Adobe Photoshop Lightroom

The Folders panel can simply be used as a means to access the imported photos that reside in them, but there’s a lot more you can do! In fact, when it comes to moving photos between folders or moving folders between drives, using Lightroom to do the heavy lifting will not only get your photos moved to a new location, but it will ensure that Lightroom’s catalog is updated with the new location information.

The problem with moving photos outside of Lightroom (i.e. using a file browser) is that the catalog doesn’t get updated. The next time you open Lightroom after the move Lightroom is going to look for those files in the last place it expected to find them, because that information is stored inside the catalog file. While it’s true that you can reconnect the catalog to photos and folders Lightroom considers missing; it’s much better when you don’t have to.

Let’s start with the easy stuff and work our way up. When you just need to move photos between folders that are already in the Folders panel, all you need to do is select the photos and drag/drop them onto the new destination folder. The first time you move files this way Lightroom will ask you to confirm that you do actually want to move the files. Click the Move button to complete the task.

Moving one folder into another folder in the Folders panel works the same way. Select the folder you want to move, and then drag/drop it onto the new destination folder. Lightroom will ask you to confirm the operation just like before and you will click the Move button to continue. You could click the “Don’t show again” box inside the confirmation dialog, but I recommend that you don’t. You never know when it might just save you from an accidental click and drag.

How about a scenario that involves creating a new subfolder first, and then moving photos into it? Let’s break out the steps:

Step 1. Select the photos that you want to move into this new subfolder.

Step 2. Select the parent folder within which you want to create the new folder.

Step 3. Click the + button in the Folders panel header. This will open the Create Folder dialog box.

Step 4. Give the folder a name.

Step 5. Check the Include selected photos box.

Step 6. Click Create.

Lightroom will then create the subfolder and move the selected photos into it. Piece of cake!

One last scenario: Say you want to move a folder full of photos into a new (not-yet-created) folder on a new disk you just installed. Let’s go through the steps:

Step 1. Choose Library > New folder. This will launch the Browse For Folder dialog box.

Step 2. Navigate to the new disk, and then create the new folder at the location of your choice. With that folder selected, click OK (Choose on a Mac). That folder will then be imported into Lightroom and appear in the Folders panel.

Step 3. Select the folder you want to move to this new location and drag/drop it onto the newly created folder.

Step 4. Click the Move button when prompted. Lightroom will move the folder to the new location. This will be updated in the Folders panel as well as on your disk itself.

You can add keyword metadata via the Import Photos dialog box as you import your images, or edit the keywords later via the Library module’s Keywording panel. 

Notice that the keywords have been sorted into categories such as Nature subjects and Places. In the Places keyword category is a subcategory called Europe; within that, Norway, and then a sub-keyword: Bygdøy peninsula. It pays to establish a proper keyword hierarchy that suits the content of your library.

The Keyword Tags panel is very useful when searching for specific images. When you click a keyword category or individual keyword, the content area or Filmstrip displays just the images that match the selected keyword criteria. Because you can assign multiple keywords to associate the image with various criteria, you can cross-reference your images in many ways.

To start using keyword metadata, you can add new keywords to the Keywords panel (anticipating the keywords you’ll need), add new keywords as you import images into the library, or add and edit keywords via the Info panel. Whichever method you use, once a keyword has been added, it’s listed in the Keyword Tags panel. Then you can arrange the keywords into a suitable hierarchy.

Once a keyword is logged into the system, Lightroom auto-completes keywords for you as you start typing the first few letters for a new keyword entry. Apart from making your data entry speedier, this feature helps you to avoid duplicating keyword entries through careless spelling or typos.

Lightroom also auto-assigns the correct hierarchy. So if I add the keyword Seascapes, the Seascapes keyword is assigned under the Nature subjects category in the Keyword Tags panel.

Here’s how this technique works:

1. In the Import Photos dialog box, enter keywords to be applied as images are imported. Notice how Lightroom auto-completes a keyword entry if similar keywords already exist.

