SOLVED! Perfect Exposure Blending for Architecture Photography

[@1young-geezer]

Anthony - you are just SO GOOD at explaining and demonstrating all your editing videos, you are one of the clearest. Thank you for this demonstration, it just continues to fill in the gaps for common knowledge for all.

[@gigxr]

i re-edited my shots 3 years ago with this method and holy. the difference is big. thanks bro

[@archiphoto]

Great to hear!

[@AerialLensVideo]

Wow - EXACTLY solves the problem as you stated - Thanks! I just downloaded the Lite version today, to get my feet wet, and inadvertently mis-matching the midtones in the dark and light layers was exactly what happened: MUDDY! Thank you so much!

[@KenedyDeMelojfk]

Amazing video. It's helping me a lot. Thank you

[@mariuslaugier1108]

It's absolutely crazy the AMOUNT of knowledge we can get in your videos Anthony, I've been following you for a few days, and I already feel like pro ! (I'm definitely not) all your content is like a perfect course, no gate keeping, pure help ! I love it, keep going Anthony !

[@Greg_Ashley]

You are producing the best videos on KZbin for this kind of work.

[@NickRedman]

Thanks

[@scotthuetteman6976]

I bought Greg Benz's training for Lumenzia-it's highly recommended. But AT Photography videos take it a BIG step further by introducing the concept of . VERY IMPORTANT step in exposure blending that no one else seems to be teaching. Greg's concept is basically to create a selection from the L or D luminosity selection, then create a , then brush in the effect on the mask. The concept here is to go straight to the mask from the L or D luminosity selection, which is OK. It's just a different technique. Either way, AT's strategy of masking the mask in a group is genius! I highly recommend watching carefully the AT Photography videos and practicing this technique.

[@scotthuetteman6976]

KZbin crushed my response. Here's the missing words: ...the concept of evening out the mid-tones. VERY IMPORTANT ....then create a SELECTION...

[@archiphoto]

Thanks for the kind words! I'm always trying to share new techniques to make architectural photography easier and more efficient.

[@donhendricks3190]

I'm new to the discipline of Real Estate/Architectural Photography and your tutorials are helping me to better understand the proper approach! Thank you so much for sharing your expertise and massive skills so generously. With love from Atlanta.

[@lensalucia]

Always up to our expectations. Thanks Anthony.

[@richpurcell]

I just finished a project where I struggled with this exact problem. Going back now and looking at my images to apply these techniques.

[@mariuszd.4909]

Thanks for great explanation of the process and sharing it with us, it could be super helpful! Also You tell at the end of video that you use an action/preset to speed up the process. Just for the sake of the video and explanation the process it was longer. Did you make a video about this preset/action? Or maybe thinking about it to make it in the future?

[@ellienavarro3238]

I'm wondering same

[@panomaxstudio8454]

Thanks Anthony. I got same problem all the time but now I understand more about it.

[@Anydesignco]

THIS IS IT! Thank you for the tutorial

[@boruchlen]

Bloody brilliant mate! Cheers!

[@g-lurk]

genius. matching the mid-tones... i had no idea. this will remove a lot of frustrations in the future. 👍👍!

[@studioryley]

Such a helpful video, and super easy to follow - thank you!

[@toddruhl]

Wow! I've struggled with fine-tuning Lumenzia, so this was an "AH-HA" video for me! Thanks for the great information. Subscribed and will share with others. Love your channel. 😍

[@archiphoto]

Awesome! Thank you!

[@JeffreyJDavis]

Excellent video and I do appreciate your educational approach. I'm an equal opportunity student and shoot both flambient and lumenzia blended exposures depending on the shoot. The key point you make about ensuring midtone alignment between exposure layers is important and you've made it in a few of your videos. Any further tips for doing this, perhaps in Lightroom prior to exporting as smart object to Photoshop? Said differently, should I be able to look at mid-tone areas in the component exposures and identify "oh, that's likely to be muddy once I blend"? In the ACR edits in this video you weren't really comparing it to the base layer you were just brightening it up. At 18:52 you say "midtones match or are slightly brighter than the base layer". Is a proactive midtones boost a good idea or not necessarily? Thanks in advance for any guidance.

