightroom

works in a non destructive way. Regardless of how
much editing an image receives, the original file is
never touched or altered. The edits you make
are stored in Lightroom’s database and are only
permanently applied to the image when exporting to
the final format, such as a JPEG. The power behind
this method is all edits are reversible, allowing you to
go back to any point in your editing process and ‘start
again’ if you’re not happy with the editing results.

One extra advantage of this system is the ability to

create virtual copies of images. Virtual because they
don’t exist as an actual file on your hard drive, instead
they are simply an additional copy in Lightroom’s
database, saving computer storage space. Before
editing any image it is good practice to make a
virtual copy, giving you the ability to edit a single image
in multiple ways whilst retaining the original unedited
for reference.

Create a Virtual Copy by right clicking (CTRL + click)

and selecting “Create Virtual Copy” from the menu.
Lightroom creates the copy, which is marked with an
upturned bottom left corner.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 21

EVALUATE THE HISTOGRAM
Let’s get one thing clear, there is no correct or
incorrect histogram. Naturally darker images such
as ones taken at night will have a histogram that is
weighted towards the left (the darks), brighter scenes
such as winter scenery will always be weighted
towards the right (the lights). The form the histogram
takes therefore depends heavily on the subject and the
time of day the image it was taken.
Tip: Click the clipping warnings to keep them
switched on during editing.
This typical landscape histogram with dark
foreground detail, bright sky detail and lower mid
tone detail.
A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW
Evaluating the Histogram gives you a visual refer-
ence to the amount of dark tones, mid tones and
light tones within the image, which is useful in
deciding which exposure compensation steps are
needed when editing.
Sharp spikes on up against the left or right side of the
Histogram are the primary thing to look out for. When
parts of the image are underexposed to pure black
or overexposed to pure white, those areas suffer a
loss of image detail. This loss of image detail is called
“Clipping” or “Burnt out”. When present in an image
the Histogram displays white Clipping Warnings in
The white clipping warnings on the left tells us that
shadow areas are underexposed and detail is lost.
the top left and right corners. Hovering over the white
triangle warnings displays what parts of the image are
being clipped with a red overlay for white clipping and
blue overlay for black clipping.
Capturing landscape scenes with even exposure
between bright skies and dark foregrounds has
always been one of the greatest photographic challeng-
es. Without the use of on-camera graduated ND filters
an even exposure is sometimes impossible to create,
giving us an image with lots of blacks and whites with
little mid range tones.
The white clipping warnings on the right tells us that
highlight areas are overexposed and detail is lost.
ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 22
SETTING THE WHITE
AND BLACK POINTS

Setting the black and white points expands the

tonal range within the image allowing you to balance the
image between the point where blacks and whites
begin to clip.

Sliding the Whites slider to the right increases the

tonal range of the image in the bright areas. It also
increases contrast and brightness in the image.

Sliding the Blacks slider to the left to increase tonal

range in the darks.

Pressing and holding the CTRL keyboard key whilst

sliding the Whites and Blacks turns the image white
or black respectively. This gives an excellent visual
representation and makes it easier to see the point
when clipping occurs. Moves the sliders until you can
see clipping occurring then pull back a little.

Tip: Some highlight clipping such as specular

reflections on shiny surfaces, street lights in night
time landscapes and the sun are acceptable and are
usually unavoidable.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 23

ADJUSTING HIGHLIGHTS
AND SHADOWS

Compensating for excessively bright highlights and

dark shadows is handled with the Highlights and
Shadows sliders.

Images areas that are too bright such as skies and

clouds can be reduced by using the Highlights slider.
Taking the slider to the left decreases brightness whilst
retaining image detail, but be careful not to make sky
highlights look grey and muddy.

Conversely if your shadow foreground areas appear

too dark, sliding the Shadows slider to the right will
brighten and bring out detail in these areas.

Check your clipping warnings on the Histogram and

adjust accordingly should clipping have occurred.

Tip: Avoid overly decreasing highlights and bright-

ening shadow areas, reducing the overall dynamic
range of an image. This will create an unrealistic,
flat looking landscape image.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 24

ADJUSTING EXPOSURE
AND CONTRAST

RAW images have a tendency of being tonally

rather flat and need a contrast boost to compen-
sate. The tonal range will have been improved by the
previous Blacks and Whites steps in this workflow but
adding a little Contrast of around +10 will help.

Adjust the exposure slider by sliding left and right and

evaluate the image. Keep a eye on the Histograms
clipping warnings.

