EDIT IMAGES WITH LUMINAR FLEX

01 INSTALLATION OPTIONS

If you’re starting from scratch, install Luminar Flex after you’ve finished installing your image-editing apps, so the plug-ins register correctly. During installation, you’ll be asked which apps are on your PC, so tick the boxes that apply. Once installed, you’ll see nothing has changed apart from a new shortcut on your desktop. You can still use Elements without opening Luminar.

02 USE AS A STANDALONE APP

Double-clicking that shortcut opens an app that looks like Luminar 3’s Edit mode. Luminar can be a bit baffling at first, as it doesn’t follow the conventions of image-editing apps, such as having a toolbar on the left. There are bars at the top, bottom and right, however, housing all you need to change your photos, including a layering system almost identical to that in Elements.

03 BEFORE AND AFTER

One of Luminar’s best features is the way the display can be set to show Before and After views of your image, with a movable divider. Near the centre of the top toolbar are an eye icon and a button showing two rectangles. The eye shows you your original image for as long as you hold it down. The two rectangles open the Before/After divider.

04 LUMINAR’S LAYERS

Lke Elements, Luminar uses layers. Each new Adjustment Layer can have a separate effect, the layers can be blended into one another, and you can create masks that show through the layer below. Here, we’ve layered the Structure Booster over the AI Auto Enhancer for a boost in feather detail, at the cost of image noise. We can sort that out with the Denoise filter on a third layer.

05 SELECTIVE EDITS

We only want the Denoise filter to apply to the bird, as that’s where most of the noise is visible. We can do this by using a mask, brushing away the areas we don’t want the effect to apply to. At the right of the Denoise filter’s entry, there’s a brush icon, use this to paint over the areas you want the filter to apply to. Tools to alter the size and hardness of the brush appear at the top.

06 USE LUMINAR IN PHOTOSHOP ELEMENTS

When it’s time to use the apps together, head to Elements’ Filter menu. A new entry, Skylum Software, can be found at the bottom of the menu, and selecting this unfolds the ability to move the image to Luminar. The new app opens, and covers Elements on the screen – you can return to Elements, but the app will be unresponsive until you click Apply in Luminar.

07 APPLY TO A WHOLE IMAGE

While Luminar is non-destructive, Photoshop Elements isn’t, so any changes you make are permanent unless you Undo or step back on the History palette. To edit an entire image, use Filter > Skylum Software > Luminar Flex without anything selected on your image. Once you’ve finished your changes in Luminar, click the blue Apply button (top right) to return to Elements.

08 APPLY TO A SELECTION

Because Luminar Flex works as a filter, you can only apply it to a selection. Make sure your selection is really good before you move it to Luminar by using Select > Refine Edge, since there’s no way of editing it once you’re there. Then, apply the filter the same way you did in Step 7 – only the selected pixels will appear in Luminar. Click ‘Apply’ and they’ll be merged back into your image.

09 APPLY TO A LAYER

While you’re using Refine Edge, you can set the output to a new layer rather than as a selection. Do this, and a cutout of your selection appears as a new layer on top of your original. Apply Luminar Flex to this, and it works in the same way as when filtering a selection, except the background remains intact (though hidden). Bring it back to blend the two layers together.

10 EXPORT YOUR FINISHED IMAGE

While you’d usually return the image to Elements and use Save As to create a new file with your edits in it, you can also export a file from Luminar as a .lmnr file. The usual Export button is replaced with Apply while working as an Elements filter, but Save is still present on the File menu. Later, you can open the file in standalone Luminar, and either work on it or export it.