Step-by-step

Shoot and edit in Raw

1 Choose Raw format

In Firstlight tap the gear-shaped settings icon. Scroll to choose formats such as HEIC, JPEG or DNG. A JPEG is 2.7MB while the detail-packed .DNG is a much larger 11.3MB.

2 Prioritise highlights

It’s easier to recover under-exposed shadow details. Over-exposed highlights are harder to restore. Firstlight shows over-exposed highlights with diagonal red ‘zebra’ stripes.

3 Fine-tune exposure

Swipe your finger down to darken the exposure. When the red stripes vanish, the sky is no longer over-exposed. Tap the shutter button to snap a Raw format file.

4 Export the shot

Tap Firstlight’s grid view to discover which formats images were captured in (such as .DNG). Tap a thumbnail then tap Share. Export the Raw file to your Mac using Airdrop.

5 Check metadata

Import the Firstlight .DNG file. Doubleclick on the shot. Click ‘Edit Photo’. Click the ‘i’ icon. From the photo’s metadata panel we can see this is a Raw format iphone-sourced file.

6 Tweak the highlights

Check out the photo’s histogram graph. At its far right the brightest pixels are still a bit over-exposed. Drag the Highlights slider left to -0.73. More detail appears in the sky.

7 Lighten shadows

Since we prioritised the iphone’s exposure to capture highlight detail the shadows are too dark. Drag the Shadows slider to 0.55 to selectively lighten the shadows.

8 Boost brilliance

Drag Brilliance right to 0.50. This powerful tool simultaneously lightens the shadows and restores more midtone and highlight detail. The histogram now has a wider, more even spread.

9 Share your photo

To turn your processed Raw file into a shareable JPEG go to File>export>export 1 Photo. Set Photo Kind to JPEG and click ‘Export’. You can upload to Twitter or email it.