WHITE BALANCE

If the image was captured using the cameras Auto

White Balance setting then typically an adjustment of
the White Balance in Lightroom is not necessary. It can
however be used to add colour and artistic style to the
image. Test it out and select a white balance that suits
your tastes.

Tip: Double clicking on the slider names resets the

values to their original settings.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 25

ADDING CLARITY

The Clarity slider boosts mid range tones in the image

and can be a powerful tool to enhance detail, making
them “pop”. Adding around +25 Clarity is fine but over
do this slider and you’ll get the fake HDR effect that
people either love or loathe.

ADDING VIBRANCE
AND SATURATION

Adding Vibrance and Saturation will depend on

the image and your personal tastes. RAW images
usually need a little colour boost, a process that is
automatically done when shooting in the JPEG format.

Enhancement of Vibrance is something I do to most

images, usually around +10 to +20.

Saturation has a more profound effect on the image

and can be added to suit your personal taste.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 26

Crop Overlay Tool LIGHTROOM’S SPOT REMOVAL: Removes spots RADIAL FILTER: Add a adjustable
and small unwanted areas. radial filter to an image (available
TOOL SET
from Lightroom 5).
RED EYE CORRECTION: Removes
Below the Histogram are Lightroom’s red eye in portraits. ADJUSTMENT BRUSH: Applies
selection of tools, some which are adjustment masks with a brush.
GRADUATED FILTER: Simulates
vital to the landscape photographer,
Graduated ND Filters. Adjustment Brush Tool
others less so.

CROP OVERLAY: Correct image

angle and re-crop images. Radial Filter

Spot Removal Tool

Gradient Filter

Red Eye Removal Tool

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 27

THE CROP OVERLAY

Getting horizons straight and compositions correct

during image capture are vital photographers skills.
Adjusting either in post-processing are sure fire ways
to reduce image resolution and quality. If however an
adjustment is needed it can be done with the crop tool.

With the Crop Overlay tool selected drag in from

any corner or side of the image to adjust the crop.
Clicking the “Aspect” section of the Crop Overlay
tool allows specific, predefined image sizes or aspect
ratios to be chosen.

To alter the angle of the image, hover around any

corner until the cursor changes to a double arrow, click
and then drag in your chosen direction.

Tip: If the image has a flat horizon such as a pho-

to of the sea, use the “Angle” tool to draw a line
across the horizon and Lightroom will adjust the
image angle accordingly.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 28

SPOT REMOVAL

A quick and easy way to remove small unwanted

objects in the image such as birds, litter on the ground
or dead tree branches - to name just a few common
ones. With the tool selected simply paint over the
offending object and Lightroom will automatically
select an area to replace it with, usually doing an
excellent job. The selected replacement area can of
course be moved around by you to enhance the edit.
Adjust the brush size and brush feather (edge softness)
to further refine the spot tool. Whilst being a fast and
clever tool for small blemishes, the Spot Removal tool
isn’t as powerful as Photoshop’s array of cloning tools.
Therefore if extensive image repair is need, Photoshop
can be used for external editing later in the workflow.

Tip: Use the Spot Removal tool to remove sen-

sor spots in the image caused by dust and dirt
on the cameras sensor. They tend to show up in
landscape photographs when a smaller aperture
has been used. If many sensor spots are present
you should consider cleaning the cameras sensor.

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 Objects such as aeroplane condensation trails that
cover a larger image area are more easily removed in
sections rather than trying to replace the area in one
go. Experiment with brush size and brush feather to
get the best results. Switching between the Clone
and Heal settings of the Spot Removal tool can help
too. Cloning duplicates the selected area and simply
paints it on top of the section to be covered, Healing
will try to merge the two areas together.

I find that condensation trails are best removed using

Photoshop’s Content Aware Fill and Clone Stamp
tools sets.

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 ADDING GRADUATED FILTERS

Simulating the effect of graduated ND filters that can

be placed in front of the camera lens during image
capture, Graduated Filters are an excellent method
of toning down sky exposure. Additionally Graduated
Filters can be ‘pulled up’ from the bottom of the image
to increase exposure and detail to foreground areas.

Together with exposure adjustments, the complete

“Basic” array of sliders are available and can be added
in a graduated effect.

Tip: Multiple graduated filters can be added to a

single image.

A LIGHTROOM WORKFLOW ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 31

ADDING ADJUSTMENT BRUSHES

While the graduated filter is a powerful tool it can only

add adjustments over a wide and straight area, the
Adjustment Brush however give us the same
adjustments in a brush format that can be applied to
the image in fine detail, just like painting a picture with
a brush.

