Lightroom Landscape - Andrew Gibson

THE
LIGHTROOM
LANDSCAPE
Andrew S. Gibson
Contents
Introduction 3
Gallery 6
Case Study One: Sheepstor, Dartmoor, England 19

Case Study Two: Playa de Illa, Galicia, Spain 39
Case Study Three: Playa de Buelna, Asturias, Spain 54
Case Study Four: Playa de Buelna, Asturias, Spain in Silver Efex Pro 2 63
Case Study Five: Ocuri Roman Ruins, Andalucia, Spain 76
Case Study Six: Wells-Next-The-Sea, Norfolk, England 86
Conclusion 97
Notice of rights
All rights reserved. No part of this ebook may be reproduced or transmitted in any
form by any means without the permission of the author.
Copyright © 2017 Andrew S. Gibson
INTRODUCTION
Digital technology has radically changed landscape photography. The latest

cameras enable us to work in conditions earlier generations of landscape
photographers considered impossible.
We can photograph the night sky, using high ISOs to record the stars in ways that
weren’t possible ten yeas ago. Modern sensors have helped create a new genre of
landscape photography.
Digital cameras, unlike film, don’t suffer from reciprocity failure. Filter makers
started making stronger neutral density filters, and then we had another new
genre – long exposure photography.
Exposure blending and High Dynamic Range (HDR) techniques have also given
landscape photographers new solutions to the old problem of coping with
extreme ranges of brightness.
The Lightroom Landscape | 3

Muxia, Spain | Fujifilm X-T1, 14mm, 1/125 @ f9, ISO 400
One of the key differences between black and white and color film photography Along the way we’ll look at important techniques like HDR. We’ll explore how you
is that you can do much more with a black and white print in the darkroom. The can make your black and white images more powerful by taking control over local
ability to lighten or darken parts of the print, control contrast and tone photos adjustments (the digital equivalent of dodging and burning).
gives the photographer powerful tools to inject emotional power into the
print. Color prints, limited by darkroom processes, are literal. Black and white is I’ll show you how to take control of contrast and emphasize texture, an important
interpretive. part of any black and white image. You’ll learn how to use split toning techniques
to add color and emotion.
Programs like Lightroom bring that flexibility to color developing as well as black
and white. The distinction between color and black and white, in that sense, is not I’m going to do this with real life examples. I’ll start by explaining the story behind
as clear as it once was. But the good news for black and white photographers is the photo, what I was aiming for and the techniques I used in the field. Then I’ll
that Lightroom gives you much more control over the black and white image than show you how I developed the image in Lightroom.
the traditional darkroom worker has ever had.
As we work our way through this book please bear in mind that everything relies
In Lightroom it’s also easy to create multiple versions of the same photo – to start on a good Raw file. What do I mean by that? A good Raw file is one that’s well
with a single Raw image and create several black and white versions of the same exposed without any clipped highlights. It should be sharp (good tripod technique
image. Are you curious to see what happens if you use some Lightroom Develop required) and well composed. This is the solid foundation that all good Lightroom
Presets? Or a black and white plugin like Silver Efex Pro 2? Just make another Virtual technique is built on.
Copy and do it.
The techniques that help you with this are explored in my book The Black & White
Why experiment like this? Curiosity leads to learning. If you are curious about what Landscape.
your tools can do you will find new techniques to use on your images. Not every
experiment will work out, but that’s part of the learning process, and the fun.
In this book I’m going to take you on a journey through the Lightroom techniques
you can use to turn your landscape photos into monochrome masterpieces.
4 | The Lightroom Landscape

Notes
Screen shots are taken from a MacBook Pro using OS X. If you are a PC user your Keyboard shortcuts: Although I will mention the most useful keyboard shortcuts,
screen will look different. Most of the differences are minor, and down to the I won’t use them all. Most of the time I will guide you to the appropriate menu
operating system not the program – on the whole Lightroom looks the same most option (i.e Photo > Add to Target Collection). If a shortcut exists, it will be listed
of the time in both Windows and Mac OS X. next to the relevant option in the menu (in this case, the shortcut is ‘B’). You can
also bring up a list of keyboard shortcuts relevant to the module you’re in by
These techniques work in both Lightroom 6 and Lightroom CC. Most will also pressing Cmd-/ (PC: Ctrl-/) at any time.
work in Lightroom 5 and Lightroom 4. There’s a note in the text when tools are
unavailable in earlier versions of Lightroom. Terminology: Photoshop comes in several versions: Photoshop Elements,
Photoshop CS, Photoshop CC and Photoshop Lightroom. For the sake of simplicity,
I would also like to clarify the way shortcuts are used in this book: I will use the term Photoshop to refer interchangeably to Photoshop Elements,
Photoshop CS and Photoshop CC, and Lightroom to refer to Photoshop Lightroom.
Right-clicking: On a PC you can right-click just about anywhere in Lightroom to
bring up a contextual menu. If you’re a Mac user and you use an Apple mouse
right-click may be disabled. If so, you can access the contextual menu by holding Left: Right-click on a PC
the Control key down when you click. Or, you can enable right-clicking (System or Ctrl-click on a Mac to
Preferences > Mouse) even with a single-button Apple mouse. Another solution bring up a contextual
is to use a Windows mouse – the Mac OS X recognizes it and enables right-clicking. menu like this. Contextual
I find the right-click invaluable, and will mention it frequently in the ebook. So menus act as a shortcut to
please don’t get confused if you also use a Mac and right-clicking doesn’t work. commonly used functions
in the Lightroom menus.
Command/Control keys: Keyboard shortcuts on the Mac often use the Command The options presented are
key. Windows keyboards use the Control key instead. I will list the Mac shortcut in related to the part of the
the ebook with the PC shortcut in brackets, like this: Cmd-S (PC: Ctrl-S). program you click on.

Gallery
I’m going to show you two versions of some of my favorite
black and white landscapes. One is the finished image, after
I developed it in Lightroom. The other is the original Raw file
as it came out of the camera. The only change I have made is
to set Treatment to Black & White.
There are two things I’d like to demonstrate. The first is that
it’s possible to dramatically improve an image through the
developing process alone. Hopefully this will encourage
you to process some photos whose potential you may have
overlooked.
The other is to give you an insight into the thought process,

what Ansel Adams called visualization.
With practice and experience you can look at a scene and see
the adjustments you’d like to make in Lightroom. It’s exciting
to be able to visualize how the developed image might
look while you are taking it. It creates positive energy that
encourages you to open Lightroom as quickly as possible
and develop your photos.

Island Bay, Wellington
I made this landscape in New
Zealand. I used an exposure of 60
seconds to blur the sea.
Increase contrast across the

image, and make sky slightly
darker.
Keep the smooth gray tones in the

sea and sky.
The concrete jetty has beautiful

texture but the flat lighting does
nothing to bring it out. I want to
increase texture and detail here
so the jetty becomes the most eye
catching element in the photo,
pulling the viewer’s gaze through
the photo to the island and cliffs
in the distance.
Above: Unprocessed Raw file

This page: Processed file.

Island Bay, New Zealand | Fujifilm X-Pro 1, 18mm, 60 seconds @ f8, ISO 200
Gorafe, Spain
This photo captures the arid
landscape of southern Spain. I
wanted the developing to bring out
the textures of the dry earth and
distant hills.
Darken the sky and bring back as

much detail as possible.
Make the hill and the land

containing the farm house lighter
so they stand out.
Bring out the texture and detail in

the foreground.
Make the farmhouse and the road

leading to it lighter to emphasize
the line running through the
image to the farmhouse, which is
a focal point.