2. After the images have been imported, search for them by using the Keywords Tags panel.

You can search for the same images by using other keyword criteria. Initially, I included the keyword Flowers. So when I searched by Nature Subjects > Flowers, the content area showed the images I had just imported, plus any other images that also contained the keyword Flowers

The Filename Template Editor works by using what it calls “tokens” to represent various text strings that you can assemble into any configuration you want. The text strings represented by the tokens can consist of image name data, image numbering options, date formats, information pulled from metadata, and custom text. The assembled tokens can be saved as reusable presets.

Opening the Editor

Although it’s accessible during import and export, I prefer to get to the Filename Template Editor from the Library module:

1. Select an image and press F2 (or choose Library > Rename Photo). A number of default presets are already at your disposal. Any presets you create will be found here as well. Select any preset to see an example of how it will display as a filename.
2. To create a new preset, click the drop-down arrow and choose Edit to launch the Filename Template Editor. When the Filename Template Editor opens, it displays the tokens of the selected preset in the window below the Preset menu. You can use these tokens as a starting point, or delete them and start fresh. In the example in Figure 1, the Date – Filename preset was selected, and it contains two tokens: {Date (YYYYMMDD)>>} and {Filename>>}.

Creating a Preset

Let’s go through the steps to create a preset that consists of the date and time and a three-digit sequence number, with the elements separated by underscores. The resulting filename will look like this:

YYYY_MM_DD_H_M_S_001

1. With the Filename Template Editor open, remove the existing tokens from the editor by selecting them and pressing Delete.
2. Click the date drop-down arrow and select the four-digit year token Date (YYYY). The selected token appears in the window.
3. Click into the window and type an underscore after the year token.
4. Return to the date drop-down list and choose Date(MM); then add an underscore.
5. Repeat this process for each remaining date and time token, each of which should be followed by an underscore, until the token is complete. The last token to add is the sequence number.
6. Click the Image Name drop-down arrow and choose "Sequence #(001)".
7. To save the new preset, click the Preset drop-down arrow and choose Save as New Preset. I prefer descriptive names like YYYY_MM_DD_H_M_S_001, but you can name your preset as you like. Click Create.
8. Click Done to return to the Rename dialog and begin the file-renaming process.

Preset Housekeeping

To remove unwanted presets, open the Filename Template Editor, click the Preset drop-down arrow, and select the preset you want to delete. Click the Preset drop-down arrow again and choose Delete preset "[preset name]".

To modify an existing preset, open the Filename Template Editor, click the Preset drop-down arrow, and select the preset to be updated. Add/remove/arrange tokens as desired, click the Preset drop-down arrow again, and choose Update preset "[preset name]". Alternatively, you could choose Save as New Preset and give the modified version a new name.

Import and Export Renaming

The Filename Template Editor accessed through the Export dialog box is the same as in the Library module. However, there are some slight differences on import:

• On import, file naming is possible only when copying or moving files.
• You have the option to apply an import sequence number token. The starting import sequence number can be configured under File > Catalog Settings > Import Sequence Numbers.

Managing photos in a high volume workflow can be a challenge. One option to consider for decreasing the clutter within your folders (aside from deleting) is to take advantage of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom’s stacking function. Stacking quite literally means to take a group of images and place them in a pile (i.e. stack) so that only the top one is visible.  Let’s take a look at how to get the most out of this feature and avoid some common pitfalls.

Perhaps you took a series of photos with the intent to combine them into a single panoramic or HDR, or perhaps you want to group all the similars from a given shoot together with only the best one showing on top. Whatever the reason, stacking is just one more Lightroom function designed to help you manage your photos.

The most important thing to keep in mind when working with stacks is that it only works in folders. You can’t stack in collections and you can’t stack photos that are stored across multiple folders. The best way to work with them is to click into a single folder and then set about creating your stacks.

How to Create a Stack

Step 1 – From the Folders panel, select the folder that contains the photos you want to stack.

Step 2 – Press G to jump to Grid view, and select the photos that you want to group into a stack. You can do this by Shift-clicking a group of continuous photos, Command/Ctrl-clicking individual photos, or using any of the methods offered under the Edit menu (which a lot of people forget about).

