Bonjour, mesdames et monsieurs.
In this episode I want to show you Lightroom versus Luminar.
(energetic music)
Bonjour, mesdames et monsieurs, my name is Serge Ramelli.
I am a French photographer from the amazing, the incredible
city of Paris, France, living in Los Angeles, California.
And in this episode I want to talk to you about Luminar
that I've been using a lot lately
and it's just came out for Windows for the first time ever.
A lot of people are confused.
Is it gonna replace Lightroom in my workflow?
Can it replace Lightroom?
I'm gonna answer everything now.
I'm also gonna be announcing a whole bunch of Photoshop
and workshops for 2018.
Starting with the workshop that I'm gonna do in February
from the 9th to 12th,
so if you wanna come and take full-time photos with me
for four days, check it out.
There's a few seats left.
It's going out pretty fast.
Also, I'm gonna be doing a workshop in Paris in May,
probably the last week of May.
And I'm gonna be doing another workshop
in July in Los Angeles.
I'm gonna do a lot of speaking in Venice in March,
and I'm gonna do photowalks all over the world.
So if you wanna come for free,
just do photowalks with me, you can.
If you wanna come on one-to-one workshop with me you can.
Check it out.
It's on my website, the link is below this video.
But for now, let's talk Luminar versus Lightroom.
Alright so I got a lot of people asking me,
"Is Luminar better than Lightroom?"
I wanna show you how I work with it
and I wanna show you what's the plus
and what's the big deal about Luminar.
This is a photo, by the way, I took two days ago.
A beautiful sand dune photo in Imperial Dunes in California,
very close to the Mexican border.
And I shot this, I think, with 154 millimeter,
with my 24 240.
That's the roll file unretouched.
So I'm gonna create a virtual copy,
and I'm first gonna retouch it
like how I would do it in Lightroom.
So I would open up the shadows, bring down the highlights,
do my black, do my white.
I would go to Shade, probably for the yellow,
maybe not that much, it's a little crazy.
Maybe just add a little bit of magenta,
you know I like that.
I probably would do a little linear gradient here on top,
and lower a bit the exposure and add some blue,
and things like this.
And I would probably add a little bit of contrast,
make it a little bit brighter and add a bit of vibrance,
because I love vibrant photo and I would probably crop it,
something like this.
That would be my photo, which is pretty cool.
Backslash key is gonna give you the before and the after.
You can do the exact same thing.
Every time I retouch a photo,
whether it's in Lightroom or in Luminar,
I always get different results.
So I'm gonna go to export and this time I'm gonna use
Open Source Files in Luminar 2018.
If you're looking for a solution to not pay a subscription,
you could use Luminar,
but I still think that Lightroom has some things
that I like.
The truth is, I like to process in Lightroom
and then finish off in Luminar.
That's my workflow.
But let me show you that you can do everything.
So that's the roll file there.
I can go to essential,
and you pretty much have the same slider,
so I can bring down the highlights, open up the shadows,
I can do my black, I can do my white.
But you get additional stuff
that you don't get in Lightroom.
You get, for example, the Boost filter.
The Artificial Intelligence Boost filter.
I like what it does on the sand.
I don't like what it does on the sky.
So you can click here, and I'm gonna use a graded mask,
and I'm gonna click and drag the graded mask at the bottom.
So now that intelligence filter is going to be
just being used for the bottom of the photo.
And same thing, I'm gonna go to shade,
I'm gonna add a little bit of magenta,
maybe back down a bit the yellow,
which I think I did in Lightroom.
But you've got a few other things like polarizing filter,
which sometimes makes the sky more interesting.
And basically that's that.
So let me crop this photo.
I'm gonna crop it.
I think I'm gonna add a bit of vibrance,
and I think a little bit more magenta on this one.
Something like this.
And I'm gonna crop it.
So you've got a cropping tool there.
Oh I'm gonna apply whatever I was doing.
And I'm gonna crop it cause that bush there,
and that sand is not so nice.
I'm going for a very zen look, so something like this.
But you know there is other things we can do.
There's a few filters I really love that's there.
So let me show you the before and after.
One that I like a lot is Image Radiance.
I like Image Radiance, and I don't like it everywhere.
I love it in my clouds.
I like to have very diffused clouds,
I wanna have diffused clouds against sand.
So you can see here the before and after
just of that filter.
It's very subtle but it just diffuses the clouds
a little more.
It blows them out here also
so you can lower a little bit the brightness.
I can add a bit of saturation.
I'm only looking at the clouds.
So on this one, same thing, I'm gonna brush it,
I'm gonna use gradient mask
and I'm just gonna click and drag for the top.
Some other stuff that you can play around with there,
I'm gonna click on done to apply this,
that's what I forgot to do earlier.
I can add a filter.
I think, on this one I wanna use, maybe, fog.
Let's see what fog is gonna give me.
So light fog, I can use, Add Fog.
But I just want it at the bottom, so I can go here
and click on the brush and this time use a radial mask
and I'm gonna click and drag a radial mask here.