Above: Processed file. Gorafe, Spain | Fujifilm X-T1, 14mm, 1/180 @ f4.5, ISO 400

Asturias, Spain
The light was very flat when I made
this photo. I needed to add contrast
and bring out the textures in the
rocks to bring it to life.
Make the sky darker.
Straighten the horizon and crop

to a panorama to emphasize the
long shape made by the rock
formations on the horizon.
Add contrast to the rocks

and sea stacks.
Crop to a panorama to emphasize

the long shape made by the rock
formations on the horizon.

Above: Processed file. Asturias, Spain | Fujifilm X-T1, 14mm, 160 seconds @ f11, ISO 200

Peak District, UK
The plug holes in Ladybower
Reservoir are a popular place for
local landscape photographers.
I was there on a cloudy day and
the lack of sunlight meant the hill
and dam wall lacked contrast and
definition. While developing the
photo in Lightroom I realized that
a dramatic crop was required to
remove the uninteresting parts of
the photo.
Crop the gray blob made by

the dam wall and the hill.
Add contrast to the water

rushing down the plug hole.

Above: Processed file. Ladybower Reservoir, England | Fujifilm X-T1, 14mm, 30 seconds @ f8, ISO 200

Asturias, Spain
Another long exposure landscape
from northern Spain, this one
created with a shutter speed of 120
seconds.
Increase contrast across the

image, and make sky darker.
Bring out the textures of all the

stones and the sea near the cliffs.
Make the rocks in the foreground

darker to frame the rest of the
scene.

Above: Processed file. Asturias, Spain | Fujifilm X-T1, 18mm, 125 seconds @ f11, ISO 200

Granada, Spain
A mid-afternoon photo showing the
Alhambra palace on a hill above the
Spanish city of Granada.
Make the sky darker.
Emphasize the textures of the

palace so that the dramatic
buildings stand out from the rest
of the photo.
Lighten the shadows so that more

detail is revealed.
Crop the photo to a panorama so

that the distracting detail in the
foreground is cropped away.

Above: Processed file. Granada, Spain | Fujifilm X-T1, 35mm, 1/125 @ f6.4, ISO 200

Case Study One:
Sheepstor, Dartmoor,
England

Behind the photo
Dartmoor is a place of mystery and beauty. Its tors have their place in literature and
legend. On this autumnal evening I met with a friend who had spent his day taking
photos on the moor. Sheepstor was his last stop for the day.
We parked our cars and walked up the hillside. There were outcrops of weathered
boulders, scattered around as if cast by a giant hand. As we arrived at the top the
stones in this photo caught my eye, and I knew that I had found my subject.
My wife had come too and she walked above me, taking photos. She wandered
into the frame, and I pressed the shutter button. This photo (right) is interesting as
it shows how color and black and white express mood differently.
The sun was setting as I took the photo, hidden by clouds. I had set the camera’s
White Balance to Daylight. It gave the scene a blue cast, which I kept in Lightroom
as it captured the mood of the place at dusk.
This photo aside, I had intended to work in black and white from the start.
Monochrome emphasizes the textures of the boulders and their dramatic shapes.
For the main photo (previous page) I stopped my lens down to f11 and focused on Dartmoor, UK | Fujifilm X-T1, 18mm, 1/125 @ f8, ISO 800
the hyperfocal distance. Then I needed to find a good composition, making sure
that there was something interesting in the foreground.
If there were more clouds in the sky I would have liked to experiment with neutral
density filters and long exposure photography. But the sky was clear, and with no
clouds to move during a long a exposure there was little point.

Black and white workflow in Lightroom
One of the changes brought about by digital photography is that you don’t have
to decide whether you are going to convert a photo to black and white until you Workflow #2: You start with a fully processed color photo, then make a Virtual
are in Lightroom. With film it was different. Photographers decided from the outset Copy and convert it to black and white. This is the workflow of somebody who
to work in monochrome and put black and white films in their cameras. They were wants to develop a Raw file in both color and monochrome. You could also take
committed. Digital photographers don’t have to be. this approach if you were looking through old work to see which color photos
would look good in black and white.
You will probably make your best black and white landscape photos if you intend
to work in black and white from the start. That way you can work with the end Workflow #3: You start by developing a photo in black and white, then make a
result in mind. This is called visualization – the ability to see with your mind’s Virtual Copy and convert it to color. It’s the reverse of the second workflow.
eye just how the scene in front of you will look after it’s converted to black and
white in Lightroom. As you saw in the gallery you can think about the developing The implications are interesting because black and white images require more
techniques you will use, such as making the sky darker, or applying Clarity to bring contrast and Clarity than color ones. When you convert a black and white photo to
out texture. color you usually have to remove contrast and Clarity otherwise the image looks
over processed.
But sometimes you just happen to realize that a photo you have already taken, and
processed in color, would also work rather well in black and white. If I am working with long exposure photos or infrared images, I use the first
workflow. Otherwise, it’s usually the second.
These different approaches lead to three slightly different Lightroom workflows.
By the way, if you are looking through old photos to see which ones you would like
Workflow #1: Your intent is to create a black and white image from the start. You to convert to black and white it’s a good idea to just pick your best. It can take a
shoot with your camera in monochrome mode, convert the photo to black and long time to convert a photo properly, so why waste it on anything less than your
white straight away, and are not even interested in how it looks in color. best work?

Working with Virtual Copies
If develop your photos in color first (the
second workflow) you can use Virtual Copies
to help convert them to black and white.
Virtual Copies are exact replicas of the

original image, including all metadata and
Develop module settings. Once you have
created a Virtual Copy (Photo > Create
Virtual Copy) any changes you make to it are
applied to the Virtual Copy only and not the
original.
Developing an image is an act of

interpretation. Most photos are open to more
than one. Using Virtual Copies lets you make
as many interpretations of a photo as you like.
Virtual Copies let you experiment and have

fun. Go ahead and give yourself permission to
try different things in Lightroom. You’ll make
some of your most interesting discoveries this
way.
Right: Three images, each with a Virtual

Copy that I converted to black and white.

Before you start
There are a couple of important things you need to do in the Develop module
before you start developing your photo.
1. Use the Spot Removal tool to get rid of any dust spots.
2. Set White Balance to Auto so that the color balance of the photo is more or less
neutral. Photos with strong color casts are harder to convert to black and white.
3. If you are converting a photo that you have already processed in color make and
use a Virtual Copy. This is so you don’t lose the work you have done on the original.
Analyze your photo

This takes practice and becomes easier the more you convert photos to black and
white. The idea is to decide what you want to achieve with your conversion. For
example, with my photo I can see that:
• The sky is too bright. It needs to be darker.
• The rocks have beautiful textures that should be emphasized.

Above: My photo – dust spots removed,
• The photo has atmosphere created by shooting at dusk and that should also be neutral color balance set, analysis done.
emphasized as much as possible.
This analysis helps you set some goals for your conversion. Once you know where
you are going, you can think about the best techniques to use to get there.