[@archiphoto]

Good points Jeffery. Tbh I can do it by eye now so for me it makes no odds doing it in ACR or lightroom. But that's not very helpful from an instructional sense, I'll have a think if there's a better way to show the mid-tone matching approach. So with regards to your own work, and being an equal-opportunities shooter, what determined the direction you take for your images, flamient vs exposure blending. Thanks 🙂

[@JeffreyJDavis]

@@archiphoto (sorry I somehow missed that you had asked a question at the end of your helpful reply). I shoot brackets and then flash shots and window pulls on every shot. My preference is to process using flambient off a single base ambient layer, I find better color and crisper, less muddy output. I usually fall back on HDR when I have troubling shadow images (fans, certain lighting fixtures etc) that I didn't properly deal with in the field with my flash pops. But I think it's important to know how to do the exposure blending as you have demonstrated here. I honestly still struggle a bit with how to line up the midtones of the 3 brackets. I'm an engineer by training and wish there were a more systematic way to do it. Cheers!

[@AnthonyTurnham]

@@JeffreyJDavis Thanks for getting back to me and elaborating on your process. Good to know. And I like that you appreciate the importance for having a few different methods in your tool kit depending on the situation. I find it quite narrowsighted when people are adamant that a particular technique is the way that all architecture photos should be taken, and that all other techniques are inherently wrong.

[@joseundercover]

I just tried it... and IT WORKS! :). Thanks!

[@cwinasia]

Thanks, this is exactly the issues I have been having ; ). I appreciate the excellent videos .

[@tiflarson]

thank you so much for this!!! so helpful

[@archiphoto]

Glad it was helpful!

[@aldobelenda907]

Wow! Mind blowing! I really needed this tutorial. Thanks! It's been a while since I've been trying to get better images, this is the solution! Thanks!

[@archiphoto]

Glad it helped!

[@Welcometocomiso]

Great tutorial, very deep and clear, interesting.

[@archiphoto]

Many thanks!

[@hiresmedianzold]

Another great video. Thank you Anthony. 😎🤙

[@archiphoto]

Glad you enjoyed it

[@daeyvees]

Aaamazing. Thanks for the eye-opening tutorials. The way you take your time to explain every bit of the process deserves a beautiful praise. Thanks AT. You are the best. It would be nice to introduce some of your raw pictures (definitely not your client's work. Lol!) for us to work with and send back to you for assessment.

[@Hackbarthja]

GREAT explanation! I’ve been struggling with the muddying for years. Thanks Anthony! (About that pre-processing preset however 🧐)

[@omarelkady]

Thank you so much for these great tutorial , really help and learn allot from it , the way you explain amazing my friend :D thank you ,

[@archiphoto]

Glad it was helpful!

[@missjo1412]

Great tutorials, very helpful, but do you have one explaining how to do it without all the extra plug ins and tools? I get that it saves time, and i might invest in the future, but right now i would love to just be able to do it myself in photoshop. Thank you🥰

[@sbvisual3910]

Finally i can use Lumenzia . Many thanks 🙏🏻

[@Ray-zh9kf]

Thanks a ton. Really good easy to understand explanation. Thanks again.

[@LiamsActive]

i love your videos. Thanks for the information and the effort you're putting in to help others. Are you able to do a video on how to set up Lightroom Classic pre-sets? i'd love to see that and set something similar up for myself as a beginner.

[@antonilin586]

Thank you! Great video!

[@_trismegistus]

Is there a repeatable way to get the exposure of the highlight or shadow layers to match the base layer (like when you are adjusting things around 17:00? I have trouble knowing if I've matched the midtone exposure properly just eyeballing it or trying to remember what the base layer looks like. Do I need to just pick a couple points and look at the values in the histogram between the base layer and the one that I'm adjusting to try to get those midtones matching?

[@Mister_EL.]

Thank you for the insights! It sounds clear in the video, but working on my own pictures, it's quite hard to get a great end product...

[@archiphoto]

Feel free to send some raw files to me to take a look at. [e-mail]

[@alomar.]

this is amazing thank you

[@tamashaasz]

Thanks for sharing this Anthony! Great tutorial as usual! Is there a chance to get access to your LR base presets?

[@antonilin586]

I was gonna ask the same😅

[@archiphoto]

Hi mate. I may cover it in another video (I did do one a while back) but I put it out there for a vote in the comments and while I did get a few requests, it was only a handful. These vids actually take quite a while to put together so if I only get several people request something it's hard to justify the time to create it. Hope that makes sense 😀

[@ciphermedia]

@@archiphoto Presets please!! 😃

[@bwb2043]

I have watched this a couple of times and now rewatching this after learning more about luminosity masking... I noticed after you made your first Lumenzia mask for the shadows that you started turning on and off the masked layer to show the effects of the layer but to my knowledge what you were showing us was the base layer and not the masked lumenzia layer. I was under the impression that if you turn off the "eyeball/view" checkbox that it hides that whole layer. Am I missing something?

