December
6th
It’s Graduation Day!
Tucked away in the tool strip of the Develop module is the graduated filter tool. The graduated filter tool is another non-destructive local adjustment tool that made its debut with Lightroom 2.0 and contributes to Lightroom’s power and flexibility.
The most obvious use of the graduated filter tool is to recreate the effect of an on lens graduated neutral density filter. The purpose of this type of filter is to allow the photographer to compensate for the tonal differences in different areas of a scene. For example, when shooting a landscape you may be faced with deciding to expose for the bright sky, thereby under-exposing the foreground detail. Or, you can expose for the foreground and wind up blowing out the sky detail. A graduated neutral density will block more light on one part of the filter and gradually let more light through as you progress across the filter. This allows you to expose the scene without blowing out the sky.
To access the graduated filter tool switch to the Develop module and click the icon in the tool strip on the right (just under the histogram) or press the letter M.
Tags: adjustment, graduated
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