The Adjustment Brush effectively paints a mask onto

the image to which multiple adjustments can be
dynamically applied to, making it a powerful tool to
target specific areas or objects in the image.

Selecting “Show Selected Mask Overlay” (or press-

ing the “O” key on the keyboard) displays the mask
as a red overlay over the image and gives a vital visual
representation targeted area, brush feather (edge soft-
ness) and flow (thickness of application).

I added masks to the mountain areas of the image to

add some targeted exposure increase by pulling up the
shadows, adding a little clarity and vibrance.
Additionally I masked the trees on the right side to
increase their presence and focal weight in the image.
Tip: Use the Auto Mask feature to prevent masks
overlapping hard edges and causing the tell tale
editing halos.

Check the clipping warnings and adjust if necessary.

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 Select specific areas such as trees or other high-
lighted areas to increase exposure, add Saturation
or Vibrance and a little Clarity to boost detail.

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 Continue to paint masks over areas that need
adjustment or enhancement.

Previous edits made with the Adjustment Brush

Tool are marked with grey dots, the active Brush
edit is marked with an additional black centre.

Tip: All previous edits can be reselected and

edited again by clicking on it’s corresponding dot.

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HSL ADJUSTMENTS
Offering control over the whole colour range, the HSL
section allows targeted adjustment of specific colours
within the image. Moving a slider in the HSL palette
will adjust only that corresponding colour.
There are three sub palettes within the HSL section,
Hue, Saturation and Luminance. Hue will shift the
physical colour from one to another, Saturation
increases or decreases the colour intensity and
Luminance alters the brightness of a specific colour.
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A common adjustment in landscape images is to
slightly darken down blue sky areas by selecting
Luminance, picking up the manual selection tool (the
small circle in the HSL palette), clicking on the blue
colour in the image you wish to select and dragging
down to darken. Conversely dragging up will brighten
the blue tones.
ALTERING THE TONE CURVE
Adjusting the tone curve is part of the editing process
that needs the most practice. It is far less intuitive than
moving sliders left or right. It is however a powerful tool
and worth spending some time with and mastering.
Similar the Histogram, the Tone Curve scale
represents the darks on the left, mid tones in the
middle and highlights on the right. Clicking and
dragging the diagonal line up or down allows
adjustment of a specific tonal range, allowing for exam-
ple darks or lights to be adjusted without altering other
tones in the image. The Tone Curve tool is an ideal way
The most common adjustment is to add a slight “S“
of brightening highlights to make the image “pop”.
curve to the diagonal line, pulling down half way into
the darks and up half way towards the lights adds
more contrast.
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EXTERNAL EDITING
IN PHOTOSHOP

Lightroom is a very powerful editing software, but it has

it’s limitations when advanced cloning and pixel based
alterations are required. Should edits of this nature be
required images can be additionally edited in external
applications such as Adobe Photoshop.

Lightroom and Photoshop are designed work

harmoniously together and it is possible to initiate
the editing of an image in Photoshop from the Light-
room application. Right click or CTRL click on an
image and select “Edit in”, then simply chose which
editing application should be used, in my case
Photoshop CC.

Editing in external applications should be done at

this point in the editing workflow. When the image is
edited externally and saved it is automatically reload-
ed back into the Lightroom catalog as a new physical
image file. At this point all previous edits done earli-
er in Lightroom are irreversibly applied to the image,
effectively being ‘burnt in’ making them no longer
editable. Additionally the new image is no longer a
RAW file which means it is less flexible when applying
exposure, white balance and other edits.

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ADDING EFFECTS

Using the Post Crop Vignette tool to darken down the

outer edges very slightly can help lead the eye into the
centre of the image, increasing the visual strength of
the images focal points.

Use the Amount slider to add a negative (dark) vignette

by sliding to the left. Good vignettes should hardly be
noticeable and it might take a little practice to achieve
ones that are not immediately noticeable. Try bounc-
ing the slider left and right to get a feel for when the
vignette becomes obvious.

Additionally I recommend shifting the Midpoint slider to

the left to increase how much the vignette bleeds into
the image and then pushing the Feather slider heavily
to the right to fade out the effect. Again balancing the
Amount slider to correct the effect.

Remember, a vignette should not be obvious to the eye

but it should help concentrate the eyes focus towards
the image centre.

