Lightroom Color Grade Tutorial

[AUTO GENERATED] hey guys Ryan here at signature edits
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and today I’m going to show you how to
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edit colors like a boss in Lightroom
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let’s do it
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[Music] 00:13
today we’re going to be looking at this
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great image taken at the beach here’s
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our before and here is our after I’m
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going to show you how to do this so
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starting at the very top we’re going to
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adjust our exposure just to bring things
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down a little bit because you can see
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that the image starts off quite bright
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next we’re going to just add some
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contrast here and in Lightroom there are
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multiple ways to do the same thing so I
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don’t necessarily have to add the
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contrast up here if I wanted I could go
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to my tone curve hit three little points
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here this is the blacks of the image
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this is the whites so this is the
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highlights mid-tones shadows I made a
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point in each and by dragging our
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mid-tones down that’ll reduce the
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mid-tone contrast dragging it up will
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increase it so you can see here’s before
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and here’s after we’ve effectively done
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the same thing as just increasing our
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contrast up here but it’s slightly
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different because we’re adjusting the
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mid-tones instead of the entire image
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contrast so whatever works better for
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you the point is there are lots of ways
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to adjust color and different settings
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inside of Lightroom it just depends what
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works best for your situation so
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continuing down we’re going to add a
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little bit of clarity just to bring out
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the texture in those cliffs and just a
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little D haze that’ll help add our color
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saturation ever so slightly and make
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that sky pop a little bit little
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vibrance and maybe the slightest bit of
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saturation okay so that’s our basic
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adjustments next we’re going to go down
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to our HSL panel which is where the real
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color magic in lightroom happens this is
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where you get the super stylized looks
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they see on Instagram how well we head
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to our hue panel and by clicking this
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little drag er I can actually adjust any
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section of my image by clicking and
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dragging up or down so dragging up my
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image is going to affect that particular
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color the blue of the sky and make it
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more purple dragging it down it makes it
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more of a teal aqua color so we’re going
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to be going for aqua today because it’s
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more of a vintage sort of look plus
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purple sky generally doesn’t happen on
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earth so let’s go with the aqua today
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great and by clicking on these cliffs I
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can see what color range if you’re
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watching here in the HSL panel is being
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affected so I’m going to take my oranges
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and my yellows up towards red a little
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bit away from green perfect just like
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that now next I’m going to adjust the
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saturation level because my sky is
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looking good but it’s
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little bit extreme so I’m going to take
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the Blues I can either do that by
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clicking and dragging down and reduce
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the saturation or I can just click this
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little toggle bar and take it down a
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little bit last I’m going to take my
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luminance in this guy down just a little
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and that’ll help get some of that color
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back so that’s before the luminance and
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after now I know this looks pretty silly
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but we’re going to keep going and keep
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playing with our colors again here’s
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before and here where’s here’s what we
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got too so far next if I wanted to I
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could add some split toning to my image
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that’s another way to add color we can
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do that by adjusting my hue and taking
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my saturation up and this will add color
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to any of the highlights in my image so
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let’s say that I want to make it a
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little bit warmer and shadows same thing
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let’s say that I want to go for that
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you know orange and teal look that the
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blockbuster movies are so famous for
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well I can do that too let’s find a nice
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teal here somewhere around there
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and then take my saturation back down
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now a great trick to do this if you
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don’t want to take your saturation up
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just so you can see what you’re doing
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and then adjust it back down every time
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all you have to do is just press alt and
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then drag on this hue and that’ll
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automatically set the saturation preview
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to 100% so that you can quickly adjust
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or wherever you want to get your colors
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so let’s say there and my shadows as you
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can see you can do some pretty extreme
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effects if you want to but we’re going
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to be subtle a little by little we’re
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going to build this image we’re going to
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skip the detail lens correction
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transform effects because those don’t
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affect color so much and go right into
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our calibration now this is one of the
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most underused misunderstood parts of
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Lightroom why because it seems scary
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what exactly is calibration well it’s
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how Lightroom interprets the color of
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your images so we can get Lightroom to
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interpret your shadows is more green
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wears more magenta we can do the same
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with our Reds whether they’re red or
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interpret it more as orange I’m going to
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take the saturation up in those oranges
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and the Reds green same thing I can take
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it more towards green more towards a
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kind of yellowish blue and then my blues
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this is always the most significant
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change dragging it all the way this way
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is really going to bring out that aqua
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and orange look bring it all the way
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this way is going to make
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look like we’re on another planet so
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we’re going to take it in the middle
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they’re probably around here and just
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like that we’ve come a long way in our
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image here’s before and here’s after now
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the last thing that I’m going to do to
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adjust this images go up and adjust my
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white balance this is one trick that you
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can do if your image isn’t looking the
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way you want it to it could be because
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your white balance isn’t set right
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adjusting this is going to adjust all
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the colors in your image because it’s
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going to add warmth or coolness to the
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entire image so by taking it and warming
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it up just a little bit you can see how
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much more red and yellow comes out of
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the image how it just seems to pop
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whereas our before shot there’s a lot
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cooler
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so just by warming things up ever so
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slightly we can take that image and get
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a little bit more pop out of the cliffs
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and out of the sky so that’s a few ways
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that we can adjust color inside of
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Lightroom as you can see there’s lots of
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different ways to do the same thing I
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could also go to it my adjustment layers
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and make myself a quick little
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adjustment brush to bring out extra
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texture and some saturation so let’s do
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that here just like that and we’re gonna
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paint onto the class I could do the same
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thing with this guy by taking my white
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balance in my temperature my exposure
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down slightly saturation up clarity can
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go down D haze can go down because
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there’s not really much to da’s up in
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the sky and my sharpness down because
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that doesn’t matter and what painting
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that on here you’ll see the sky’s
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getting a little bit more intense and
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that’s mostly because of this trick up
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here both lowering the exposure upping
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the saturation and lowering the
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temperature you can really add blue to
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this guy even if it’s a little blown out
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so that’s just a nice little trick you
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can use and we can dial back that effect
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just by reducing our values here if you
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want to download this preset I’ll make
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it available in the link below I hope
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this tutorial was helpful for you if it
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was please don’t forget to hit that like
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button make sure to subscribe for more
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great content and if you have a question
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leave it in the comments below
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hey if you have an edit that you would
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like to see done or an image that you
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would like to see edited please send me
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a message I’ll get back to you and we’ll
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do it in a future tutorial alright until
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next time go make something awesome
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[Music]