This 10-minute tutorial begins with a question for those of you see captivating backlit photos with beautiful golden tones and think to yourself, “why don’t my photos look like that?” There are a number of challenges with shooting under such conditions, and the tutorial below explains what they are and how to overcome them.

Instructor Simon d’Entremont is a notable Canadian photographer who specializes in nature and wildlife imagery and the occasional portrait. In this 10-minute episode he demonstrates the necessary camera settings and techniques so you don’t end up with shadowy silhouettes when backlight is the name of the game. He also explains how to include eye-catching sun stars for added impact.

As the term implies, backlight occurs when the sun is behind a subject and can cause all kinds of problems with color fidelity, contrast, and exposure. Under these circumstances the part of your subject facing the camera is in shade, while surrounding areas are really bright. When this occurs the implications for achieving a correct exposure are obvious.

Simon discusses the fundamentals of backlit photography, one of which is that it’s best to shoot when the sun is low in the sky. At these times the light is less harsh “as it needs to go through more atmosphere to reach your camera’s sensor.” Simon notes further that “the atmosphere scatters shorter wave lengths like blue colors—leaving beautiful red and orange tones in their wake.

Thus, when the sun isn’t high in the sky the dynamic range of a scene is greatly reduced—making it easier to capture brighter tones without blowing out your highlights. Tip number two is best described by Simon: “the fluffier or furrier the subject, the more interesting rim light will surround them.” Simon illustrates how this works and contributes to photos with an artistic effect that can be quite “glamorous.”

In other words, portrait subjects with long flowing hair are perfect for backlit portraits, as are furry subjects for wildlife shots. As Simon suggests, think baby chicks and furry foxes. The magic of rim light occurs when the sun is able to partially penetrate the edges of a subject to create an appealing halo effect.

The foregoing is barely a taste of the techniques you’ll learn, and they’re all easy to understand and employ. By the time the video concludes you think of backlighting as a bonus, rather than a difficult obstacle that must be overcome.

Simon’s instructional YouTube channel is a great source of tips and tricks—especially for those who shoot and edit outdoor photographs, so take a close look and up your game.

We also recommend watching a tutorial we posted recently from another accomplished shooter, explaining a variety of simple pro techniques for capturing alluring outdoor portrait photographs.

Regardless of the type of images you shoot you’ve likely captured photos with ugly, unnatural color casts. There are various ways to correct this unfortunate problem during the editing process, and today you’ll discover a quick and oft-ignored technique In Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw (ACR).

Minneapolis-based photographer Greg Benz is also a very adept image-editing expert who regularly posts tutorials that simplify common tasks. In this quick episode he demonstrates how to use the Refine Saturation tool for achieving accurate and pleasing colors.

Many of you may be familiar with applying Photoshop’s Luminosity Blend mode to correct unwanted shifts in color, and today you’ll learn how to manage similar problems in Lightroom with the easy-to-use Refine Saturation slider. Benz notes that when you increase contrast with a Point Curve, colors often desaturate and Hue may also shift. The good news is that it’s easy to offset these unwanted changes by taking full advantage of Lightroom’s Refine Slider.

A you’ll see, this simple tool works wonders for both global and selective enhancements. It’s important to note that this quick trick is only available with the Point Curve— not Parametric or RGB Curves. After describing the details of how this tool works, Benz describes the best way to get the job done, depending upon the specific image at hand.

You learn that it’s time to employ this slider anytime you see unwanted saturation or a hue shift within a Curve. He also explains why a contrast boost on skin tones or highly saturated colors are especially important cases. Another recommendation is to “try using an S-Curve if the Contrast slider produces unwanted shifts in colors.”

The Refine slider is also very helpful if you need to make tonal adjusts to highlights, shadows, or both. In these instances Benz demonstrates how to use a local adjustment based upon the luminance range, and then employ a local curves with the Refine slider to further perfect the adjustments.

Benz wraps up the lesson by illustrating how it can be very helpful to try intermediate slider values to achieve optimal results. You’ll also learn why “you may wish to make small tweaks to the curve after big moves with the Refine Slider.

There’s much more to see on Benz’ popular YouTube channel, so be sure to pay a visit. And don’t miss the tutorial we posted earlier from another process expert, explaining a foolproof method for converting color photographs to black and white, with an explanation of several mistakes to avoid.

