6 Lightroom Hidden Features in 2024
Have you using Adobe Lightroom for many years? But still, you find spend more time in photo editing by doing things manually. Maybe you switch to other software like Adobe Photoshop because you think Lightroom doesn’t have certain features. In this article, I’ll tell you some hidden features of Adobe Lightroom that will save you time, and make your editing process smoother and perfect.
1. Targeted Adjustment Tools
These tools allow you to precisely adjust specific parts of your photo. For example, if you want to brighten only the sky or enhance the colors of a particular object, you can use these tools.
All you have to do is click on the “Adjust saturation by dragging in the photo” icon beside the saturation. Then, you just need to select the part of the image you want to adjust. Now, whenever, you adjust any color, it will automatically adjust that color in the selected part of your image. In this way, you can achieve accuracy by adjusting only small details in the image without spoiling the parts of the image.
2. Sharpening Mask
- This feature helps sharpen details in your photo while protecting smoother areas. It prevents sharpening from being applied to areas like skies or skin, where it’s not needed.
- Guide: When sharpening your image, hold down the Alt/Option key while adjusting the Masking slider. The areas turning white will be sharpened, while the black areas won’t be affected.
3. Dust spot removal tool
- This tool helps you easily remove dust spots or other small imperfections from your photos. It’s handy for cleaning up your images without having to switch to another editing program.
- Guide: Click on the “Healing” tool in the side panel. Then, select the “visualize spots” in the bottom left corner of the screen. The image will visualize dust spots. Now you can zoom the image by pressing “space” (Lightroom shortcuts) and remove the spots by using the healing tool in the Lightroom.
4. horizon straightening tool
- If your photo’s horizon isn’t perfectly straight, this tool helps you fix it with just a few clicks. It ensures that your landscapes look balanced and professional.
- Guide: Click on the Crop Overlay tool, then select the Angle tool. Drag along the horizon line, and Lightroom will straighten it for you.
5. mask and before/after reveal
- This feature lets you see the adjustments you’ve made to your photo by masking them temporarily. It’s useful for comparing the edited version to the original or fine-tuning your adjustments.
- Guide: Press the backslash () key to toggle between the before and after views of your photo. You can also hold down the Y key to see a split-screen view.
6. panoramas
You might be thinking that Adobe Lightroom cannot make Panoramas, and you must have Adobe Photoshop for this purpose. But the reality is that you can actually make panoramas of your images by using Lightroom and it is also as perfect as Adobe Photoshop.
Select the photos you want to stitch, right-click, and choose “Photo Merge” > “Panorama.” Lightroom will automatically align and blend the images to create a seamless panorama. The tip is that your left and right images should contain a little extra content than you actually want in your Panorama.
Conclusion
These 6 hidden features of Adobe Lightroom can make your life super easy. Panorama in Lightroom is my favorite hidden feature. I will be very happy if you share your findings about other hidden features I haven’t mentioned in the article. You can simply approach us at our Contact Us page.
