One Tip to Improve Your Photos in Lightroom 

Found this channel 2-3 months ago and got hooked on the love of photography/outdoors. Started watching from the very first video and finally caught up today. I have been meaning to get out and use my camera for something other than family photos for a while now and this channel has definitely inspired. Planning a weekend away with the misses and already found a few hikes that should result in some decent shots (even if they don't they seem like great hikes!).

I’ll put my hand up.... I didn’t know this! Brilliant... now I’m off to re-edit 100 images 👏🏻

Thomas what makes your channel one of the best is your field videos with follow up videos showing how you process the images you made. It completes the process for your viewers. Learning about the range mask is great tool to learn about. Thanks

as a person that always using lightroom, I definitely need this, and just realised that it can do this kind of magic. many thanks for bringing this one up, Tom!

I've just started using the technique shown in this video on a long exposure shot. Well Lawd 'Tunderin, it was absolutely brilliant when trying to deal with exceptionally bright lights on a bridge on a very black night. Without using this Luminescence Mask, I couldn't bring out details of the dark water and sky as the lights would be completely blown out. What a difference!! Thanks for bringing this to our attention....works like a charm.

I mostly take images of woodland in tricky lighting conditions. At dawn, during bad weather or in the middle of the night. This will save me countless of hours of editing in the future. Time is very precious commodity as a father of three. Thank you very very much for bringing it up. If your travels takes you to my neck of the woods some day in the future ( the arctic bit of Sweden) I'd shake your hand and buy you a pint of prefered beverage.

My god, the amount of times I could’ve used this! Great tip!

I remember when these changes were announced but completely forgot they existed. Thanks Thomas for the reminder and demonstrating some good examples of their usefulness. Very helpful video :)

OMG! That woodland shot is incredible!

Thomas....thanks for this very useful and easy to use tip. I soooooo like your level of PP. There are just so many landscape photographers that are over processing their images.....at least to my taste. It is pretty hard to out-do mother nature and when you try using a computer it falls short. One of the main reasons that I follow your channel more than most is your level of PP. Please keep it up!

Thank you! I had no idea and have spent so much time going back and forth and trying to erase out adjustments and not make it look crazy cartoonish.

as C1 user - this is a truly good tip . and a reason to watch how all roads may lead to Rome if one has a good map. I never thought about using luma for balancing out "horizontal" polafilter-like artifacts. Edit - stupidity is to blame the tool when one already got it but did not know enough to utilize it. I am saying this as one who used to take images BW for a decade when growing up - and being fooled by color contrast every single time. To the extent that now with digital I tend to "see" color contrast far harder than tonal contrast ending up with pushing saturation rather than luma to make an impact. This brief lesson made me remember that luma is something that works with BW - color-.contrast is implying the color wheel. I must remember both to balance or "pop" what I try to do.

Learn something new everyday! I had never used this feature in Lightroom before but will definitely give it a go when needed on future images.

I knew the range mask was in LR, but didn't know what it was for. Now I know and will give it a spin when called for. Thanks Thomas.

Fantastic! I updated my Lightroom last week and just hadn't had time to check out the new stuff. And I had a photo that I wasn't happy with that needed this exact thing. Thank you!!!

That's an excellent hint! I am extensively using Lightroom and wonder how could I overlooked it 😱

Very helpful video. I twigged into the colour masking just after it came out. Did not understand how the luminosity masking worked. Extremely instructional and very beneficial. Thanks for taking the time to point this out.

The first image actually looked fantastic in black and white when you were applying that mask. Very dreamy and interesting, I prefer it to the colour version. I'm sure you cold've made it even better by making a dedicated B&W edit and playing with the tones a bit

Brilliant tip Thomas. I too use this tool as its like a dodging and burning.

It is very similar to the HSL secondary in premiere pro.. I came across this feature today but I didn't know quite well how to use it, now i know, thanks Tommy 👍

The colour option is very useful too.

I was not aware of range masking. So I opened LR and tried it out and it is wonderful. Thank you!

This is awesome! I've been setting my filters and going back in and erasing the areas where it wasn't needed. This will save so much time.

This is a great feature I didn't know existed. Of course most landscape photographers know how to do this is Photoshop but it requires more work and the more processing you can do while the image is in RAW format (before baking it to Profoto RGB for the TIF or PSD) the better the final result.

