Polarizing filters can make your skies richer and your images more dynamic, but what if you could achieve that same look without any additional gear? With a few strategic tweaks in Lightroom, you can create that deep blue sky and high-contrast look, making your landscapes more vibrant and engaging.
Coming to you from Christian Möhrle with The Phlog Photography, this tutorial covers how to use Lightroom’s masking and adjustment tools to simulate a polarization effect. Möhrle starts by explaining the basics: you first need to get your exposure right. He suggests switching to the “Adobe Standard” profile to reduce contrast, giving you more flexibility. Adjust the temperature to warm up the scene, then raise the whites and lower the highlights. This increases the punch in your image and helps reveal more details in the sky, which is essential for the polarization effect.
To achieve the look, Möhrle uses color range masks. By targeting the blue hues in the sky, he’s able to darken these areas selectively, making the clouds stand out against a deeper background. This is done by lowering the exposure and blacks for the selected blue areas. The trick is layering multiple masks to create a smooth gradient, mimicking how a real polarizer would darken the sky in stages. Möhrle points out that this approach works best on images with clear blue skies and distinct white clouds, making it ideal for landscapes.
What makes this technique effective is its precision. Möhrle uses subtractive masking to refine areas around trees and other elements, ensuring the effect doesn’t look artificial. He subtracts portions of the mask using linear and radial gradients to control where the polarization is applied. This keeps the sky’s brightness natural while adding contrast at the top, where you’d expect the most polarization to occur. This approach helps maintain realism in the final image, preventing any overly dark or unnatural areas from forming.
Once the main effect is in place, Möhrle fine-tunes the look by adding clarity and contrast to specific parts of the sky. He even stacks additional color range masks to boost the intensity without sacrificing the smoothness of the gradient. If more precision is needed, Möhrle shows how to refine the selection with more advanced masking techniques, ensuring that only the desired areas are affected. The result is a polished and dynamic sky that looks like it was captured with a high-quality polarizer.
Möhrle also demonstrates how to clean up the image in Photoshop. Using the new Generative Fill tool, he quickly removes distracting elements, like stray trees in the background, with just a few clicks. This extra step refines the final image, making it look cleaner and more professional. Check out the video above for the full rundown from Möhrle.
And if you really want to dive into landscape photography, check out our latest tutorial, "Photographing the World: Japan II - Discovering Hidden Gems with Elia Locardi!”