You see it did the wrong way.
The fog is everywhere but there.
That's fine, you can go to here and click Invert
and now the fog is only gonna be there
and I can add the fog there in the back.
That's the softness.
Something like this is too strong
so I'm gonna lower the amount
just to give it a little bit of depth in the photo.
And you can go for dark fog, which is less strong.
And you can see the before and after,
so let me click on Done here.
Before and after of that filter.
Before.
And after.
Just gives it a little bit of different colors on the thing.
It's not a huge thing so I'm gonna apply this.
Oh there's one more that I love.
There's one filter I use all the time,
it's called Advanced Contrast.
Advanced Contrast does really cool things.
So let's see on the highlights,
I can make the highlights a lot stronger,
a lot more contrast just in the highlights.
If I wanna do that, I can balance them.
Okay, midtones.
Oh look what it does on the midtones,
it adds contrast there.
Shadows, I can open up the shadows there.
I just play around with the slider and see what it gives me.
So, before and after.
Yeah I like that,
and we can compare it to the one that I got in Lightroom.
That's the one from Lightroom,
and that's the one from Luminar.
Pretty similar.
So you can do the same things.
Now let me show you a few other things.
So this is a photo I took in Paris a while back.
I'm gonna create a virtual copy and I'm gonna reset it.
Let me show you how I actually work.
So same thing here.
I'm gonna open up the shadows, bring down the highlights.
I'm gonna do my black and my whites.
When I actually do cities
I don't bring down the highlights that much.
I wanna get a glow there.
I do a little bit of minus clarity,
and on this case I think I cropped the photo
cause I didn't wanna get this gentleman there.
And I always go for a little pano,
so I think I cropped it like this.
And at this point, this is when,
maybe, add a bit of more contrast.
This is when I'm gonna take it into Luminar.
So, export.
And this time I'm gonna use the option
Edit a Copy with Lightroom Adjustment.
And that's gonna take into account what I did into Lightroom
and it's gonna do it in Luminar.
And I'm just gonna go directly to some fun stuff.
So I'm gonna go to Add Filter.
I love Soft Glow, for example.
I wanted a bit of more moody feeling,
so add a bit of Soft Glow,
it's gonna add a bit of soft glow in the highlights.
I wanna go a bit more crazy
so I'm gonna add a filter called the Radiance Filter.
And I'm gonna boost the radiance.
And you see, it gives a good qualities of photo.
But I don't like it everywhere.
So I'm even gonna add a bit of saturation,
just on the thing here.
Maybe a bit of warmth, some cool.
Let's see here, maybe a bit of warmth.
But again, this time I'm gonna take a brush,
I'm gonna click on Brush,
and I'm gonna make sure the opacity of my brush
is about at 50% so when I brush it's not the full strength.
I always use 100% softness, so it's very smooth.
So you don't see brushstrokes,
and I'm gonna make a big brush.
And then I'm gonna start brushing here.
And you see, as I start brushing,
basically the whole effect goes away
and I'm just gonna add it on a few lamps here and there,
just to make a little glowy effect, Paris by night.
It's not a huge change.
Before, after.
Look at what we've done so far.
Before, after, before.
Just made some glows.
And I always check out the Advanced Contrast,
cause that's really something you don't have in Lightroom
that I like, so let's see what it does on the highlights.
Nope, I don't like what it does on the highlights.
Let's see what it does on the midtones.
Yeah, not so bad, a little bit of the midtones,
and let's put on the shadows a bit more.
And let's see balance midtones, shadows.
I just like to play around with it and see what it does.
Check it out, before.
It just gives you more contrast options.
Okay I like that.
One more that I like...
And you know I would spend a lot more time,
I would just play around.
But there's one more I wanna show which I love
and you don't have in Lightroom.
And that is the famous, the one and only...
I didn't put it in my favorites.
When you click there it puts it on that little star there.
It puts it in your favorite.
Detail Enhancer.
So what's cool about it is
you got small, medium, and large details.
And again, I like to play with small details.
It's completely different from clarity.
It does it everywhere.
I don't like that, so I'm gonna click on Brush.
And I usually only add details here and there,
just on the front of the photo, not everywhere.
Just so that we have soft here and a bit of details there.
It's very subtle but when you do big print,
it does make a difference.
So voila.
That's before and after.
Before and after, so that's before Lightroom.
Not a huge change,
but it just adds that little je ne sais quoi
that you don't find anywhere.
Okay, next.
New York, New York.
So same thing, this is the retouched version.
I'm gonna create a virtual copy, I'm gonna reset it,
and I'm gonna do my workflow.
So I'm gonna open up the shadows, bring down the highlights,
bring down the whites, and the blacks.
The white balance is crazy on this one.
I'm gonna add some blue and some magenta.
I'm gonna boost a little bit the exposure,
something like this.
I'm gonna make it straight using the angle.
Boom, boom, boom.
I'm also gonna make it more panoramic
cause I love panorama, I don't know why.