Tip: Use a positive (lighter) vignette to combat

naturally occurring vignettes caused by the
cameras lens.

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NOISE REDUCTION

Most commonly, landscape photography is done

using a tripod which allows the photographer to use
lower ISO settings, making digital noise much less of an
issue. If a higher ISO was used and noise is present,
Lightroom’s Luminance Noise Reduction tool is a very
powerful method of removing it.

Keep an eye on the image preview provided in the

Detail section while sliding the Luminance slider and
watch the noise disappear. Press the ALT keyboard
key while shifting changes the image preview to black
and white which can help with visualising the level of
applied noise reduction.

IMAGE SHARPENING

All digital images require some degree of sharpening

by adding contrast to edges and image detail.

Moving the zoomed image preview to an area of the

Over sharpening an image should be avoided at all
image that contains high detail makes it easier to see
costs and is a tell tale sign of poor editing skills. Apply
the effect of the sharpening on the image. Sliding the
the sharpening so you see a strong increase in image
Amount slider to the right will make the preview image
sharpness, then pull back a little. Shifting the slider left
appear much sharper.
and right can help you find the sweet spot. I tend to
never add more than 60 sharpening to any image.
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To refine the sharpening, move the Masking slider
to the right. This adds a mask to the sharpening,
applying it only to certain areas. Pressing the ALT key
whilst moving the Masking slider will display the black
and white mask where image sharpening is only added
to the white areas. Move to mask slider to add sharp-
ening to important edges but not to smaller details
ROBERT RHEAD @RobRheadPhoto 38
THE FINAL STEPS

With the editing now largely completed, take a

quick look again at the Histogram and the clipping
warnings. Sometimes during editing the blacks and
whites can shift slightly so it’s worthwhile keeping an
eye on them and adjusting accordingly. Clicking on the
clipping warning arrows in the Histogram will switch
them on permanently, displaying the blue and red
overlays in the image which can help to keep you on
track during editing.

ASSESSING THE IMAGE

With the image editing now largely complete it’s time

to sit back and assess your image. Ask yourself these
questions and try to be as honest with yourself as you
possibly can.
• What catches your eye the most?
• Is there any unnecessary clutter?
• What are the strongest points? APPLY THE FINAL RATINGS The key to learning Lightroom is to experiment, to try
• Want are the weakest points? things out and evaluate the results. This workflow will
To help with finding the edited images again in the help you through that learning journey. It will be the
Learning to be very critical about your work will
future, give them a star rating. Finalised edits receive confident guide holding your hand as you take your
help you to improve your photography skills very
a three star rating, favourite edits receive a four star first steps.
quickly. Create virtual copies of the original version and
rating and if I feel the image is portfolio worthy then
try editing again in a different way.
I give a five star rating.
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EXPORTING
THE IMAGE

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EXPORTING THE IMAGE

After reaching the end of the editing process you’ll

want to export the image from Lightroom so it can
be uploaded to your website portfolio, online social
media service or anywhere else you choose to use
your image.

Depending on the desired usage I recommend the

following settings:

For use on website portfolios, a balance between good

image quality and small file size is needed to allow for
fast internet download speeds:

• Image Format: JPEG

• Color space: sRGB
• Quality: 70
• Limit file size to: Yes, 200k
• Resize to fit: Long Edge, 1000 pixels
• Resolution: 72 pixels per inch
• Output Sharpening: Yes, set to Screen, Standard.

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For use on Facebook or other social network plat-
forms:

• Image Format: JPEG

• Color space: sRGB
• Quality: 100
• Limit file size to: No
• Resize to fit: Long Edge, 1600 pixels
• Resolution: 72 pixels per inch
• Output Sharpening: Yes, set to Screen, Standard.

For use in printed publications:

• Image Format: TIFF (Some magazines may

specify JPEG)
• Color space: sRGB
• Quality: 100
• Limit file size to: No
• Resize to fit: No (Unless a specific size is required)
• Resolution: 300 pixels per inch
• Output Sharpening: No

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BEFORE AND AFTER
COMPARISON

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IMPROVE YOUR
PHOTOGRAPHY
Learn to take better pictures with Robert Rhead’s
photography workshops. With a diverse selection of
photographic workshops and subjects ranging from
landscape photography at locations throughout the
UK, studio photography, Lightroom and Photoshop
tuition you’ll find a workshop that feeds your
photographic passion.

Discover the photography workshops at

www.robertrheadphotography.co.uk

Follow Robert on Twitter

Follow Robert on Facebook

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