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Lesson Info

Basic Editing in Lightroom CC: Dehaze Tool

We talked about all these basic adjustments but one of the things that we didn't talk about, in the basic adjustments, was in the effects, we talked about that dehaze filter. So the dehaze filter is a really unique filter because it can actually cut through fog. It has the ability to kind of bring stuff out that's ... so I have this photograph that ... I was in Iceland and I was kind of ... I had planned on going to various spots and this spot was kind of a famous spot. I wanted to go see it, I wanted to photograph it. So I had planned on it to be the last thing I saw before I went to the airport and flew out. As I was driving there, fog was just rolling in and I could see the fog moving in towards me and it would just get closer, and closer, and closer. By the time I got there, it was night time, even though it wasn't night, it was day, but it was so thick that I couldn't even, you know, the sun wasn't even available. This is a 30 second exposure to get that amount of light, so I mean...

it's very dark. It's super, super dark when I'm taking this photograph. The ocean was a little bit ... It was a pretty crazy ocean. Pretty big waves and the tide was coming in. So I was out there and I recognized that I had to go about 600 or 700 yards around this bend before I could get away from the tide. So as the tide was coming in I was like, "I really need to expose this now, because I don't know how fast this tide comes in and I don't want to be caught in this water." So I was trying to take it as quick as possible. So I only have one photograph of this and so I just got the 30 second exposure and hoped for the best, that I would get the best exposure, and then I wrapped it up and I left. Plus, I had to get to my flight. So, here's the exposure, obviously there's a lot of fog, but I want to see what's back there. So, the dehaze filter is a very unique version of contrast and as I increase the dehaze you can see how it brings out the details. You can see now, that these rocks are starting to show up. See that? So we're even getting this rock here which was ... There's a rock right there that I wasn't able to see and as I keep increasing that dehaze filter, see how these ... Oh and now there, look, there's a rock behind that rock that I didn't see. So if I double click this and go back see how, almost non-existent that one is? And you can't hardly see that this is two rocks. So as you increase the dehaze, it really does a fantastic job at getting you, oops ... at getting you out, so you can see what's back there. Now, it obviously has a bi-product which is darkness, because it's adding contrast. That's the way it's pulling stuff out is it's adding contrast in unique places and so once you've done some dehaze, then you've got to go back up and you've got to brighten up your photograph to kind of let that dehaze ... Now, I went crazy with the dehaze and so it looks a little stylistic, almost painterly. Which I would never go that far with it but I wanted you to see what it can accomplish. So this is what it normally looks like and this is what I can get with dehaze. So that gives me a nice amount of detail in the background and still gives it some fog so I want that fog to show up still there so that's really quite helpful for the shot. Then at that point, then, I would go in and start working on, you know, other aspects of the photograph as well, but I wanted you to see that because that is a very unique, very cool feature and I love it because it helps me out getting through foggy days or ... I have a photograph that I took in China where I could barely see the buildings it was so smoggy and when you turn on the dehaze you can see all of the buildings like it was a clear day. So it's really impressive what that can do to get you through some of the smog and fog or glare on glass or something like that. It'll kind of cut through that kind of stuff. You'll also see it cut through ... Let's go back to our image here. Oh, wait, that's not it. There, so if we go to an image like this the dehaze filter will also help to cut through some of that glare that ... See that glare is hitting my glass on my lens and that's what's creating that glare. Glare can be nice, but if you want to cut through it a little bit and get a little bit more detail in the hair and stuff like that if you click on the dehaze, see how you can start to see the detail in the hair come back and you can see some of the detail in the arms and stuff like that, so if you want to cut through some of that glare that strikes your lens you can use that dehaze and that will help you tremendously in getting through that. Any questions? I know that we had one about Google store, that's right. Okay, so there was a question earlier about cloud storage. So, the question is this, and I'm just going to kind of generalize the question, which is ... I already have cloud storage, and I have lots of photos in that cloud storage, like I'm using Dropbox or I'm using Google Drive, or something of that nature. Can I somehow port that information over to Creative Cloud and then start that way instead of having to download it and then re-upload it? There are services that will take you from Google Drive, over to Dropbox, that will take a direct rout, but I don't know of any service that will