I don’t use Lightroom , but Capture One also has this feature and I didn’t think of using it in this way. So thanks for the tip that ranges further than just Lightroom

This is also very useful when you have used a graduated ND filter on camera and something (like some tree branches) intrudes into the filter area, which is sometimes unavoidable. Makes it easy to correct in post.

I was skeptical and thought it is click-bait title... I was wrong. It is great one. Range Mask ftw!

I have been using this for a couple of months now and it's amazing. Great vid Tom

I wasn’t aware of this feature either. What would also be useful would be a brush that could be used to selectively “switch off” parts of the gradient filter. That would be useful around mountain peaks (as in the example), buildings and the like.

Thank you so much!!! I had no idea about this... this will 100% change the way i edit... that eliminates alot of erasing!!!

Videos like these once in a while are really helpful, we got to watch you set up and take the image and then learn a tip for the editing. I will remember this one. The effect on the trees is fantastic. Thanks for taking the time to explain this.

I agree, very useful tool, I use it all the time. I have not used the Colour mask either, but I have a sunset where the pink is over saturated, so It could be useful on that image

Can't believe I didn't know about this one! Legit going to change my workflow in a lot of cases. Thanks so much for sharing!!!!

I've actually seen this tool in LR but never actually understood it before now - thanks heaps for the new enlightenment

Another nugget from Mr Heaton. Thank you...

Hi! If you hold Alt or Option while draging the range sliders you will instantly see the mask in B&W and so where the effect will apply. It's much more handy than turning on and off the "show luminance mask" button

My editing skills haven't always been the absolute best. This feature is a real game changer, played around with some older files and was left with a far superior image. Great video. Great tips, thanks a tonne

Thank you so much. I'm still learning and this tip has been more helpful than you know. I can't wait to start using the range mask feature.

Thanks for the tip. I’d wondered about that feature but hadn’t used it yet. Now I will when needed.

Very useful tip!! I used to mask it manually. This would save lots of work. Many thanks!

Hey Tom, Totally agree - Range Mask in LR is brilliant. Also the pipette colour picker tool can be used to sample your area to affect by clicking an area or shift clicking multiple areas or drawing out a larger area - awesome. P.S anyone want to buy a 3 x set of soft and a 3x set of hard Lee ND Grad Filters 😉

Thanks so much for this, perfectly timed! I was out taking sunrise photos yesterday and the sky wasn’t as I hoped it would (cloud on the horizon blocking the sun). Looking at my images I had a pretty boring sky to the right, and on the left a dark cliff coming down diagonally from the corner. I was disappointed and couldn’t work out how to improve the sky using a graduated filter effect without darkening the cliffs...now I know! Perfect :)

You know I've been using Lightroom classic all this time despite there being a new Lightroom CC - glad to see I am not the only one still using the old one.

Thanks, was aware of the feature but didn't properly understand it. That's this evening sorted having a go with some images. Thanks for the good work.

this is the most valuable LR video tutorial I've seen . Thanks man!

Thanks Thomas, I've had a lot of problems with graduated filters in LR as they were just a blanket fix. Now its possible for me to selectively reduce the filter where it's not needed is perfect!

Been using LR for years and it's now obvious I have more to learn. Excellent tutorial Thomas, thanks.

I’d heard of it but thought it was going to be something more complicated. Thanks for demonstrating how simple it is, and how effective. Right, I can think of an image or two that now need attention

This is an absolute game changer! How did I not know about this before!!?

So far YOU taught me how to focus stack(which I use ALL the time now)...and I also now use, what I call, the "Heaton" crop (6 X 17) for my landscapes and now this! WOW! Definitely, I can see that I will be using the Range Mask!! I have the West Maui Mountains which I always have an unbalanced sky due to the sun setting behind the west side of the mountain. By the way, I think your Scotland trip was epic! Maybe your best trip? Watching your trek and what you had to deal with; well, just let me say that the images you came back with are simply BREATHTAKING! It was worth it all! Thanks so much for sharing.

Thanks Thomas, good-on-ya!

Oh my god that’s amazing! Thanks for sharing this tips! I spend so much time messing up with the brush previously when applying Graduated filters!

A very powerful and underused tool is range masking and I am a great believer in going back to old images and doing a re -edit as I learn more and can apply more skills to an image, glad you have been up here in Scotland a bit recently, your workshop with Simon would have been brilliant I’m sure.

