Earlier this week, Adobe unveiled a handful of Lightroom updates, including AI enhancements, the addition of a preset “Amount” slider, and support for video editing.
Most of the new updates apply to Lightroom, but several also affect Lightroom Classic and Adobe Camera Raw. And while the updates may not yet appear in your Creative Cloud app, the company promises that “these releases…will be available to everyone by the end of the week.”
Let’s take a closer look at Lightroom’s newest features:
Video editing comes to Lightroom
Adobe Lightroom now has the power to edit videos.
Users can apply edits – including exposure modifications and color grades – to videos, and can even copy-paste adjustments from photos to videos and vice versa. You can also trim video clips in the standard Lightroom interface.
Note that the video-editing support does not extend to Lightroom Classic – it’s only offered by the CC version of Lightroom – and its use is somewhat limited; you cannot splice together video files, for example.
But Instagrammers who work with both photo and video can now maintain a single Lightroom-based workflow for all files, and casual users will appreciate the option to edit smartphone videos and photos side by side.
Adobe quotes Lightroom Ambassador Tristan Zhou: “‘I absolutely love the new video feature. Since I produce both video and photo content, this new feature allows me to do everything in one app instead of jumping back and forth from different apps and software. Such a game-changer!’”
Lightroom and Lightroom Classic get a preset boost
If you’ve ever felt that your presets were too intense or too weak for particular images, you’re in luck:
Lightroom, Lightroom Classic, and Adobe Camera Raw feature a brand-new “Amount” slider, which lets users apply a preset, then increase or decrease its intensity. That way, you can select the right preset for the job, then fine-tune the edit until you get the perfect result.
LR, LRC, and ACR also offer a set of so-called “Adaptive Presets,” which are applied selectively to files via Adobe’s artificial intelligence technology.
The presets are divided into two sections, Adaptive: Sky and Adaptive: Subject, and target (as you’d expect) skies and main subjects, respectively. Choose a Sky preset, then watch as the sky is improved without altering the rest of the image. Adobe notes that “[t]hese presets allow you to access the power of AI masking with the ease of a single click.”
For photographers who frequently edit skies and main subjects separately, this should be a useful time-saver.
Additional Lightroom updates
While video editing and preset enhancements make up Adobe’s most impactful updates, users will appreciate several minor changes, including:
- The ability to copy and paste masks from image to image (in Lightroom, Lightroom Classic, and Adobe Camera Raw)
- One-click, AI-based red-eye removal (in Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw)
- Five Premium Preset packs to purchase (in Lightroom, Lightroom Classic, and Adobe Camera Raw)
So head on over to your Creative Cloud app and check for updates. If you have any questions, be sure to leave them in the comments below!