Converting to black and white
There are two ways you can tell Lightroom to process a photo in black and white
(assuming that you haven’t already applied a black and white preset during the
import process).
1. Go to the Basic panel and set Treatment to Black & White.
2. Go to the HSL / Color / B&W panel and click on the letters B&W in the panel
heading.
Both these options have exactly the same effect in the latest versions of Lightroom
(CC 2015.7 and 6.7 or newer). Lightroom automatically sets the color sliders in the
B&W panel to what it thinks is best. The sliders tend to look like the ones on the
diagram on the right, curving around in an S shape.
In earlier versions of Lightroom you have the option of going to the Presets tab in Above: The typical S curve of the Above: The sliders zeroed. If you
Preferences and unticking the Apply auto mix when first converting to black B&W sliders when Lightroom applies move a slider away from the auto mix
and white box. Lightroom then leaves the color sliders in the B&W panel at their auto mix. The exact settings vary position the Auto button (circled)
zeroed settings (see right). according to the photo converted. becomes clickable. Click it to return to
the auto mix settings.
If you want to see what the image looks like without the auto mix settings applied, A negative value for a slider means
click on the toggle in the heading of the HSL / Color / B&W panel to disable it. that Lightroom makes the tones
corresponding to that color darker. A
positive value means it makes them
lighter.

Above: Earlier versions of Lightroom give you the option of turning auto mix
off. Untick the Apply auto mix when first converting to black and white box
(marked above) to make this happen.
Tip: Go to the History panel in the left-hand panels in the Develop module.
Right-click on the Convert to Black & White entry (above) and select Copy
History Settings to Before.
Now, when you press the backslash key (‘\’) to see the before version of the
photo, you will see the initial black and white conversion made by Lightroom.
This helps you see whether the changes you make in Lightroom have
Above: If you are using the latest version of Lightroom CC or Lightroom 6 this improved upon the initial conversion.
option is missing. If you prefer Lightroom not to apply auto mix settings, you
can create a Develop Preset to use instead.

Above: My photo with Lightroom’s auto mix settings applied. These settings Above: Set the toggle in the HSL / Color / B&W panel (circled above) to the off
made the grass darker, which I liked. But the Blue slider was set to +16, position to disable the effect of the B&W color slider settings. This lets you
making the sky lighter. I moved it to -25 to darken the sky. see effect of the auto mix settings and helps you decide whether they are
appropriate for your photo.

Tip: Set the background color to white to help you see accurately how light
the brightest tones in your photo are.
The photo in both screen shots on this page is identical. But the sky in the left-
hand photo looks darker because the background is set to mid-gray.
Change the background color by right-clicking anywhere on the background

(but not the photo itself) and selecting White from the menu (right).
If you are planning to print the photo on white paper this also helps you
visualize how the final print will look.

The histogram
Next I looked at the histogram, which told me that there were clipped highlights In my photo (above left) part of the sky is overexposed. The way the histogram is
(areas that have no detail because they are too bright). cut off on the right confirms this.
Go to View > Clipping (or use the J keyboard shortcut) to see which areas are I moved the Highlight slider left to -72 to bring back the detail in the sky and make
clipped. Clipped shadows are shown in blue, clipped highlights in red. it darker (above right). The histogram has shifted to the left and is no longer cut off
on the right. The red clipping warning has also disappeared.
Clipped shadows are not important, as long as the photo is not underexposed.
They are a natural part of the scene. Clipped highlights are another matter, because
neighboring tones tend to break apart and look unnatural.

Emphasizing texture
Next I wanted to bring out the texture of the rocks. Clarity is the best tool for this. With a global adjustment applied to the entire photo. The Clarity slider in the
The actual mechanics of Clarity slider are somewhat complicated, but the effect is Basic panel is a global adjustment.
that it increases edge contrast in mid-tones, emphasizing texture and detail.
With a local adjustment applied to part of the photo. Use the Adjustment Brush,
The above screen shots show how the photo looks with Clarity set to zero (left) Radial filter or Graduated filter.
and +100 (right). You won’t often need to push Clarity to +100, I’ve done it here
purely to illustrate the difference between the two settings. Global adjustments are usually applied before local adjustments, although as with
most settings in Lightroom you can move back and forth between them until you
There are two ways to apply Clarity. get the effect you want.

In this photo I decided to apply
Clarity as a local adjustment to the
rocks. I didn’t apply Clarity to the
sky as I wanted it to stay smooth
and provide a little visual contrast
against the rougher textures of the
rocks.
I used a Graduated filter to apply

the Clarity adjustment to the rocks. I
started by pulling the filter up from
the bottom of the screen (and set
the Clarity slider within the filter to
+87).
The screen shot on this page shows

the mask created by the Graduated
filter in red.

Adobe introduced a very useful
feature in Lightroom 6 and
Lightroom CC that gives you even
more control over the Graduated
filter (you can also use this feature Click Brush to reveal the
with the Radial filter). Adjustment Brush options
under the Graduated filter.
There are three options at the top of
the Graduated filter panel.
New. Create a new Graduated filter.
Edit. Adjust the sliders for the

selected Graduated filter.
Brush. This is the new setting. When

you click on it Lightroom reveals a
brush tool underneath the sliders
that you can use to alter the shape
of the mask.
Select A or B to use the Adjustment

Brush to add to the mask created by
the Graduated filter. Select Erase to
remove part of it.

the Graduated filter mask after I
used the brush to erase part of it.
I deliberately erased the mask

covering the tops of the rocks. I did
this because the increase in Clarity
(to +87) created a white halo around
the top of the rocks.
If you have Lightroom 5 or earlier

you can use the Adjustment Brush
to create a mask with this shape.
You can see the result of the local

Clarity adjustment on the next page.

the photo so far. It needs two more
local adjustments.
The first is to make the rock in the

foreground darker. It is too bright
and pulls the viewer’s eye from the
main rock stack.
The second is to make the rock

stack brighter, so the eye goes to it
naturally.
The Adjustment Brush is the ideal

tool for both local adjustments.
Make this rock darker Make these rocks lighter

Above: The mask created by the first Adjustment Brush. Above: I set Highlights to -95 and Exposure to -0.70 to make the rock darker.

Above: The mask created by the second Adjustment Brush. I took care to Above: I set Exposure to +0.72 to make the rocks lighter and Clarity to +19 to
create this mask, zooming in and making sure that it didn’t overlap the sky. add some texture and detail.

Above: Next I created a new mask with another Adjustment Brush to cover Above: I set Highlights to -100 to make this area darker. This was the final step
part of the rocks that had become too bright. in the developing process for this photo.

Above: To see the difference that the Adjustment Brush has made click the Above: When the toggle is in the up position (above) it shows you the photo
toggle in the bottom left corner of the Adjustment Brush panel. When it’s in with all Adjustment Brushes. This is a quick way of seeing whether your local
the down position (above) it shows you the photo without your Adjustment adjustments have improved the photo.
Brushes.
Note: You can also do this with Graduated filters and Radial filters.

You can see the finished version of
the photo on the right. The original
image, after the initial black and
white conversion in Lightroom, is
below.
Sheepstor, England | Fujifilm X-T1, 14mm, 1/14 @ f11, ISO 200

Case Study Two:
Playa de Illa, Galicia,
Spain

39
Behind the photo
The Playa de Illa is one of my favorite beaches in
northern Spain. At high tide the sea comes almost
up to the cliffs. At low tide it goes out far enough
to let you walk along to neighboring beaches and
enjoy the spectacular views.
It was cloudy when I took this photo so I decided

to try some long exposure photography. I tried
to compose the image so that the sand in the
foreground led the eye through the frame to the + =
rock stacks on the horizon. But it didn’t work within
the narrow rectangle of the 35mm frame. I decided
to work in the square format instead.
My 35mm lens framed the rock stacks perfectly,

but the focal length was too long to include the
beach in the foreground. Switching to a shorter
focal length pushed the rock stacks further into the
distance, which I didn’t like.
The solution was to take two landscape orientation

photos and merge them together in Lightroom to
make a square format image (sometimes called
a vertorama if you search for this technique on
Google). The diagram on this page shows how it
works.

