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Key Takeaways
- Start with a Lightroom beginner course on YouTube to learn the fundamentals and key features effectively.
- Master advanced features through tutorials focusing on specific techniques, like masking, color editing, and canvas color changing.
- Utilize various tutorials to develop specific styles, like moody and film-style editing, by learning from popular photographers.
Enhance your Lightroom skills and make photos that impress people with these excellent Lightroom YouTube tutorials. In addition to full courses, you’ll learn how to achieve specific photography styles and use certain tools within the platform.
There are several free resources to learn about Adobe Creative Cloud, and Bring Your Own Laptop’s Lightroom mastery course is an excellent place to start. In this video, you learn about the fundamentals of Lightroom and get an overview of how the app’s key features work.
You also learn about using the RAW photo file format in Lightroom, which is the best choice for editing pictures from a mirrorless or DSLR camera. Some smartphones, including many Samsung devices, now let you take pictures in RAW too.
In this tutorial, you also learn the difference between color grading and correction, saturation vs. vibrance, and how to edit specific colors. You can use many of these tips on the mobile and desktop apps. Throughout the tutorial, you’ll have to complete projects to further familiarize yourself with Lightroom.
Once you have a basic understanding of Lightroom, you’ll want to learn how to use the app’s more advanced features. This tutorial by That Icelandic Guy is an excellent starting point, and I have used many of his suggestions to make my pictures stand out.
This tutorial covers how to mask more effectively in Lightroom, and you’ll also find out how to use Denoise—which is one of Lightroom’s many helpful AI features. You’ll also learn how to change the background canvas color you’re using to edit in Lightroom, plus much more.
Another tutorial worth checking out by That Icelandic Guy is “How I Edit Photos in Lightroom”. This video is great if you want to achieve more of a moody and dramatic style, as that’s what many of his pictures exude.
The video covers many of the sliders that he uses, and he also discusses how you can use the Color Grading wheels to emulate his photography. You’ll also find out how he masks specific parts of his image to get the desired final effect.
I always recommend watching these kinds of tutorials if you like a certain creator’s style because you can then apply their tips to your own pictures. While you only have access to some of the features with RAW files, there are others—such as tone curves—that you can use with JPEGs from your smartphone.
The first of two Signature Edits tutorials that I recommend is Learn Lightroom Classic. In this video, the creator goes through Adobe Lightroom in comprehensive detail and discusses each essential feature. You also learn how to manage your presets for easier access and editing.
Furthermore, you learn how to use some of the more complex Lightroom features—such as the RGB tone curve tools—more effectively. I also like that you can see the ISO, focal length, aperture, and shutter speed for each picture. As a result, you can get ideas on how to make your images look better right out of the camera and simplify your editing process.
When following this tutorial, you’ll also learn about masking, cropping, and other Lightroom tools. If you’re new to photo editing, make sure to check out these top fixes for common photo editing mistakes and make your images pop even more.
Curves can take your images to the next level in Lightroom, but they’re also quite difficult to use if you don’t already have experience. I recommend watching a few tutorials to understand these tools in more detail and Learn Lightroom Curves by Signature Edits is a great place to start.
This comprehensive tutorial shows you how to use the Tone Curve feature and how to use the Point Curve feature for more accuracy when editing your pictures. You’ll also learn how you can change specific parts of your picture to ensure a more accurate look for what you’re trying to achieve.
Moreover, you will learn how to edit skin tones with this tutorial as well as using the RGB curves.
Another Lightroom Classic tutorial that’s worth checking out for a better overall understanding is this video by Zac Weston. In just over 40 minutes, you learn how to use the app’s different sliders and ways to get more out of the Tone Curve features.
Weston also covers how to change the vertical and horizontal aspects of your picture, in addition to altering the Calibration sliders. If you want further information on how to use this specific feature, you can learn about what the Lightroom Calibration tool is and how to use it.
Alen Palander is a popular photographer with over 700,000 Instagram followers and 100,000+ YouTube subscribers. He has a very distinctive dark and moody editing style, and he was a source of inspiration in my photography for a long time.
Tone Fuentes’ “How to Edit Like Alen Palander” tutorial is a great starting point if you want to achieve a dark and moody style in your pictures. In the video, Fuentes breaks down Palander’s editing style and then shows you how to create moody and sunny presets. You can then apply these presets to your pictures and edit the sliders when needed.
Film photography is one of my favorite photography styles, and around 70% of my photos these days have grain and similar effects. It’s very fun to digitally replicate and add your own twists to Kodak and similar cameras, but it’s also quite difficult if you don’t know how.
Tone Fuentes has another Lightroom tutorial that I’d recommend called “How to Create the Kodak Portra Look in Lightroom”. Like the previous video mentioned in this guide, he analyzes the style to provide background context.
After analyzing the Kodak Portra look, Fuentes then shows you how to create this for yourself. You can save the style as a preset to use more efficiently on your pictures.
FUTC is one of my favorite recent discoveries on YouTube. He’s a photography YouTuber based in Germany and specializes in Fujifilm photography while injecting a sense of humor into his videos. One of the best videos I watched when learning film-style photography was this one on getting the dark and dreamy look.
In this video, you get a breakdown of the different settings you can tweak in Adobe Lightroom. You also see different examples of pictures edited with this style and get tips on what to avoid. For further tips and tricks, you might also want to check out these different ways you can get Polaroid and film-style photos.
Evan Ranft is another photography YouTuber I highly respect, and I love his punchy photography style. “Stop Ruining Your Colorful Photos” was a useful tutorial for me to follow when it came out, as I was particularly guilty of overdoing the saturation and vibrance sliders. To this day, I still sometimes refer to it when I need a reminder.
In this video, Ranft breaks down his full photo editing workflow and adjusts the different sliders and other settings in real-time. You’ll also find out how he color grades.
Lightroom is a tricky platform to master, but you’ll find plenty of free resources that help you get a good understanding. Once you’ve gotten to grips with the app’s essentials, you’ll find it much easier to add your own twist and begin developing a unique style.