Dodging and Burning is not just a Photoshop thing!

I will be the first person to advocate that Dodging and Burning is the most powerful technique we have in our arsenal as Digital Artists to make incredible images in Photoshop.  These techniques can be used to add instantaneous depth and pull a muddy image out of the muck and make it awesome in minutes!

I have created several videos now on Dodging and Burning in Photoshop over the years:

  1. Curves Adjustment Dodging and Burning….  2015
  2. Automatic Dodging and Burning in Photoshop…. 2014
  3. Dodging and Burning With a Purpose: Photoshop CS5…. 2012
  4. Dodging and Burning…. 2011

Photoshop is a great source for dodging and burning your images, but did you know you can use Adobe Camera Raw or even Lightroom for this?  I have been experimenting with this over the last few months and think I finally made some Dodge and Burn brushes in ACR that work like a charm.  The secret to Dodging and Burning is that it is not just about increasing or decreasing the exposure in the brush.  It requires a little boost in Contrast, Clarity and even the Whites and Blacks.

Here are the settings I use for making my Dodging and Burning brushes in Adobe Camera Raw.

You can do the same in Lightroom in the Adjustment Brush panel.

Dodging and Burning Adjustment Brush Settings

There are several benefits to using these techniques in ACR or Lr:

  1. More accurate control over tone and color
  2. Temperature Color Control
  3. Point and Click Brush for easy adjustment
  4. Easier to adjust intensity of D & B adjustments
  5. Correction to the video:  Lightroom is capable of Wacom Tablet sensitivity ACR is not.

Creating an Adjustment Brush in Lightroom is a bit different than Camera Raw.  Eric says in the comments:

Save an Adjustment Brush Preset in Lightroom

Check out the Video tutorial on this topic here:


 

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Blake Rudis
f.64 Academy and f.64 Elite are the brainchildren of Blake Rudis. While he is a landscape photographer, he is most passionate about post-processing images in Photoshop and mentoring others.

For Blake, it's all about the art and process synergy. He dives deep into complex topics and makes them easy to understand through his outside-the-box thinking so that you can use these tricks in your workflow today!
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