The square format
The square format is used a lot in long exposure photography. Working within the
square frame encourages a minimalist style of composition built on shape, tonal
contrast and clever use of negative space.
If your camera has Live View or an electronic viewfinder then it’s easy to work with
the square format. Most cameras give you a choice of aspect ratio. If you select the
square format, the camera displays the cropped image in Live View or an electronic
viewfinder (but not in an optical viewfinder). It’s even more effective if you set the
camera to its monochrome mode so you can see the scene in black and white. Rock stacks on
horizon (the main
If you have an older camera without the aspect ratio setting you can crop the subject)
image in Lightroom.
A disadvantage of cropping is that you lose some of the photo (cropping a 35mm
image to square removes a third of the image). This may not be ideal if you intend
to make large prints. But you can get around it by combining two rectangular
images together to make a larger photo, giving you lots more pixels to work with.
This technique works best if you have a tilt-shift lens, as you can use the shift
movement to take photos that merge with a minimum of distortion. It works nearly Negative space created by Foreground
as well, but with less precision and an element of guesswork, with ordinary lenses. smooth sky and sea
Above: The composition of this square format photo is very simple. There
are three main elements – the rock stacks on the horizon, the beach in the
foreground and the negative space created by the sea and the sky, smoothed
out during a long exposure of 58 seconds.

Merge to Panorama workflow
In Lightroom 6 or CC you can merge photos using the Merge to Panorama tool.
In earlier versions of Lightroom you have to export your photos to a program like
Photoshop or Photoshop Elements.
The workflow starts when you take the photos. Use Manual mode and set the same
ISO, aperture and shutter speed for each photo (assuming that the light levels stay
constant). This gives you two images with same depth of field and brightness and
makes the merging process straightforward.
You need a good deal of overlap – at least 30% – between the images so that
Lightroom can merge them properly (right).
You can process the photos before you merge them. Lightroom applies most of
the settings in the most selected image (normally the first photo) to the merged Above: Make sure the images overlap
image. The exceptions are: by at least 30% for a good quality
merge
• Local adjustments (Graduated filter, Radial filter and Adjustment Brush).
• Spot healing.
• Crop adjustments.
• In the Lens Correction panel, the Defringe settings are the only ones carried
over.
Lightroom applies lens corrections automatically to both photos before merging

them. It will let you know if it can’t find a lens profile for your lens.

These empty areas indicate that there are
no shadows or highlights in the photo. It is
made up entirely of mid-gray tones.
Above: The histogram shows that the

photo’s tones fall within a narrow range
of what the camera’s sensor is capable of
recording. To make the image look better,
we need to use the Tone sliders in the
Above: I took the photos on a warm summer evening. The combination of Basic panel to add contrast and expand
humid air and sea spray reduced the scene’s contrast. The histogram shows the histogram so that it reaches the edges
that the image is very flat, without highlights or any true blacks. of the graph.

Left: The quickest way to add
contrast is to use the Whites and
Blacks sliders.
As you move the Whites slider

right, the histogram expands
and moves closer to the right of
the graph. The idea is push the
histogram up against the edge of
the graph without going over.
The same happens on the left side

of the histogram when you move
the Blacks slider left.
Lightroom can do this for you

automatically. Double click on the
word Whites and the word Blacks Above: This is the result. The photo has a lot
while holding the Shift key down more contrast. You can adjust the settings
(marked left) to make this work. selected by Lightroom. The highlights were
When I did this Lightroom set too bright, so I set Whites to -79.
Whites to +86 and Blacks to -79.

As you develop the photo bear in mind that Lightroom doesn’t carry over local
adjustments and spot healing to the merged image. At this stage you should
get the image more or less how you want it, then apply the same settings to the
second photo so they match. Here’s how you do it.
1. Go to the Grid module and select the image you just processed. Go to Photo 2. Tick all the boxes except Local Adjustments, Transform, Spot Removal and
> Develop Settings > Copy Settings (you’ll also find the same option if you Crop. Click the Copy button.
right-click on the thumbnail).

This is the most
selected image.
3. Click the second image to select it. Go to Photo > Develop Settings > Paste 4. Hold down the Cmd key (Mac) or Ctrl key (PC) and click on the first
Settings (or right-click to bring up the same option). Lightroom pastes the thumbnail so that both photos are selected. One image has a lighter frame
selected settings and updates the thumbnail. than the other. This indicates that it’s the most selected image. If both photos
are developed identically then it doesn’t matter which is the most selected.
It’s easy to change the most selected image. Click once on the left thumbnail
to select it, then hold the Cmd or Ctrl key down and click on the right
thumbnail to add it to the selection. The first photo you select is always the
most selected image.

5. Go to Photo > Photo Merge > Panorama (also available in the right-click 6. Lightroom creates a new Raw DNG file with the suffix -Pano and saves it in
menu). The Panorama Merge Preview window opens. Set Projection to the same folder as the original files.
Spherical and Boundary Warp to zero. Click Merge.
You can develop the new DNG file exactly the same way as any other Raw file.
This makes the merge process in Lightroom a lot more efficient than sending
large TIFF files to Photoshop.

7. For some reason Lightroom changed the tone settings during the merge, 8. I clicked the Crop Overlay tool (marked above) and set Aspect to 1:1. I
and made the photo brighter. The next step was to crop the image, but it was dragged and resized the square to find the best composition.
so bright it was difficult to see the edges. So I set Exposure to -2.0 to make it
darker. Now we can see the curved boundaries of the two merged images. Tip: Press the L key twice to enable Lights Out. This turns the background
black and makes it easier to crop the image.

9. Next, I moved the Exposure slider to the right to make the image brighter. 10. I added another Graduated filter further up in the frame and moved the
Then I added a Graduated filter over the sky. I moved the Highlights and Highlights slider left to darken the top part of the sky.
Exposure sliders left to make the sky darker. Then I used the Adjustment
Brush to erase the part of the filter that covered the rocks stacks and the sea.
You can see the mask above.

11. I set Clarity to +44 to bring out the texture of the rock stacks and sand. 12. This screen shot shows the final image. You may that the histogram
doesn’t reach all the way to the right side of the graph. This indicates that
Part of the rock was quite dark, so I used the Adjustment Brush to select that there are no true highlights in the photo, something that’s easily confirmed by
area and moved the Shadows slider right to reveal the detail. The screen shot looking at it.
shows the area covered by the mask.

Photo files and backup
This is my system for saving and backing up photo files.
• Keep all your original photo files, whether they are Raw or JPEG, in a master
folder on an external hard drive.
• Subdivide the master folder using a single folder for each year.
• Within each year folder create twelve new folders, one for each month.
• Within each of those folders create a new folder for each shoot.
• Copy the master folder to two external hard drives, giving you two backups of
your photos. Keep one of those drives off site in case of burglary or fire.
The advantage of this method is that it’s easy to carry out and doesn’t require any Above: The 2016 folder on my hard Above: Each of those folders contains
cloning or back up software. You can see right away if the folders containing your drive contains 12 folders, one for as many folders as required to store
most recent photos have been backed up. each month. the photos taken in that month.
This system makes it easy to see at a
But a problem occurs when you use Merge to Panorama or Merge to HDR. glance which files need to be backed
Lightroom creates a new DNG file and saves it in the same folder as the originals. If up.
you’ve already backed that folder up then the new DNG file won’t be copied over.
The solution is simple. Whenever you use the Merge function and create a new
DNG file, you should also create a new folder on your external hard drive that you
can move it to. The new folder should go in the current month’s folder. You can
back it up to your other hard drives at the end of the month.

