How do you use the contrast slider in Lightroom? The best Lightroom tool that almost always gets underused by most photographers especially beginner photographers is the contrast tool. It is an intimidating tool because if used incorrectly, you can potentially destroy your image.
The contrast tool is my favorite tool to finish an image with. Once I edit a photo the way I like it, (landscape, portrait or any kind of image) I always go to my contrast slider to finish it up.
Contrast makes the photo look real, it makes it look like a finished image. If you are ever in doubt of how to edit a photo or what you need to do to an image to make it pop, always go to the contrast slider.
When you watch the video below, you can see that the image above looks really good after I edited it and before I touched it up. However, once I brought up the contrast the photograph came alive. It made it look so much better. Like a suit without a tie, the contrast slider is the tie to finish off the suit.
Contrast is just as important as anything else, but I always give it a bit more love than all the other sliders. Contrast brings the colors of an image together, it darkens the right spots and it makes your sky pop.
When you use contrast correctly in combination with all the sliders in Lightroom, you will see a very large difference in your images.
Contrast should always be adjusted in all of your images. Once you start to do it and getting familiar with it, you will see there is nothing to fear.
In this video, you can see how I use contrast to bring my photo to life and to finish it off before sending it off to print.
How to use the Contrast Slider
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