Today’s modern image-editing tools enable us to turn good photos into great ones, and even transform a subpar shot into one that’s quite special. But there’s a common mistake made by beginners and more advanced shooters alike; namely excessive processing that can really kill a photo.

We’ve said it time and time again: don’t overcook your photos with a heavy-handed approach. This advice applies to numerous processing tasks, two of which are discussed in the quick video below. We encourage you to pay close attention, because heavy-handed editing is often worse that no editing at all.

Educator Matthew Cuda is a professional wildlife and nature photographer, and he’s really good behind the computer—in large part because he always takes a subtle approach. In this episode he discusses a couple of detrimental editing mistakes he says he sees all time. One is going overboard with Lightroom’s Denoise tools and the other is over sharpening photos to the point that they’re crispier than potato chips fresh out of the fryer.

Cuda pulls up an overprocessed image of a black vulture in flight, to demonstrate these problems. Then he explains how to get the job done right. The photo was shot at ISO 20,000 with the exposure bumped up by 1.5 stops. As he explains, the image was captured with a Sony A9, “which is a fairly low-noise camera,” but you’re really up against it when shooting with these settings. In other words, “this isn’t a hill you want to die on.”

Zooming in on the shot reveals ugly noise and artifacts that cause some photographers to jump into Lightroom’s Develop module, click on Denoise, and move the slider far to the right. Unfortunately, doing that further degrades the image in predictable ways that Cuda explains. This isn’t to say that Denoise AI is merely an image-killer, as long as you use it with restraint on an appropriate photograph.

The second, and often related, big mistake that happens all too often is that these same photographers take sharpening to the max in an attempt to reclaim all the detail they just destroyed. Doing this simply piles one problem top another, with the result that the image becomes totally unusable.

Cuda demonstrates how to do things properly for an effective compromise between minimizing noise without smoothing out all the important small details in a shot. Anyone who has ever cooked oysters understands the importance of doing so carefully on low heat, and much the same applies when cooking your images.

There’s much more to learn about shooting and editing on Cuda’s instructional YouTube channel, so be sure to check it out and pay attention to his advice.

And speaking of taking the proper approach to processing your images, don’t miss the earlier tutorial we posted from another expert, explaining a better way to convert color images to b&w, with common mistakes you should avoid.

We’ve all captured what we thought was a great photo, only to pull it up on the computer and discover it’s not nearly as compelling as expected—particularly when shooting outdoors when there are several challenges to overcome.

Sometimes the problem can be easy fixed with a bit of thoughtful cropping, but other times you confront converging vertical lines or bland colors because your exposure settings missed the mark. Today’s Photoshop tutorial from the PHLOG Photography YouTube channel explains how to correct these issues and more with some straightforward adjustments in Photoshop.

Instructor Christian Mohrle is an accomplished German landscape photographer whose image-editing tutorials are very popular among Shutterbug readers. The video below demonstrates his approach for transforming ho-hum late-day images into those that are really special.

Mohrle begins with a bland panoramic photo that was shot after the sun dropped below the horizon, and, frankly, it needs a bunch of work. His primary goal is to pump up the colors while maintaining a realistic look, but there are other issues that require attention. As always, there’s a link beneath the video for downloading the Raw file so you and Mohrle can make the fix together.

The lesson begins with some rather significant cropping to achieve more dynamic framing, and the wide format of the photograph provides plenty of flexibility. The next step is an initial correction of the shewed perspective of the buildings that gives the strange appearance as though they’re leaning outwards. He quickly uses Photoshop’s Geometry tab for a first pass at this task, which he refines later in the lesson.

Next are a few very basic adjustments to prepare the image as much as possible for the selective masking enhancements that follow. These including changing the profile from Adobe Color to Adobe Landscape, improving exposure in the Lights Panel, and a few other quick tweaks. Now it’s time for straightforward masking to improve the image even further.

The real magic occurs as Mohrle demonstrates several color grading enhancements that provide a truly stunning look. He also employs careful sharpening before further refining the remaining distortion of the buildings.

All that’s left to complete the transformation is a quick fix for lens flare and the addition of glow to the bright area of the sky. He provides all the important settings for each step of the process. The difference between his before/after images is truly remarkable.

You can find more editing tips and tricks for editing landscape images by paying a visit to Mohrle’s’ instructional YouTube channel, so be sure to take a look.

And on a related note, check out the tutorial we posted recently from another accomplished outdoor photographer who explains how to edit sunset photos in Lightroom, with free presets included.