Step 3 – Go to Photo > Stacking > Group into Stack, or press Command/Ctrl+G to create the stack.

Once created, stacks can be collapsed—meaning you only see the top photo in the stack—or expanded so that you can see all the stacked photos next to each other. When in Grid view, you’ll see that stacked thumbnails have a special stacking handle on the left edge of the first photo in the stack and on the right edge of the last. You can click that handle to expand or collapse the stack. You can also press S to expand or collapse a selected stack. A tooltip that indicates how many photos are in that stack will appear on stacked photos.

One other stack indicator that I want to call your attention to appears in the Folders panel and Library panel. If you see two photo count totals next to a folder in the Folders panel or next to All Photographs in the Library panel, it means that there are some collapsed stacks within them. So, for example, if you see a folder count displayed as 91/99 it means that there are 99 total photos in that folder, but you will only see 91 thumbnails because there are collapsed stacks within it.

Lightroom provides a number of ways to arrange photos within folders, collections, and other photo groupings. The way photos are sorted affects the order in which they appear in slideshows, print layouts, and web galleries. If you’re wondering what the sort options are, or are frustrated because you can’t get a manual sort order to work, this tutorial should sort you out.

As photos pass through the Import process and start appearing inside the Grid view of the Library module, they’re in Import Order, which simply means the order in which they were imported. Typically, this should reflect the order based on filename and capture time, which makes sense because files are named sequentially as they’re captured. That’s a fine starting place, and perhaps in some situations it’s an order that never needs to change. However, for those situations when you want something different, Lightroom has other options to explore. There are two places within Lightroom that you can access the controls to switch among the various sort order options:

• View > Sort
• Sort controls on the toolbar

Just choose the desired option from either place, and Lightroom sorts the photos in a snap according to the order you specified. With one exception (I’ll get to that shortly), all the available options affect the sort order of whatever image grouping you’re currently viewing, whether it’s a folder, a collection, or even a metadata grouping.

Now, about that exception. At least weekly, someone asks me about what Lightroom calls “user order,” which most people call a “manual sort order”—meaning that you just want to click-and-drag photos into whatever order you want. The main reason why I get so many questions about this is because it just doesn’t work the way people expect. Let me tell you why.

First, user order works only under certain conditions. You have to be working within a single folder (with no subfolders—not even empty ones) or a single collection (with no subcollections). If you want to arrange a group of photos manually that are stored in multiple folders, you first have to put them all in a collection, and then you can arrange the sort order.

One of the most common stumbling blocks happens right after import. As soon as you click the Import button in the import dialog box, Lightroom switches to a special view in the Library module called “Previous Import.” You may not notice it, but it’s located inside the Library panel.

Even though all the photos you’re looking at are stored in a single folder, the fact that you’re looking at them while in this Previous Import grouping means that the manual sort won’t work. A manual sort is limited to the two conditions I mentioned because the manual sort information has to be tied to a specific location—that is, a folder or a collection. The Previous Import view changes with each import, so there’s no way to tie a specific sort order to such a transient grouping.

So if you want to sort those newly imported images manually, you have two choices:

• Right-click any image and choose Go to Folder in Library, which switches to the folder containing those photos.
• Select all of the images and press Ctrl-N (Mac: Command-N) to create a new collection. (Make sure that the Include Selected Photos box is checked.)

Choose whichever option best suits your needs.

Once you have the photos where you want them, press Ctrl-D to clear any selection you may have made (unless you want to move multiple photos at once). Then click the photo itself (not its frame) and drag it to the new location. As you move the selected photo over the other photos, the space between the photos darkens. This is a visual cue that if you release the mouse button the photo will move to that spot. Release the photo when you see the desired destination space change. You can do this from Grid view in the Library module or from within the Filmstrip in any module.

That’s all there is to it! Your manual sort order should remain whenever you return to that folder or collection. That is, unless you change to one of the other sort orders. If you do, you can select User Order from the sort options to switch back to the way you originally arranged it.