3. Give the new folder a name and make sure you tick the Include
selected photos box. Click the Create button. Lightroom adds a
1. Go to Grid view in the Library module and select the DNG file that you want new folder to your hard drive and saves the selected DNG file in
to move to a new folder. the new folder.
2. Go to the Folders panel, right click on the folder to which you want to add 4. It’s easy to add another DNG file to the same folder. Select the DNG file
the new folder (the one that’s going to hold the DNG file) and click the Create you want to move. Go to the Folder panel again, right click on the folder you
Folder Inside option. created earlier and select Move Selected Photo to this Folder. You can repeat
the process for TIFF files created by sending photos to be edited in plug-ins.

The finished photo is on the right.
The originals are below.

Galicia, Spain | Fujifilm X-T1, 35mm, 58 seconds @ f11, ISO 200
Case Study Three:
Playa de Buelna,
Asturias, Spain

Behind the photo
The Playa de Buelna is one of many beautiful beaches in Asturias, a
province in northern Spain. It’s a small beach, and every time that I
went there were only a few people there, enjoying the solitude and the
remarkable beauty.
This particular evening there were three other people on the beach – a
woman watching her two daughters as they swam in the sea. While we
waited for sunset a group of photographers came and took some photos
of the rock you see in this photo. They didn’t stay long, and soon moved
on elsewhere.
As I set up the tripod a group of three walkers wearing large backpacks

passed by. The shells hanging from their packs indicated they were on the
Camino de Santiago, the walking route that crosses northern Spain and
arrives at the Galician city of Santiago de Compestela. They were looking
for a place to camp for the night.
It was a still, cloudy evening, perfect for long exposure photography. I

started off using a wide-angle lens and made some photos like the one
on the right, showing the rock at the head of the small bay that leads to
the beach.
Then I switched to my 56mm lens and made the photo you see on the
previous page. This lens is a short telephoto on my crop sensor Fujifilm
X-T1 camera, and has the same field of view as a focal length of 84mm
on a full-frame camera. The change in focal length allowed me to take

a completely different approach to composition. The photo taken
with the 18mm lens (previous page) shows the rock in context, and
includes the cliffs so you can see the entire scene. I included some
ferns in the foreground to add interest and lead the eye through the
frame to the rock.
The 56mm lens brings the rock in closer and eliminates the context.
It’s a semi-abstract image. I used a six stop neutral density filter and a
shutter speed of 160 seconds. The clouds and the sea moved during
the exposure, blurring and removing texture and detail from the sky
and the sea. I set aspect ratio to 1:1 as the simple composition suited
the square format.
My aim during the developing stage was to emphasize the difference

in texture between the hard, uneven surface of the rock and the much
smoother sea and sky.
First steps – adding contrast

The photo is flat and lacks contrast. This is confirmed by the histogram
which has a small gap on the left side and a larger one on the right.
The histogram’s peaks show us where the majority of the tones in the
image fall.
This lack of contrast is a natural result of shooting in flat light. As there The histogram confirms the
is nothing white in this photo there is no need to force the histogram image lacks contrast. The peaks
to reach to the right. Instead, I would like to emphasize and explore indicate that the image mainly
the beautiful gray tones of the sea and the sky. contains light gray tones.

Adding clarity
I wanted to add Clarity to this photo to bring Above right: The photo
out the beautiful textures and the detail in the with Clarity at zero. The
rock. It’s tempting to apply Clarity as a global image is flat and lacks life.
adjustment. But look at what happens to this
image when I do that.
The screen shots on the right tell the story. I

set Clarity to +78 to bring out the texture of
the rock, and Shadows to +48 to compensate
for the way the Clarity slider made the image
darker. The rock looks much more interesting.
But it also increased the texture and the detail
in the sea.
Below right: The photo

with Clarity set to +78. The
rock looks much better,
but it brought out too
much texture in the sea.

There are times when you may want apply Clarity as a global adjustment, but in
this case I decided that I wanted the sea (and clouds) to be as smooth as possible. I
didn’t want to lose the wonderful, subtle gray tones.
So I took the opposite approach and set Clarity to -26 in the Basic panel (above
right). This softened the texture in the sea and clouds, making them smooth and
dreamlike.
Then I zoomed in and used the Adjustment Brush to create a mask covering the
rock. I set Clarity to +100 and Shadows to +15. The local adjustment cancelled out
the negative global Clarity setting (-26), added extra Clarity and compensated for
the natural tendency of Clarity to make the tones darker. The screen shot bottom
right shows the mask.

Next, I right-clicked the pin representing the Adjustment Brush
and chose Duplicate to create another Adjustment Brush with
exactly the same settings as the first. The Clarity slider only
goes up to +100. If you want more Clarity you can use this
technique to layer one Clarity adjustment on top of the other.
You can then adjust the sliders in the duplicate Adjustment
Brush to whatever settings you need.
The underneath of the rock was still quite dark, so I created

another Adjustment Brush to lighten that area (I set Shadows
to +61). The screen shot below right shows the mask created
by the Adjustment Brush.

These two screen shots show the before (top) and after
(bottom) results of the local adjustments carried out with the
Adjustment Brush in the previous pages.

Next I applied a Graduated filter to the sky and set Exposure to -0.44 to darken
the top edge of the sky. I used the Adjustment Brush to erase the bottom part
of the mask where it covered the sea and the rock. The screen shot (above right)
shows the area covered by the mask.
Finally I pushed the Highlights slider in the Basic panel right to lighten the
highlights and give the image bit of a lift (bottom right).

The original image, after the initial
black and white conversion, is
below.

Asturias, Spain | Fujifilm X-T1, 56mm, 160 seconds @ f8, ISO 200
Case Study Four:
Playa de Buelna, Asturias, Spain in
Silver Efex Pro 2

Silver Efex Pro 2
In the previous case study I showed you another photo that I made at the Playa de • It uses Control Points rather than Adjustment Brushes, Radial filters and
Buelna. It’s ideal for showing you how you can use one of my favorite black and Graduated filters for local adjustments. Whether you see this as a benefit
white plug-ins, Silver Efex Pro 2, for converting your landscape photos to black and depends on the way you prefer to work, but there’s no doubt that Control Points
white. Silver Efex Pro 2 used to cost a lot of money, but is now free. Download it and are a very good way of making local adjustments.
have fun!
• Silver Efex Pro 2 comes bundled with the other plug-ins in the Nik Collection. It
A disadvantage of using Silver Efex Pro 2 rather than Lightroom is that it breaks the won’t be hard to find uses for them. At the very least you’ll have some new toys
Lightroom workflow. When you export a photo to the plug-in Lightroom converts to play with!
the photo to a 16 bit TIFF file (note, this depends on your settings in Preferences
> External Editing) and saves it in the same folder as the original Raw file. TIFF • The history panel makes it very easy to see what you have done to the photo,
files are large, and soon eat into your hard drive space, but if you can live with this and make comparisons between different stages of processing.
then there are many benefits to using Silver Efex Pro 2 for your black and white
conversions. • You can add borders to your images in Silver Efex Pro 2.
Remember, you can always convert those huge TIFF files to JPEG once you have • If you like to emulate film Silver Efex Pro 2 lets you emulate the grain structures
finished editing them to save on hard drive space. You’ll appreciate the space of 18 commonly used black and white films.
saving if you use Silver Efex Pro 2 regularly.
• Silver Efex Pro 2 supports the zone system way of working.
Silver Efex Pro 2 has several advantages over Lightroom.
If you don’t have it already, you can download the Nik Collection from www.
• It gives you more control over mid-tone contrast. Silver Efex Pro 2 calls this google.com/nikcollection/.
Structure, rather than Clarity. There are several Structure sliders to use compared
with Lightroom’s single slider.
• There’s an extensive set of presets that you can use as starting points for your
conversion. There are also presets for toning.