I just love that sort of cinematic look.
I might go to add some sharpening, do some masking.
If you watch my YouTube channel, you know I do that a lot.
So basically when I'm done with that,
that's when I start playing around, or maybe add a gradient.
I prefer to do my gradients in Lightroom,
maybe add a bit of blue, lower a little bit the exposure,
not so much.
I like to do that there, I think that's cool.
I also like to do my dodge and burning also in Lightroom.
I think it's faster than Luminar.
I don't know, I'm so much used to Lightroom.
But I love to have some fun.
So again, Luminar, Edit the Copy with Lightroom Adjustment.
Have some fun.
And I just throw filters at it and sometimes, you know what,
I don't do anything, sometimes I do everything.
So you could do everything with Luminar
and not by Lightroom,
but then you will be missing out
on all the digital asset management that Lightroom has,
all the catalog.
I have 200,000 photos in my Lightroom catalog.
I am not ready to go to Lightroom CC,
I am not ready to go to Luminar because it's my flagship,
this is where my life is.
Okay on this one I'm just gonna go...
Let's check Essential.
Essential is good because you've got the AI filter.
I can just try the AI filter.
I like what it does there.
And I can try the little polarizing filter,
maybe it helps a little bit.
I'm gonna click on Add Filter.
Oh one thing you can do also which is cool in Luminar
is you can create a layer.
I can create a layer,
so you can do different filters on that layer
and then lower the opacity of the entire layer.
You'll see what I mean.
So I'm gonna add a filter to that,
I'm gonna add the famous Advanced Contrast.
And I just move around, see what it does.
Highlights, no.
Balance highlight.
No, not that much.
Midtones, yeah, look at midtones.
Love what it does to the sky.
Shadows, maybe I put up the shadows a little bit.
It's more contrasty, it's just more punchy, you know?
More, more, more punchy.
And let's see here, what else can we play around with?
Let's see here.
Oh yeah I know, I wanna add filter.
I'm gonna add again the Soft Glow.
I love the Soft Glow.
Soft Glow.
And I think it can work pretty well on your...
I just love it here.
Just make the whole city a little more brighter.
And basically that's it.
That's all I would do there.
And I would apply and get it back into Lightroom.
And then in Lightroom, sometimes, I continue the process.
So it's a game of playing between one and the other.
So now I'm back into Lightroom.
Here is the Luminar version.
And I'm like, "Yeah, why not do another?"
I think that this is too bright,
so I wanna do another lower the exposure there.
And maybe I wanna lower the exposure again here on top
so that we now have the city that's beautiful.
So basically let me show you this.
I'm gonna reset.
So that's what we started with.
That's what we got doing Lightroom,
and that's what we got going into Luminar.
That little je ne sais quoi.
15th is in a couple of days.
You can still get a good price on it.
If you click the link on the window, you get 10% off.
You should really buy it.
It's for the first time ever for Windows.
In French we have an expression,
"Avoir plusiers cordes a son arc."
It means just having more tools to play around with.
Just do what you do in Lightroom,
then just put it up in Luminar
and play around with some of the filters.
You are going to fall in love, I promise you.
When Luminar is gonna come out with digital management,
it's going to be a killer.
Because I'm not ready to give up on Lightroom at all
for Luminar, because let me show you this.
This is one of my Lightroom catalogs,
and everything is keyword, everything's there.
It's got 179,688 photos.
And I have my whole organizations there.
I've got all my collections, which are,
I think, on my iPhone.
Oh my God.
I can make books, I use books,
I use the web module to send photos to clients.
I'm not giving up on Lightroom.
And I think Lightroom classic is better than ever.
But Luminar is just a plugin.
If there's one plugin you need to have, it's this one.
I've been using plugins for 10 years, whether it's Topaz,
Color Efex Pro, the whole Nik software,
a few others there.
Luminar blows my mind.
I don't think there's one more complete plugin out there.
And I totally endorse it.
I get emails, I'm not kidding, about every once in a week
for new plugins and new technology,
and I only promote,
I do get paid for saying this, guys,
just so you know.
I do get money if you buy Luminar.
I get a commission.
But there is a lot of other software
I could make commissions on it that I don't
because I'm not using them.
I am truly using Luminar.
And I only promote stuff that I actually promote.
I got a half a million subscribers,
I've got all brands that wants to pay me to do videos,
and I'm turning down every proposition
because I only wanna promote stuff
that's my integrity of what I use.
And I use Luminar, and I use Aurora.
I think Macphun, now it's called Skylum,
is really killing it.
I'm gonna be advising them on their new, also, Luminar,
with asset management.
Cause I think they're working on a solution
for having all your photos in a cloud.
I think they're gonna take image management
to a whole new level.
It's great, I love Adobe.
It's healthy to have competitors which are innovating.
It just gets everybody going, and in the end,
it's you guys that wins,
because you get better and better software all the time.
Okay that was a little long,
but the presales is finishing on the 15th.
Go grab Luminar now.
Link is on the video.
You will not regret it.