Lightroom 201

Ready to take your Lightroom editing to the next level?

You survived Lightroom 101. You found the Develop module, moved a few sliders around, and—hopefully—didn’t accidentally turn your photo into something that belongs on the cover of a 1980s heavy metal album.

Now it’s time to get a little more powerful.

Join SPC President Shawn Wyrozub for Lightroom 201, a virtual mentoring session focused on one of the most useful tools in Lightroom Classic: Masking.

Masking gives you the ability to make targeted adjustments to specific parts of your photograph instead of changing the entire image. Want to brighten your subject without blowing out the sky? Darken the background? Bring out detail in the clouds? Make a face stand out? Fix a distracting area without affecting everything around it?

That’s where masking comes in.

During this session, we’ll dive into:

• Understanding what masking actually does
• Subject and Sky masks
• Selecting people and specific parts of a person
• Brush masks
• Linear and Radial Gradients
• Colour and Luminance Range masks
• Adding and subtracting from masks
• Combining different masking tools
• Refining masks for more precise adjustments
• Using masks to direct the viewer’s eye
• Real-world examples of how masking can transform an image

We’ll focus on why and when you’d use each tool, not just where to find the buttons. The goal is to help you start looking at your photographs differently and recognize opportunities where a targeted adjustment can make a good image even better.

And don’t worry if the word masking makes Lightroom sound like we’re about to perform some sort of photographic magic ritual. By the end of the session, you’ll understand what you’re doing—and, more importantly, why you’re doing it.

So bring your questions, bring a few images to experiment with, and let’s get masking.

This virtual mentoring session is open to current members of the Sackville Photography Club.