First steps
The first step is to prepare the image in a similar way to how you would do
it if you were going to develop the photo in Lightroom. The key difference
is that you need to send a color photo, not a black and white one, to Silver
Efex Pro 2.
Remove dust spots, set a neutral color balance, and make basic tonal
adjustments so the photo looks more or less okay to your eye. There is no
need to increase contrast, even if the photo is very flat, or increase Clarity,
as you will do these things in Silver Efex Pro 2. The color photo I started
with is shown on the right.
When you’re ready go to Photo > Edit In > Silver Efex Pro 2. You can do
this from the Library or Develop modules. Right-clicking on the photo also
brings up this option (below).

Above: Going to Photo > Edit Right: If you click the gray arrow next to the
In > Silver Efex Pro 2 opens a words Copy File Options Lightroom shows
window like the one above. Make you some extra options. My recommended
sure Edit a Copy with Lightroom settings are shown on the right. 16 bit TIFF
Adjustments is selected (it’s the files give Silver Efex Pro 2 the maximum
only available option if you’re amount of information to work with and
processing a Raw file). help you obtain a better black and white
conversion. You can also set these under
External Editing in Preferences.

Click these buttons Click these icon
to show or hide the to change the
side panels. background color.
The Silver Efex Pro 2 interface has

a similar layout to Lightroom’s
Develop module. The panels on the
right are for developing your image.
The panels on the left are where you
find Silver Efex Pro 2’s presets and
history.

The presets are divided Click the Compare button to see how the current
into categories. preset compares to the original neutral conversion.
Click a thumbnail to apply the

preset to your photo.
Click on the star icon to add a

preset to your favorites.

Your first task is to select a preset. By
default Silver Efex Pro 2 uses a Neutral
preset that is similar to the action of
setting Saturation to zero in Lightroom.
You can go with this or chose another.
Bear in mind that presets are a starting

point. If you like what a preset but it has
something like a border or a split tone
you don’t want, the bits you dislike are
easily removed.
I decided to use the Dark Sepia preset

as my starting point as I liked the dark,
moody feel it gave the image.
Above: Wet Rocks preset Above: Dark Sepia preset Above: Antique Plate preset

I used the Global Adjustments sliders to apply Structure to the midtones and
shadows and make the mid-tones brighter. The sliders I moved are marked
below, the photo after making these adjustments is shown on the right, and
the settings are explained in detail on the next page.
Dark Sepia preset settings Settings after my adjustments

The Brightness controls are similar to the Tone
sliders in Lightroom’s Basic panel. The main
difference is that Silver Efex Pro 2 gives you direct
control over midtones with a Midtones slider. This
enables you to make an image brighter (or darker)
without overly affecting the highlights or shadows.
Dynamic Brightness is similar to Lightroom’s
Exposure slider. It adjusts brightness while trying
The Contrast slider works the same way as the to preserve highlight and shadow detail.
one in Lightroom. Amplify Whites and Amplify
Blacks are similar to the Blacks and White sliders
in Lightroom’s Basic panel. Soft Contrast is
interesting – it seems to increase Contrast in a
subtle way, applying a subtle soft focus effect at
the same time.
The Structure sliders are similar to Lightroom’s
Clarity slider but give you far more control by
letting you apply it to the Highlights, Midtones
and Shadows separately. Fine structure affects
small details and is a far more subtle effect. I
increased Structure in the Shadows and Midtones
to bring out the texture and detail in the greenery
and the cliffs.
The Tonality Protection sliders help prevent

Shadows and Highlights clipping. Move the sliders
right to bring back detail in both areas.

Click this button to add
Local adjustments in Silver Efex Pro 2 a new Control Point.
Silver Efex Pro 2 uses Control Points to make local
adjustments. It doesn’t take long to learn how to use them,
although they are not as simple as Lightroom’s Graduated
and Radial filters.
When you add a Control Point Silver Efex Pro 2 analyzes the
color and tone of the pixels below the point and applies
the adjustment to surrounding pixels of similar tone and
color. You can set both the size of the area affected by the
Control Point and the effect using the sliders underneath.
You can control Brightness (BR), Contrast (Co), Structure
(St), Amplify Whites (AW), Amplify Blacks (AB), Fine
Structure (FS) and Selective Coloring (SC). You’ll need to
click the black triangle below the pin to see the last four
sliders.
Each Control Point is represented Tick or untick these boxes to turn the
Use the buttons in the Selective Adjustments panel to by a yellow pin. Control Points on and off. Click on a
duplicate Control Points, arrange them in groups and turn Control Point to activate it. The active
them on and off. The top slider controls the size of Control Point is shown in yellow.
the area affected by the Control
You can click and drag Control Points to move them around Point. Click this toggle to turn all Control
the image. The effect changes according to the colors and Points on and off.
tones of the pixels under the center of the Control Point. Click this triangle to hide or reveal
the bottom four sliders. Click this button to duplicate the
active Control Point.
Click this button to delete the active

Control Point.

Above: I placed three Control Points over the sky and moved the Brightness Above: Click the Show / hide selection for all Control Points button (marked
slider left to make the sky darker. This adjustment is similar to using above) to see the selection created by the added Control Points. The selection
Lightroom’s Graduated filter. is shown in white. It’s graduated and covers an area greater than that
indicated by the Control Point circles. Use this information to set the size of
Note: You won’t see a display like this in Silver Efex Pro 2. I combined three your Control Points.
screen shots in Photoshop so you can see where I put the Control Points.

I finished by adding another Control
Point to the rock and increasing
Brightness, Structure and Fine
Structure to make it stand out a
little more.
Click Save when you have finished processing

the photo. Silver Efex Pro 2 closes and returns to
Lightroom.

The final image, created in Silver Efex Pro 2, is on the right.
For comparison purposes there’s another version of the
photo, created in Lightroom, below.