I saw this feature but had no idea how to use it. thanks for sharing this. I'll go back through some of my shots and see where i can re-edit

Thanks for the extremely handy tip, Tom.

This is the single most useful tip I've got off RU-vid LR vids. I had no idea 👍👍👍

For people using Adobe Camera Raw in Photoshop, the range mask feature is available in Adobe Camera Raw 10.0 and later.

Brilliant! Great tool, great tutorial. Thanks, Thomas

Been using and teaching LR for years and I never knew about this. Thanks Thomas!

Thank you so much. Didn't knew about it. This is the life changer

I've used this before when darkening skies above tree lines but I've never thought of using it to lift shadows. Thanks for the tip, I'll definitely be using it more.

Wow! I love taking photo´s of mountains, so this is soooooo helpful! Thanks Thomas!

Appreciate this video! We should never stop learning..THANKS FOR THIS INFO!

Thanks for the tip Thomas, I already heard about it but never seen in the practice. And I love the image from the workshop with Simon, those trees are phenomenal! See you on Wednesday!

I did not know about this feature at all and I use lightroom all the time - thank you so much for sharing this Thomas! 😊

Great tip! I didnt know it. I could have used this so many times on my landscape shots. Thanks!!

Many thanks Thomas, i wasn't aware of this great feature!

This is one of the best LR tips I've seen. Thank you! So many hours wasted trying to manually paint masks for uneven horizons 😂

Thank you Thomas.....gonna have to watch that one again, while I have an image on the other screen. Again, appreciate the insight.

I really liked that photo in black and white the contrast was out of this world I know you worked hard on the colour but consider bnw for that mountain photo

"I'll just increase the smoothness". - Thomas Heaton thanks for sharing this tip!

Thanks for the tip! I didn't know Lightroom could do this. Opens up new possibilities.

Nice explanation Thomas. I’ve recently started using the range mask as well. It’s a wonderful tool. Nice video.

Agree sir...fantastic tool. Tried as you were speaking and wow. Crazy...lol

I had a genuine jar-drop moment when you upped that range slider 🤯

Brilliant, so simple and effective. I’ve been aware of this but avoided it. Until now. Thanks Thomas

That ethereal music is even in my dreams. I always remember TH when I hear this type of music.

News to me, thanks for showing needed this for a recent edit, will be trying this out shortly

When using this graduation filter and you want something to be cut out of the selection you can just click on the brush button, next to edit and new, and use the alt or option to remove them, or add areas. Also nice to know I think.

Thank you thank you thank you! I have come up with this certain situation plenty of times and now thanks to you I have another tool in my pocket to help me deal with it!

loved seeing the mountain image again as its amazing how your eye picks out some different detail. This time its the peak in the top left hand corner after you applied the range mask. To me it just seemed to pop more and accentuated the morning sun striking its side

Brilliant. I've been struggling with brightening trees without effecting the sky for ages. It's a real pain trying to paint between the branches but this tool looks excellent.

Finally, thanks for sharing the info, I've heard the term, hadn't taken the time to look into it, but it might be my savor in my wildlife images

Thank you. Well done. Always appreciative of your info, and your presentation style.

Gracias Mr. Thomas Heaton! Just used it.

This is the best explanation I saw up to this time. Simple, direct, elegant. Thanks

I knew about but not really fully understood how it works , now i do , thanks

A great reason to upgrade from my old Lightroom 5.7! Thanks for a brilliant LR lesson. I like the new video format with the images screened again at the end too. All good stuff. Thank you.

Thank you very much for the tip Thomas!

Thanks Thomas I didn't know about this and have always hated the effect of the radial filter encroaching on areas where it was not wanted, enjoy your channel thank you.

Super, thank you. Didn't know about this one and certainly looks very practical.

Very handy tool Tom, very well put together as usual

I'm kind of surprised that so many people didn't know about this. It's a great feature!

OMG--what a timesaver! I hated having to go into PS to do this!

OMG!.. I didn't know about this feature, used to do all this manually. Thank you so much, Thomas

Absolutely Stunning Tip. I had no idea it was there.

Quite Interesting and Helpful. Regular Lightroom users are in kinda deadly need of a thing like this. Thank you so much...Subscribed!!

I describe that slider as a blend if for Lightroom masking.

This tip comes at the perfect time. I need this technique for one of my current images.

I knew of the range mask, but for some reason I thought it only applied to the brush.. Thanks mate, this was helpful 😊