take you directly from Google Drive to Creative Cloud, but that's probably less of a problem than the problem of, it has to come through something. It has to come through Lightroom web, Lightroom CC, Lightroom on your iPad, it has to come through somewhere to get up to the cloud. Now, chances are, if you have Google Drive or something like that, and you have five terabytes worth of stuff, then you have to decide whether or not you want that, because that's ... A Google Drive account is very inexpensive if anything at all, so if you have five terabytes on it, it's probably costing you next to nothing, whereas if you wanted five terabytes on the Creative Cloud, you would be paying a lot more for it than you're currently paying for it. So you have to decide whether that's worth it to you. But you would need to take that imagery and upload it through some kind of CC app, so either on your Lightroom CC, Lightroom Web, or your iPad, something has to upload it to get the original stuff up in that cloud and working. Now, that being said, chances are if you have stuff on Google Drive, you also have it on your computer and it's still inside of your Lightroom catalog it's just also backed up on the cloud. So, all you have to do, if you're in Lightroom Classic, is turn on your cloud sharing to Lightroom Mobile and it will start uploading all of those previews, those smart previews, into the cloud. It's not the full file, but it's the smart previews. If you want the full files in the Creative Cloud just simply import all of those files into Lightroom CC, or use the migration tool over in the file menu, and hit Migrate Lightroom Catalog and go click on your catalog and pull it in. Push it up to the Cloud, so those are the ways that you could fix that issue. If you have stuff up there as a backup, I would just leave it there because if all it is is a backup and it's just sitting there just in case ten years from now you want to go look at your life's work and you've lost everything because there was a fire. Just keep it there, just leave it there. That's what it's for, is just a backup. And then start going forward from here with your Creative Cloud, and then as you finish, and you no longer need stuff, take it off your Creative Cloud because if you only have a certain amount of space and you don't want to pay for more, just take that and throw it up in the Google Cloud, only keep what you need. So, I only keep, in the Cloud ... I keep in my Lightroom CC Cloud, I keep my portfolio and my current work. I don't keep everything I've ever shot. That would be wasteful, I don't need it and it's too much. That's ten terabytes worth of stuff. I'm not going to go buy ten terabytes on the Creative Cloud, because I don't need it. I need enough to put my portfolio on there and whatever I'm currently working on, right? For someone who's not a professional photographer, for my Mom, it's not going to be a portfolio, it's going to be all of her favorite images and that's it, and the stuff that she's currently looking at, and she'll look at it and then as soon as she's done looking at it, she'll look through 300 photos that she took on vacation and then she's going to get rid of 150 of them, and keep 50, and then that's her portfolio and the rest of it she just hits delete and it goes away because she doesn't need it. So that's the way someone who's not professional, who's just having fun taking pictures, that's what you do because your client is you. So you don't have to worry about trying to get your client to like the stuff you gave them and hopefully they're not mad that you didn't shoot this or you didn't deliver that, so you don't have to worry about keeping all of this stuff for archive purposes. Just take the stuff you like and delete the stuff you don't. Basically your catalog will kind of increase for a photo-vacation and then it'll decrease once you're done selecting, and then it'll increase when you go to Italy and it'll decrease and then it'll increase and then it'll decrease, and you'll just keep doing this for years until you hit a terabyte worth of information. So it's a very different ball game for someone who's an amateur or, you know, a photo-enthusiast versus someone who's a professional working photographer, very different. Hopefully that answers that question. Any other questions on that vein? I like to edit on my desktop because I designed it to maximize efficiency and speed for editing, but I also cull in Lightroom, and I could cull anywhere. Could I start a collection in Classic, on my desktop, and then move it to CC and cull it sitting on a couch on a laptop and then put it back? The answer is yes, but you don't have to put it back or take it, it's just there, that's the key. And we'll show you how to do that tomorrow. So, tomorrow we're going to talk a little bit more about the connection between Lightroom and ... Lightroom CC and Lightroom Classic, even I have a hard time remembering. So, Lightroom Classic, if that's your workhorse, you absolutely can use Lightroom CC as a way of culling things and working on things away from your main desktop. So we'll talk a little more about that. And then, of course, the third day or our next class for Lightroom Classic for professional and serious amateurs, that class, we will actually go through that exact workflow and how you get stuff there. Why you do it, when you do it, all that kind of stuff.