Outdoor Photography How To

We've all come across an interesting scene that would make a spectacular shot in better light. Sometime the problem is a bland day, while other times your vantage point relative to the sun is not where you need it to be. In either case, this tutorial from the PHLOG Photography YouTube channel demonstrates how to win the challenge—even if you have to create glorious light of your own during post-processing.

Instructor Christian Mohrle is a very successful photographer based near Germany's beautiful Lake Constance. He's also an image-editing expert, and in this episode he demonstrates a powerful workflow that never fails when the light just isn't right. We suggest downloading his sample Raw file with the link beneath the video so you can emulate his changes as they're explained.

This minimalist shot with a pretty building on the horizon has potential, but the sky is really bland, there's no light hitting the structure, and the foreground is dark and dull. But watch what happens when Mohrle gives mother nature a helping hand by using Lightroom masks to introduce stunning golden light while balancing out the tones to perfection.

Mohrle's goal for the original image is to "create a beautiful light effect coming in from the left side of the frame, hitting the landscape in the foreground and the subject in the center." The sky gets a spectacular boost as well. Mohrle anticipated problems with this contrast-rich scene and shot multiple images at different exposures. Thus the first step is merging all five shots into a single HDR image.

Next on the list are a few basic adjustments to the merged file to make it as good as possible for the masking magic that follows. He changes the profile from Adobe Color to Adobe Landscape which immediately bumps up saturation. He also increases base exposure, gently brings up the whites, and drops highlights to retain as much color information as possible in the sky.

After a few more straightforward local adjustments, the fun begins by employing masks to achieve the local adjustments necessary for creating the beautiful effect. Mohrle walks you through the simple step-by-step process for enhancing specific areas within the frame without affecting others.

All that's left to create the dramatic transformation is some thoughtful color grading and sharpening. You'll definitely be impressed after viewing Mohrle's before/after images.

There's much more to learn on the instructional PHLOG Photography YouTube channel, so make sure you pay a visit and explore what's available.

And don't miss the tutorial we featured recently with another post-processing expert who demonstrates how to restore image quality to blurry, pixelated photographs with a straightforward editing technique.