4 Tips for Editing Photography Using Adobe Lightroom – Luke Stackpoole

How to Achieve a Dramatic & Atmospheric Style in Photos

I wanted to share a few photography tips, but this time related to editing, using Adobe Lightroom. This is the keystone to achieving my dramatic and atmospheric style in my photos.

Tip 1 – Tone Curve Fade

This is a standard tone curve in a typical S shape, you may be familiar with the S-curve, and I use a variant of this for most of my edits. This dampens the blacks and whites, creating a more matte look.

You can adjust the strength of the curve to suit your style, by bringing up the darks on the left side (creates a more matte look in the blacks) or bringing down the top right of the curve to fade the whites to a more flat look. The overall effect is creating a more subtle tonal balance.

Tip 2 – Sharpen & Refine Details

In order to retain the crispness of an image, despite the reduced clarity from the basic panel adjustment, I tend to add an increased amount of sharpness, which is applied on all my presets also.

The secret to doing this without introducing noise is to hold the alt/cmd key and drag the masking slider to see where the sharpening is being applied. I typically hover around 50-70 which is usually the edges only. Now the image will be looking almost painting-like whilst retaining sharpness on the edges!

Tip 3 – Colour Grade

I wanted to show the power of colour grading using just 1 colour slider – in this example, the green slider in Lightroom. By adjusting the hue to the left, (more yellow) and reducing the saturation and luminance we can achieve a totally different atmosphere, a more natural colour yet far more visually appealing and cinematic in my opinion. Check the images below of the Tigers to see the difference!

Tip 4 – Add Dynamic Light

The last thing I do to an image is work with the graduated filter controls to add depth and dynamism to an image by playing with the lighting. Typically, I will lighten/darken certain areas of an image to lead the eye in the frame and create a sense of atmosphere. In the image below you will see it looks quite flat before adding a darkening to the foreground and sky and after it really leads you into the centre of the frame to capture all your attention on the important aspects of the photo.

Luke Stackpoole, Photographer & Filmmaker

Luke Stackpoole is a distinguished photographer and filmmaker known for his captivating and emotive imagery. As a ColorPro Ambassador for the past three years, Luke has become an influential figure in the creative industry. Based in the UK, he made a bold career shift from finance in 2017 to pursue his passion for visual storytelling. Since then, he has collaborated with top brands and garnered a substantial online following of over a million people.