When you’re in the Library Grid view, if you double-click on a photo (or click on the Loupe View button in the toolbar), Adobe Photoshop Lightroom displays your photo in the Loupe view, which is a zoomed-in view of the photo. Besides just displaying the photo really big, the Loupe view can display as little (or as much) information about your photo as you’d like. These text overlays appear in the upper-left corner of the Preview area. You’ll spend a lot of time working in the Loupe view, so let’s set up a custom Loupe view that works for you.

Step One
Go to the Library module’s Grid view, click on a thumbnail, and press E on your keyboard to jump to the Loupe view.

Step Two
Press Command-J (PC: Ctrl-J) to open the Library View Options dialog box; then click on the Loupe View tab. At the top, turn on the Show Info Overlay checkbox. The pop-up menu to the right lets you choose from two different info overlays:

• Info 1 overlays the filename of your photo (in larger letters), in the upper-left corner of the Preview area. Below the filename, in smaller type, is the photo’s capture date and time, and its cropped dimensions. (Good news—we may have a winner of the “bad default settings” contest.)
• Info 2 also displays the filename, but underneath it displays the exposure, ISO, and lens settings.

Step Three
Luckily, you can choose which info is displayed for both info overlays, by using the pop-up menus in this dialog box. For example, instead of having the filename show up in huge letters, for Loupe view Info 2 you could choose something like Common Photo Settings from the pop-up menu. With this option, instead of getting the filename in huge letters, you get the same info that’s displayed under the Develop module’s histogram (such as shutter speed, f/stop, ISO, and lens setting), even though you’re in the Library module. You can customize both info overlays separately, simply by making choices from these pop-up menus. (The top menu in each section is the one that will appear in really large letters.)

Step Four
Any time you want to start over, just click the Use Defaults button and the default Loupe info settings will appear. Most of the time, I find this text appearing over my photos really distracting. The key part is “most of the time.” At other times, it’s handy. If you think this feature might be handy for you, here’s what I recommend:

• Also turn on the Show Briefly When Photo Changes checkbox below the Loupe Info pop-up menus. This setting makes the overlay temporary—when you first open a photo, the info appears for around four seconds, and then hides itself again.
• Or you can do what I do: Leave the Show Briefly When Photo Changes option turned off, and when you want to see that overlay info, press the letter I to toggle through Info 1, Info 2, and info overlay off.

The feature that seems to catch the most people by surprise is Adobe Photoshop Lightroom’s three different Screen Modes—Normal, Full Screen with Menubar, and Full Screen. Here’s how it works, when you first launch Lightroom you’re in Normal screen mode. In this mode, you can resize the Lightroom window as needed and see the menu bar and the Minimize, Maximize and Close buttons. This mode is fine when you don’t want Lightroom to cover your entire screen, and it can make it easy to switch between applications.

You can access all the screen modes by going to Window > Screen Modes. However, the easiest way to jump to the next screen mode is by simply pressing the F key. This is how people stumble into this option. One click of the F key and Lightroom expands to fill the screen, which also results in the removal of the Minimize and Close buttons, but keeps the Lightroom menu bar across the top.

Press F again and the menu bar vanishes and Adobe Photoshop Lightroom expands to completely cover the entire screen.

Now, you can see how easy it is to change the screen mode, but if you didn’t know what you did to get here it would make it difficult to find your way back! Luckily, all you need to do is press F one more time and you are back to Normal screen mode! So, now that you know, make the most of it.

There is another useful interface feature whose purpose is to clear away the clutter and focus just on your photos. It is called Lights Out mode and it can also be found under the Window menu. Lights Out has three states—Lights On, Lights Dim, and Lights Off.