Case Study Five:
Ocuri Roman Ruins,
Andalucia, Spain

Behind the photo
The remains of the ancient Roman town Ocuri lay on a hill amongst the white • Lightroom creates natural looking HDR photos rather than the oversaturated,
villages of Andalucia in southern Spain. The views indicate the Romans picked a high contrast images sometimes created with other programs.
good spot to build it.
• It may be a better option than exposure blending, where you send two photos
When we arrived the air was clear but cool, and the sky was blue – a typical winter’s taken with different exposure settings to Photoshop and combine the correctly
day in the hills. The site is only open to the public at certain times, which meant we exposed parts of both into a new image using masks and layers.
couldn’t return at sunset.
First steps – preparing the images
I liked the contrast between the rough texture of the rocks and the organic forms of You will get the best results if you use a tripod to make sure the photos are aligned.
the trees growing amongst the ruins. But some of the most interesting trees were It’s possible to hand-hold the camera and let Lightroom align the photos during
backlit by the sun. So I bracketed the photos and used HDR merge in Lightroom to the merging process, but it’s not guaranteed to work perfectly.
create an image that retained detail in both sky and foreground.
You can merge as many photos as you want but you can get good results with just
HDR in Lightroom two images, one underexposed (to preserve highlight detail) and one overexposed
Lightroom 6 and Lightroom CC have a merge to HDR tool. In earlier versions of (to get good shadow detail).
Lightroom the only option is to export the images to Photoshop or a HDR plugin.
There are several advantages to using Lightroom. The exposure settings you should use depend partly on the brightness range of the
scene. But if you were to merge two photos then underexposing one by two stops
• Lightroom creates a 32 bit DNG file you can develop the same way as any other and overexposing the other by two stops is a good place to start.
Raw file. You can adjust White Balance, change the color profile, apply Develop
Presets and use all of Lightroom’s Develop module tools without restriction. There’s no harm in taking a sequence of bracketed photos. It’s better to have too
The Exposure slider values run from -10 to +10 (instead of the normal -4 to +4) many photos than too few. A sequence from -2 stops to +2 stops at one stop
because of the file’s extra bit depth. intervals should be more than enough. You can extend the exposure range if your
camera allows it. Experiment with merging two or more photos from the sequence
• There is less noise in the shadows than you would expect from a non-HDR file. to see what gives you the best result.

You can convert the photos to black and
white first, or leave them in color and
convert the HDR file. It’s up to you.
+
If you do any developing before merging
photos, remember that Lightroom doesn’t
carry all the settings across to the new
photo. These settings are taken from the
most selected image and applied to the
merged file. =
• Presence sliders (Saturation, Vibrance

and Clarity)
• HSL / Color / B&W panel
• Split toning panel
• Detail panel
• Lens Corrections (excluding Upright)
Earlier versions of Lightroom 6 and

Lightroom CC can only carry out the
merging process if they have access to the
original Raw files. Lightroom CC 2016.6 (but
not Lightroom 6) onwards lets you create a
merged HDR file from Smart Previews. But
the resulting Raw file has a length of 2540
pixels along the longest edge (the same as
a Smart Preview) and is not full-size.

1. Start in Grid View in the Library
module. Select the photos you
want to merge (alternatively you
can select them in the Filmstrip if The exposure settings show
you are in the Develop module). that there is two stops
difference between these
Go to Photo > Photo Merge > two images.
HDR. The same menu option is
available if you right-click one of
the images.

2. The HDR Merge Preview window I ticked the Auto Align box
opens and builds a preview of the HDR as the merged photos were
image. You may have to wait for it to hand held.
appear, especially if you are merging
more than two photos.
I didn’t need to choose a
The Auto Align and Auto Tone boxes Deghost Amount setting
are ticked by default, and Deghost as there was no subject
Amount set to None. Lightroom movement between
remembers the last settings used if exposures.
you have changed them.
Tick Auto Align if you hand held the

camera, and leave it unticked if you
used a tripod.
Auto Tone performs a similar function

to the Auto Tone settings in the Basic
Panel in the Develop module. Ticking
the box encourages Lightroom to
open up the shadows and lower the
exposure in highlights. Otherwise you
can untick it to see something closer to
the most selected image. Either way,
you can adjust the Tone sliders in the
Develop module afterwards to get the
look and feel you are after.

There are no presets and not many settings to
adjust. The aim is to let Lightroom produce a
natural looking HDR file for you to work on in
the Develop module.
Use the deghosting buttons if something in your

photo has moved between exposures. This is
most likely if you are photographing water or
there are people in the frame. When Deghosting
is enabled Lightroom uses the image data in the
most selected photo. Tick the Show Deghost
Overlay box to reveal the area in which
Lightroom has detected and attempted to clean
up ghosting (shown in red).
One weakness of the interface is that you can’t

zoom into a 100% view. You may become aware
of issues like ghosting only once you move
onto the Develop module and zoom in to 1:1
magnification. You can re-process the images if
this happens.
Click the Merge button when you’re done. Lightroom

saves the merged image as a 32-bit DNG file, with
the suffix -HDR appended to the file name. Now you
can work on the new photo in the Develop module.

Try moving the Exposure,
Highlights, Shadows, Whites and
Blacks sliders to see how much
difference they make to the image.
You can pull much more detail out
of both highlights and shadows of a
HDR file than a regular Raw file.
For this photo I moved the

Highlights and Whites sliders left
to bring back detail in the sky, and
the Shadows slider right to open
up the shadows. I also increased
Contrast to add some pop and
Clarity to bring out the detail in the
rocks and trees.

Next I went to the HSL / Color /
B&W panel.
Auto mix had been enabled

automatically. It tends to push the
Blue and Aqua sliders to the right,
which is often the opposite of the
effect photographers want when
including blue sky in their black and
white photos.
I moved the Aqua and Blue sliders

left to make the sky darker.

Finally I used the Adjustment Brush
to create a mask over the rock in
the foreground. I increased Clarity
to bring out the texture, then
moved the Shadows slider right
to compensate for the way Clarity
made the masked area darker. I
moved the Contrast slider left to
remove some of the extra contrast
added by the Clarity slider.

One stop overexposed
One stop underexposed
Andalucia, Spain | Fujifilm X-T1, 14mm, f8, ISO 200

The finished photo is shown above
on the right. The merged originals
are on the left.

Case Study Six:
Wells-Next-the-Sea,
Norfolk, England

Behind the photo
Last year I had my Fujifilm X-Pro 1 camera converted to infrared. Once I received the
camera back from the company that did the conversion I wanted to test it, and did
so in varying lighting and weather conditions.
What I found was interesting. Traditionally, photographers seem to use infrared

in bright, sunny conditions because that’s when you get the strongest effect. But
I also found that I could use the camera on overcast days. You still get the typical
infrared effect (white foliage and grass) but the tones are softer and more subtle.
Infrared images can be challenging to process. There are issues with White
Balance and tonal values. But, if you have an infrared converted camera, don’t be
discouraged. It’s not as difficult as it may seem at first.
The photo is part of a series of images I made of beach huts. I like the way the huts
have become part of the landscape. I also liked juxtaposing the geometric shapes
of the huts with the organic shapes of the grass and clouds. There’s an interesting
contrast between the texture of the wood huts the are built with and the textures First steps – adjusting White Balance
of the natural landscape. These are the elements I want to emphasize in the The initial problem you will encounter with an infrared image is White Balance.
conversion. Setting it to Daylight gives you something like the screen shot above shows – a
color photo with a strong red cast. We need to get rid of that before the black and
white conversion can begin.
Note: This photo was taken with a Fujifilm X-Pro 1 with a 720nm infrared
conversion (my book The Black & White Landscape covers the technicalities in
detail). Photos taken with cameras fitted with other types of infrared filter may look
different.

1. I used the White Balance Selector (circled above left) to correct 2. The above screen shot shows the result of the White Balance adjustment
the color temperature by clicking on an area of foliage (above made in the previous step.
right). Lightroom read the color values of the pixels under the tool
and calculated the White Balance settings required to make the Note: Some photographers recommend making a custom DNG profile for your
foliage white (the color it should be an in infrared photo). You may infrared converted camera on the basis it helps you obtain more accurate
need to click around on various pieces of foliage to get the most White Balance. I don’t think it’s necessary, especially for black and white
pleasing result. infrared photos.

