I want to introduce you to dxo's powerful new Luminosity masking feature in this video you'll
find this in the recently released filmpak 7 but you can also access the same tools when you have
both the dxo filmpack 7 and photolab 7 installed I'm starting with a raw file I shot with my Fuji
xt5 I haven't applied any adjustments to this image yet other than converting it to a dng
file using dxo's pureraw 3 when I open the file for editing you can see that it's a bit Overexposed
I shot this after Sunset and I didn't adjust the camera's exposure compensation to darken
the image if we look at the histogram we can see that the raw file has captured the entire tonal
range now before I go any further I will apply the Fujifilm Pro via standard digital film simulation
that's what I usually have my Fuji cameras set to shoot I'll then go to the customize
tab where you'll find the new Luminosity masking tools I'll also mention that there's been quite
a change to the controls in filmpack 7 over the previous versions we now have much more control
over things like color and tone in the image I want to use these controls to darken the image
by reducing the exposure now if I scroll down you can see the Luminosity mask section I want to add
the first Luminosity mask to select the sky in the image I can add it by clicking the plus icon at
the bottom of the list you can then see the new Luminosity mask appear in the list you'll also
notice the controls in the Luminosity masking section become enabled this includes a helpful
mask range selector divided into 11 separate zones this will immediately make sense to you
if you're familiar with Ansel Adam's old system the donkey's tones in the image are on the left
and the lightest are on the right currently zone 5 is selected but we can choose a different Zone
by clicking it with our Mouse as I do this you can see the controls on the Zone strip update to
reflect the Zone I click on by doing this we can see that the sky spans roughly is on 5 through
to zone 9. I'll therefore click on zone 9 as a starting point then in the zone strip I can click
the control and move it to the left as I do this you can see the selected range increases which is
shown in the mask the only problem now is that we have the foreground and Sky selected applying any
adjustment to the sky is also going to affect the foreground which we don't want to fix the problem
I'll select the erase brush in the bottom left corner of the interface I can then change the
size Feathering an opacity of the brush I'll use a large brush and set the opacity to 100 I can now
paint over the areas that I don't want to select as I paint you can see that it removes the red
mask from the area telling me that it's no longer selected when I only had the sky selected I'll
hide the mask using the show mask option I can now apply an exposure adjustment using the controls
in the light section of the Luminosity mask as I use these you can see that they know only affect
the sky selected by the Luminosity mask I'll also add a contrast and micro contrast adjustment to
improve the definition of the clouds if we want to see the effect of the adjustments we can click
the eye icon to the right of the Luminosity mask in the list this hides the individual Luminosity
mask allowing us to see its effect we also have an opacity slider if we think the adjustment is too
strong this means we don't need to change multiple sliders to reduce the strength of our effect
now that I've adjusted the sky the foreground looks dark and the header is a bit dull I'll
therefore add a second Luminosity mask and use it to select the foreground Heather
as before I click the plus icon to add the new mask which appears in the list if I turn on the
show mask options again you can see the red mask selecting the image mid-tones I can then
click the zones to check the Heather's Luminosity range most of it is in zone 5 through to zone 7.
I'll therefore click Zone 7 to select it and then move the Luminosity range control down to Zone 5.
this selects the Heather but also the sky so I'll use the erase brush again to remove the mask from
the sky when that's done I'll hide the mask again I can then use the controls in the light section
of the Luminosity mask to make the Heather appear brighter unfortunately this does damage the color
in the Heather so to fix that I'll increase a tint slider in the white balance controls to
make the purple heather stand out more we can then turn off the Luminosity mask to check its effect
working with a Luminosity mask in this way feels effortless and the results I've been able to
produce seem quite impressive if I need to I can now continue to add more Luminosity mask to adjust
different areas of the image when I'm done I'll click the apply button to close the Luminosity
mask tool to finish the image I'll scroll up to the top and just add a small vibrancy increase
and then scroll down to the bottom to use the global tone curve adjustment
when I use the compare icon at the top of the interface to compare the changes to the
original image you can see the difference the Luminosity Mask tools have made as I
said earlier in the video if you have photolab 7 installed as well as filmpack 7 you can
use the Luminosity Mass features in the local adjustments panel of photolab watch my review
video next to see photolab's newly redesigned local adjustments thanks for watching today
and I hope you enjoyed the video if you did please take a moment to share it with someone
and don't forget to subscribe if you haven't already I'll see you soon for another video