Lights On is the normal working mode, but if you press the L key once you’ll cycle over to Lights Dim. By default, Lights Dim reduces the brightness of everything except the selected photo to 80% of normal brightness. This allows you to still make out the interface controls, but puts the emphasis on your photos. Dimming the lights does not prevent you from continuing to make adjustments, as all the controls are still accessible. If the default setting is too dark (or not dark enough) for your needs, you can change the dim level by going to Lightroom’s preferences:

WIN: Edit > Preferences > Interface

MAC: Lightroom > Preferences > Interface

On the Interface tab, click the Dim Level drop-down menu and choose a different setting. I prefer 50% for dimming as it makes the interface more useable to me. While you’re on the Interface tab you’ll also notice that you can change the Lights Out Screen Color. It’s hard to beat black for turning out the lights, but a medium gray can also be helpful when you want to look at your photos on a neutral background.

Press L once more to cycle to Lights Out mode where everything but your photo changes to the Lights Out screen color you chose. I find it a very helpful feature when wanting to quickly show someone a photo without the clutter of the interface, but it has practical applications as well. My favorite is to use Lights Out mode when cropping. Try this:

1. Select a photo you want to crop.
2. Press F twice to jump to Full Screen mode.
3. Press R to jump to the Crop tool and choose your aspect ratio.
4. Press L twice to jump to Lights Out mode. Now all you should see is your photo, but the crop tool is still active. Grab a resize handle and crop as desired. As you change the size of the crop rectangle you will only see the uncropped area of the photo. This gives you a quick way to see what the result of the crop will look like while you work.
5. Once you’ve completed the crop, press L once to return to Lights On, press F once to return to Normal screen mode, and press D to exit the Crop Tool, but remain in the Develop module.

Lightroom doesn’t want to take over your hard drive, but it needs your help to prevent this from happening. The reason so many people encounter this issue at some point is that the default location for the Lightroom catalog is in a folder (also named Lightroom) on your start up drive.

On Windows: My Pictures/Lightroom

On Mac: Pictures/Lightroom

Inside this folder you will find the Lightroom catalog, which has an .lrcat file extension, and the Lightroom preview cache, which has an .lrdata file extension. If you want to get a better handle on the relationship between your Lightroom catalog and your actual photos I strongly recommend that you watch this video tutorial by George Jardine. The most important thing you need to know is that the catalog file (.lrcat) is where all your Lightroom work is stored. This is one of the most valuable files on your disk, so take the time to back it up.

There is nothing wrong with keeping the Lightroom folder on your startup drive if you have ample space, but you want to keep your startup drive at least 20% free (50% free is better) because other programs use that free space for normal operation. If you have too little free space you may start having problems across the board.

So, let’s look at what you can do to manage this situation to your advantage.

Another default setting that can impact your free space is the aforementioned catalog backup. If you don’t manually choose where to have your backup catalogs saved Lightroom saves them to the Lightroom folder on the startup drive! This is not ideal for 2 reasons. First, you don’t want your backup copy to be on the same drive as your original catalog because if your drive fails you lose the back up too. Second, each time a backup process runs it creates a new copy of your catalog, which over time can eat up quite a bit of disk space. So check out my previous tutorial on catalog backups to learn how to direct those copies to a different disk.

Next, let’s take a look at some of Lightroom’s settings that can impact the size of the Lightroom folder. Go to Edit > Catalog Settings > General (Lightroom > Catalog Settings > General on Mac).

The General tab is sort of like the dashboard on your car; it can tell you a lot about the Lightroom catalog. If you ever forget where the catalog is located you can open this dialog and find it simply by clicking the Show button.

Click on the File Handling tab. There are 3 settings here that have an impact on the size of the preview cache. Ideally you only need your Standard Preview Size set to be about the same size as your monitor’s resolution. So, on my MacBook Pro, which runs at 1440×900, I have my previews set to 1440. While on my Windows desktop running a larger and higher resolution display, set to 1920×1200, I set the preview size to 1680. This controls the maximum pixel width of the standard size preview files, and the smaller the file the less space they require.

The next setting to configure is the Preview Quality. The default setting of Medium is just fine. Think of this as the amount of JPG compression applied to the preview files. The more compression the smaller the file size. Medium is a good compromise between file size and quality.