3. Next I went to the HSL / Color / B&W panel and clicked on B&W to convert 4. Infrared images, even those taken in bright sunlight, often lack contrast.
the image to black and white. As I’m using the latest version of Lightroom it I went to the Basic panel and double clicked on the words Whites and Blacks
automatically calculated Black & White Mix slider values. I moved the Orange (marked above) with the Shift key held down to make Lightroom calculate the
and Yellow sliders a little more to the left to make the sky darker. settings for those sliders. I pulled the Whites slider back towards zero a little
to remove some clipping that occurred as a result of this adjustment.

5. Then I used Clarity (+84) to bring out the texture and detail in the grass and 6. The back of one of the huts was in deep shadow and I wanted to make it
the beach huts. I applied a Graduated filter and used the Adjustment Brush lighter. I applied an Adjustment Brush mask and moved the Shadows slider to
to create a mask so that the Clarity adjustment was applied to the grass and the right (above).
the huts, but not the sky (above). This process is shown step by step in the first
case study.

7. Next I created another
Adjustment Brush and masked
both beach huts. Then I moved
the Clarity slider right to bring
out the detail and texture in their
wooden surfaces even more. It
also made that area darker, so I
pushed the Shadows slider right
to compensate.

8. You may have noticed the bright piece of grass sticking up in front of the
beach hut on the right. It wasn’t so visible at first, but became more obvious
as I increased contrast and Clarity. This sort of distraction is best dealt with
when you take the photo, if possible. Luckily it was quite easy to remove using
the Spot Removal tool.
I dealt with it by healing the grass in sections. This gave Lightroom the best
opportunity to find another part of the image to sample for the healing
process. If the area to be healed is too big, Lightroom can’t find an suitable
area to sample. When this happens you don’t get a realistic fix.
To use the Spot Removal tool, zoom into 1:1, hold the left mouse button down
and paint over the area to be healed. Lightroom automatically selects an area
to sample. If it gets it right you won’t be able to tell that something has been
cloned out.
If it gets it wrong (this happens surprisingly often) you will have to move the
sampled area by clicking and dragging the black dot that controls it (see next
page).
Above: The distracting piece of Above: The result after Spot

grass I wanted to remove. Removal. The grey dots indicate
where I used the Spot Removal
tool (see next page).

This is the area sampled by the Spot
Removal tool. It is the same size and
shape as the area to be healed. The
white arrow between the two areas
shows the link between them. Click
and drag the black dot in the center
to move the sampled area.
Alternatively, press the forward

slash (‘/’) key on the keyboard. This
shortcut tells Lightroom to select a
new area to sample.
Above, above right and right: The

other Spot Removal adjustments I
made to remove the grass.
One of the Spot Removal tool

segments I created to remove the
grass.

9. Finally I used the Post-Crop
Vignetting tool to darken the
edges of the photo, encouraging
the eye to stay within the frame.

The original image, after the initial
black and white conversion, is
below.

Wells-Next-The-Sea, England | Fujifilm X-Pro 1, 14mm, 1/125 @ f5, ISO 200
Some more infrared photos taken of beach huts taken with
my converted X-Pro 1 camera.

conclusion
Lots of tutorials and books recommend Photoshop for converting your landscape
photos to black and white. But the truth is you can do most, probably even all, of
your developing in Lightroom.
There will be times when you want to use Photoshop or a plugin like Silver Efex Pro
2. You may be interested in seeing what you can achieve with other black and white
plugins like Tonality Pro and Topaz B&W Effects. With Lightroom at the heart of your
workflow it’s easy to export your photos to these programs when you need to, and
return when you are done.
The Lightroom Landscape | 97

But developing isn’t the most important part of landscape photography. What’s
important is the urge to explore and experience the natural world. Landscape
photography gives you the impetus and reason to be there. But it also meets the
deeper, more spiritual need that people have to spend time in nature.
I’m currently working my way through a series of Netflix programs called Tales by
Light. Each episode features a different professional photographer. What impresses
me most is just how dedicated they are to photography, and the time they make to
visit some of the world’s most beautiful and interesting places.
I hope this trilogy of books about landscape photography encourages you to do Above: The Black & White Above: The Black & White
the same. Go explore. There are a lot of wonderful places out there, waiting for you Landscape teaches you how Landscape Companion contains
to find them. to create beautiful black and interviews with twelve talented
white landscape photos with landscape photographers. Learn
Happy shooting, your digital camera. Techniques from the best and find out what
Andrew S. Gibson covered include long exposure why they love black and white
and infrared photography. There photography, how they find
www.creative-photographer.com are also case studies with well such beautiful landscapes to
known landscape photographers photograph and how they work
Rob Dweck and Cole Thompson. on location.
Learn more at https://store. Learn more at https://store.

creative-photographer.com/ creative-photographer.com/
products/the-black-white- products/the-black-white-
landscape landscape-companion

Beautiful ebooks for
photography lovers...

Lightroom Landscape - Andrew Gibson

Uploaded by

Document Information

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Lightroom Landscape - Andrew Gibson

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

THE

Case Study One: Sheepstor, Dartmoor, England 19

Digital technology has radically changed landscape photography. The latest

The Lightroom Landscape | 3

4 | The Lightroom Landscape

5 | The Lightroom Landscape

The other is to give you an insight into the thought process,

6 | The Lightroom Landscape

Increase contrast across the

Keep the smooth gray tones in the

The concrete jetty has beautiful

Above: Unprocessed Raw file

7 | The Lightroom Landscape

8 | The Lightroom Landscape

Darken the sky and bring back as

Make the hill and the land

Bring out the texture and detail in

Make the farmhouse and the road

Above: Unprocessed Raw file

9 | The Lightroom Landscape

10 | The Lightroom Landscape

Make the sky darker.

Straighten the horizon and crop

Add contrast to the rocks

Crop to a panorama to emphasize

Above: Unprocessed Raw file

11 | The Lightroom Landscape

12 | The Lightroom Landscape

Crop the gray blob made by

Add contrast to the water

Above: Unprocessed Raw file

13 | The Lightroom Landscape

14 | The Lightroom Landscape

Increase contrast across the

Bring out the textures of all the

Make the rocks in the foreground

Above: Unprocessed Raw file

15 | The Lightroom Landscape

16 | The Lightroom Landscape

Make the sky darker.

Emphasize the textures of the

Lighten the shadows so that more

Crop the photo to a panorama so

Above: Unprocessed Raw file

17 | The Lightroom Landscape

18 | The Lightroom Landscape

19 | The Lightroom Landscape

20 | The Lightroom Landscape

21 | The Lightroom Landscape

Virtual Copies are exact replicas of the

Developing an image is an act of

Virtual Copies let you experiment and have

Right: Three images, each with a Virtual

22 | The Lightroom Landscape

Analyze your photo

• The sky is too bright. It needs to be darker.

• The rocks have beautiful textures that should be emphasized.

23 | The Lightroom Landscape

1. Go to the Basic panel and set Treatment to Black & White.

24 | The Lightroom Landscape

25 | The Lightroom Landscape

26 | The Lightroom Landscape

Change the background color by right-clicking anywhere on the background

27 | The Lightroom Landscape