Lightroom CC Advice - Bluer Skies

[James Cutting]

Afternoon all,

After some advice/opinions. I'm still going through my RIAT shots, and noticed a lot over the weekend that the sky was quite white/washed out. I've seen quite a few photos from RIAT that have managed to bring the blues out really well. In some shots it isn't that much of an issue, but in some it is.

However, I'm struggling to do this myself. I use Adobe Lightroom Creative Cloud (also do have access to the older LR Classic) but I was wondering if anyone knew a good way how to try and naturally bring out the blues in the sky a bit better without making it look like a sky replacement

Any tips/advice would be appreciated.

Here is an example - Could I bring out the blue more in this, or not particularly? Hopefully it gives an idea - maybe it is just down to the angle some shots are at...

Swedish Air Force JAS-39C Gripen Solo Display by James Cutting, on Flickr

Thank you

[blakey]

That looks like a blanket of cloud with a bit of blue peeking through...... how do you expect to get blue skies when it's cloudy lol

[James Cutting]

Yeah...probably not the best example, admittedly in a rush when posting this. I just see sometimes people really manage to make the sky pop out more in their images and wondered how

[Del]

I don'y know about LR CC, I use LR Classic, but a couple of things I sometimes try with this sort of thing is :
1. to whack up the dehaze, which sometimes puts in enough contrast to separate out any blue sky and clouds
2. or to create a mask, do a "select sky" and change the temp into the blue end of the range
or some combination of both.

[Typhoon2]

You can also use the Hue/ saturation/ luminance sliders to tweak and make the sky "pop". Just increase the blues and aquas and it will only target those specific colours. Worth playing around with those to try and create a bluer sky.

[nellis6]

I uploaded your image to LrC and edited nothing other than the following
Under the Histogram you have 4 symbols. The right hand one is 'masking' (or use shift + W). Click on this.
Choose 'Select Sky'
Then on the sliders select 'Temp' and move to the left until you are happy with the colour (I used -29)
Click 'Done' and then export as normal

Unfortunately I don't use anything that I can upload the image to on here, but I can email it to you so you can see it.

[Senna4165]

Go to top righthand coloum
PRESETsekect sky
scroll down to presets sky and other and alter

[James Cutting]

Hi all,

Thanks for your advice tips and comments, much appreciated! I will look into them and give it a test

[Tally-ho]

Here is an example - Could I bring out the blue more in this ...
Swedish Air Force JAS-39C Gripen Solo Display by James Cutting, on Flickr

Thank you

It can be done. You need to play around with the tools that allow you to enhance specific colours, add some contrast maybe, or more light, and then the hue / tone tool. Here's an example:-

[Off Airways]

Well ... I have to say there is not a lot of true "Blue" there ... there is more magenta and it's certainly "OVERDONE" in the top left corner!

Some pictures just should not be enhanced, if the image is correctly exposed then that's the way it is!

Sorry it doesn't work for me.

John (ABIPP ARPS)

PS: If you want more blue you may want to consider dropping the "Temperature" of the image. Daylight is around 5600K, if you shoot or process cooler, maybe try 4800K you'll a bluer effect.

https://www.shutterstock.com/blog/kelvi ... emperature

... and to throw another spanner in the works - have you calibrated your monitor?? if not you'll be chasing your tail

[fourringcircus]

Try dehaze on the sky! It has a polarizing effect. You can also mask the sky and reduce the exposure to bring back the blues.

Do them together by small amounts rather than going too far with just one option.

[James Cutting]

Thank you all for the replies and duly noted. Screen all calibrated too will have a play around and see how it looks!

[Mouldyhants]

I know this thread is a bit old but there are now new masking tools in light room that make this a lot easier. Worth checking out YouTube tutorials on selections and what you can then do with them. You can even access tone curves in masks now.

[James Cutting]

Thank you! Is this in CC variation, or classic?

[PitchAxis]

Lightroom Classic has the new masking tools. With aircraft especially rotary wing and prop aircraft you need to make sure that the mask is correctly applied, The quickest way to do this is to press O to apply a red overlay which really helps show the effect.

[James Cutting]

Thanks! Think I'll make the switch back to LR Classic and look into some tutorials.

[James Cutting]

I know this thread is a bit old but there are now new masking tools in light room that make this a lot easier. Worth checking out YouTube tutorials on selections and what you can then do with them. You can even access tone curves in masks now.

You're a hero for suggesting that! I am going through my GT World Challenge shots from brands, and after watching a tutorial on YouTube, it makes edits so much easier being able to do specific areas like that. Will be good to put it through its paces at RIAT Had to update LR Classic but it seems to be a lot better than the newer CC, just makes the Macbook work harder