The last setting to consider is the schedule for discarding 1:1 previews. A 1:1 preview is what you look at when viewing your photos at 1:1 (i.e., full size or 100%) in the Library module. This is essentially a full size JPG copy of your photo. So, after awhile these can really take up a lot of space! The purpose of any cache is to speed up viewing time by keeping a copy at the ready whenever you need it. However, Lightroom will always render new 1:1 previews as needed, so if space is tight change that setting to discard After One Week to help keep a lid on the growth of the preview cache.

The last step is to switch back to the General tab and look to the bottom for a button labeled Relaunch and Optimize. Clicking this button is a painless way to possibly reduce the size of the .lrcat file. Just click it and Lightroom will do the rest.

One last thing to consider is to move your entire Lightroom folder (the one that contains the catalog and previews) off the startup drive. Another internal drive would be ideal, but an external drive with a fast connection will work just fine. Here’s how:

Step 1.

Close Lightroom.

Step 2.

Open Windows Explorer (Finder on Mac), navigate to My Pictures (Pictures on Mac) and select the Lightroom folder.

Step 3.

Move the entire folder to the drive of your choice. If you have the resources you might consider dedicating a single (large capacity) external drive just to holding the Lightroom folder. That way it can grow as needed without impacting anything else.

Step 4.

After the move operation is complete, open the Lightroom folder at the new location and double-click the .lrcat file to open it in Lightroom. Lightroom will then store this new location in its preference file so it will open it automatically in the future. You can also go to Edit > Preferences > General (Lightroom > Preferences > General on Mac) and hardwire the default catalog (this is what I do) by configuring it at this location.

Hopefully this will put your startup drive back in the safe zone and make your Lightroom experience much more trouble-free.

Step 1.

Free up space on your startup drive.

You want to keep at least 15-20% (or more) of your startup drive free and clear of data at all times. Your operating system and some applications need the elbowroom to operate. Running out of space can seriously impact performance.

Simple things like emptying your recycle bin/trash, moving data to another internal or external drive or uninstalling unused applications can recover an amazing amount of disk space. Keep in mind that if you are going to move imported photos to another drive that you should do it from inside of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom.

Step 2.

Run your system’s disk maintenance functions.

Windows has two utilities that can help you keep your system running in optimal condition—Error-checking and Defragmentation. Double-click My Computer and then right-click the C drive and choose Properties. Go to the Tools tab to launch these utilities. Run the Error-checking first, reboot and then come back and defrag. These can take some time to complete, so you might consider running them overnight.

On a Mac you have the Disk Utility. Open Finder and go to Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility, select your disk and click the First Aid tab. Click the Repair Disk Permissions button. This is good to do before and after you install any application as a regular part of your workflow.

Step 3.

Relaunch and optimize your Lightroom catalog.

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom has a built-in catalog maintenance function that you can run any time you feel performance is getting sluggish. You probably won’t notice a significant difference on a small catalog, but there is no harm in running this operation. Go to Edit > Catalog Settings (On Mac, go to Lightroom > Catalog Settings) and click the General tab. Click the Relaunch and Optimize button.

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom will close and relaunch. During startup you will see the Optimizing Catalog progress window, which lets you know it is working. Click the OK button when the operation is complete and Lightroom will open.

This just performs some basic housekeeping on your catalog and can result in both a smaller catalog file size and a performance boost.

Step 4.

Increase the size of your Camera Raw Cache.

The purpose of this cache is to store recently rendered versions of photos you’ve brought into the Develop module to prevent Lightroom from having to re-render them each time, which can greatly boost performance. Go to Edit > Preferences (On Mac, go to Lightroom > Preferences) and click the File Handling tab. Increase the size of the Camera Raw Cache to 20-40 GB based on the amount of free space you have (see Step 1). If you have another internal drive with more free space you can click the Choose button and relocate it to that disk. Click OK to put the settings into effect.

Step 5.

Render 1:1 previews after import.

This is one of those times where you can pay up front and enjoy faster performance down the road, meaning you will notice a slight performance drag right after the import is complete, but once all the 1:1 previews are rendered you will enjoy a performance boost while you are working later.

