STEP BY STEP

Lighten things up

1 Pick a process

Open presets_start.dng in Lightroom’s Develop module. Open the Camera Calibration panel. Lightroom 5 and onwards use the 2012 Raw processing engine, but you could jump back to the 2010 process, if you prefer, to replace the Basic panel’s Highlights and Shadows slider with the Recovery and Fill light sliders.

2 Choose a profile

We’ll leave Process set to 2012 (Current) so that we’re using Lightroom’s latest Raw-processing tools. Now to try various profiles from the drop-down menu. Camera Landscape makes the skin look too orange. Camera Portrait increases contrast without boosting colour, so we’ll settle with that profile as a starting point.

3 Fine-tune the profile

To counteract the slight magenta tint, drag the Shadows slider to -47. To make the skin look less orange, go to red Primary and drag Saturation down to -22. If you’re unhappy with the look, hold down Alt and click a label, such as Reset Shadows.

4 Go back to basics

Go to the Basic panel to finish off. Set the Exposure slider to +0.90 to brighten the image. Set Highlights to +20, Whites to +22 and Vibrance to +36 for a subtle colour boost. A before-and-after view demonstrates how effective the Camera Calibration panel can be.