On the Import dialog there is a setting at the bottom for Initial Previews. This allows you to tell Lightroom what to do about rendering previews immediately after the import process is finished. If you click the drop-down menu and choose 1:1, you can have Lightroom jump right into the process of rendering 1:1 previews right after the import is finished. You will see the progress meter above the Identity Plate increment as it works. You may notice a bit of sluggishness while that is happening, but once it is complete it should be much smoother sailing from there.

The one downside to this is that 1:1 previews are stored in the preview cache (alongside the catalog file) and can take up a fair bit of space over time. To keep from undoing the work you did in Step 1 you can configure Lightroom to discard those large 1:1 previews after a certain period of time. Go to Edit > Catalog Settings (On Mac, Lightroom > Catalog Settings) and click the File Handling tab and choose the interval that makes sense for your needs. There isn’t any reason to set it to Never as Lightroom will always re-render the 1:1 previews if needed at a later date.

You can send any type of source photo to Photoshop as a smart object, but you’ll get the most flexibility in editing by opening a raw photo as a smart object.

The beauty of the smart object is that we can re-visit that embedded data any time we want to make changes to our raw processing. When you send a photo from Adobe Photoshop Lightroom this way it comes into Photoshop with any Adobe Photoshop Lightroom adjustments already applied. To edit a smart object from a raw file just double click the smart object icon and it will open inside of Camera Raw. You can then change the adjustments any way you see fit just as if you were working on the original raw file.

Camera Raw? Yes, remember Photoshop can’t edit raw data and needs to use the Camera Raw plugin for that, and Lightroom can’t read layers, so double-clicking the smart object icon will always open an embedded raw photo Camera Raw.

Here’s an example using a photo with a brown bear standing in white water. I tried to expose to the right to get the bear, but you can see with the clipping indicator turned on how much data is clipped.

Adjusting the Recovery slider alone is not going to get the job done in this photo. However, if I also reduce the exposure slider I can see that there is still data in those highlights. Unfortunately the exposure reduction has a negative impact on the rest of the photo.

This is a good candidate for sending to Photoshop as a smart object where I can double process the raw data for both the highlights and the shadows and blend them together to get the best of both worlds. Here’s how:

Step 1.

I’ve already done this, but the first step is to process the photo just for the highlights. Don’t worry about the rest of the photo; just get as much detail as possible in the highlight area.

Step 2.

Go to Photo > Edit In > Open as a smart object in Photoshop. This takes the raw data and embeds it into a special smart object layer inside of a new document in Photoshop. You can tell a smart object layer by the special smart object icon on the layer in the Layers palette.

The data in the smart object layer is not at all connected to the original raw photo. Meaning if I change the adjustments back in Lightroom it won’t affect the smart object and vice versa.

Step 3.

Create a copy of the smart object layer so that we can process it differently to bring back the data in the rest of the photo. Right-click the smart object layer and choose New Smart Object via Copy, which will create a new smart object layer that contains its own copy of the original raw data.

Step 5.

Double-click the new smart object layer to open it in Camera Raw and process for the shadows and midtones without worrying about the highlights.

Step 6.

Apply a layer mask to the top layer and select a large soft tipped black brush. Reduce the opacity of the brush down to 33% and paint over the highlight area to slowly bring back some of the detail in the underlying layer.

This is going to be done to your taste. Increase or decrease the brush opacity to change how it looks. What you want to do is blend in some of the detail in the bottom layer into the top layer, which will allow you to combine the best highlight recovery with the best midtone/shadow recovery.

Step 7.

When we send smart objects to Photoshop we need to tell Photoshop where we want this file saved to and we can even change the filename. When you are finished blending the two layers go to File > Save. This will launch the Save As dialog. Navigate to the folder that contains the source raw file, give this copy a better name (or at least remove the “as Smart Object-1” from the filename) and click Save.

Step 8.

Lightroom doesn’t know about this new copy without our help. Switch to Lightroom, jump to the Library module and select the folder in the Folders panel that contains the source file. Go to Library > Synchronize Folder. This will allow you to import this new copy into the Lightroom catalog.

This is a great technique to keep in your toolbox for those types of photos that need a drastic highlight recovery.