[@bwb2043]

After all, I do appreciate the technical breakdown that you have provided here. thanks!

[@archiphoto]

Can you provide a timestamp please so I know where you're talking about? Thanks

[@lisacousins6110]

Hi Anthony .. I’ve learned so much from your videos .. thank you! Question .. your images in Lightroom, right from the start, look so much better than mine .. no matter what I do there is always some unwanted warmth in my raw photos. Do you apply a preset on import to remove any warmth? Especially if the room is poorly lit( which is not the case in this tutorial and you have tons Id natural cool light) how to fix the warmth in the raw brackets before blending?

[@AnthonyTurnham]

Hi Lisa, Hmmm warmth in the raw photos. No it's not really something I experience. I do kick things off with an initial preset ad then may tweak white balance from there if necessary. Sometimes I drop the yellow / orange saturation in HSL if there's a cast. If it's really evident though I'll use photoshop to take care of it. The video on setting up my preset is here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/omfCf6SOididepI

[@Marrakechphotographer]

Hello can you do lumenzia with flambient? Using flash window pull ?

[@dannyrichardson8861]

Great video! I’ve just started working for an estate agent as photographer, videography, drone, floor plans, design & social media… I’m learning that speed is key. How long does it take you to photograph a large luxury property & fully edit your work? I currently use photomatix to blend my 5 hdr exposures then fine tune in Ps but your results are 🔥 so I’d like to know a bit about your workflow timeline

[@archiphoto]

For a start I'd be ditching Photomatix and moving to the HDR engine (acquired from the mighty Aurora) inside Neo (bit.ly/NeoSale) it's now got batch merging and the results are very natural. To do a full home shoot and edit all the images it might take a couple of days. If you're shooting for a realestate agent this timeframe just isn't going to be profitable but if shooting for the right architectural client the several thousand, per job, they pay makes it worth it.

[@image-i-nation-photography]

I tried shooting brackets but always find exposing for the windows and lighting the room works best? I would love to learn more about hdr and shooting brackets

[@albertlewis]

Excellent video, thank you

[@tristanheeb]

Anthony, new update allows you to open smart objects as layers now

[@AnthonyTurnham]

True. Thanks Tristan!

[@benjaminrosephotography3510]

Thanks Anthony for the great video. You explain it so well and this is exactly the problem I am having. Would you be able to share the raw files and final edit for us to practice on the same picture to help learn? Seriously think you should make a small easy Real Estate / Architectural editing training course with particular focus on lumenzia. Thanks so much :)

[@AnthonyTurnham]

I'd love to be able to share these images for practice / learning but most of what I demo is all captured on professional gigs so I'm not able to share the photos. I'm in the process of teeing up a fake shoot so that I have more flexibility with the files. Watch this space....

[@JewelsFlowers]

Have you thought of doing a video about using Lumenzia for correcting white balance. Often I will have blue furniture and pillows in an interior and just pulling back the blues will ruin those colors. But I want the blue off the whites. Have you ever used Lumenzia for that or do you have another method. Same thing for the yellows, magentas, cyans, etc. Thanks.

[@LuisAlvarez-fj5ny]

Anthony, this is a master piece of luminosity masking techniques tutorial. Thank you for sharing. Question: some people strongly feather the mask, e.g. 100, Is it needed in this double masking method?

[@diczman]

Anthony thank you very much for your content! I switched from HDR to manually blending exposures and now I'm learning how to make luminosity masks. Sometimes I've got that muddiness and sometimes feathering mask helps. What do you think about it?

[@archiphoto]

I'm not big on the idea of feathering the mask. The masks Lumenzia (bit.ly/3dpGeub ) creates are do precise that I feel If you've followed these steps there's no need to fudge the mask and reduce it's fidelity with feathering. How much are you using for the feather amount?

[@diczman]

@@archiphoto I think about 35 pixels😅I know that's wrong🙄I will learn your way of blending exposures😌

[@adjake1]

ive watched so many of your videos. it is much appreciated, but I'm still not getting it. My exteriors are still getting muddy. I'm still using lumenzia light (free version) does that make a difference?

[@denisl1071]

Thank you very much, but if we open files as smart objects, how do we align the layers?

[@grahammurphy3360]

I enjoy your videos. Do you have presets that you use to prepare the files pre blending?

[@archiphoto]

I do! I mentioned it in my recording but then cut that bit out as I felt I was getting too into the weeds. But yeah, absolutely. All that prep of pushing sliders is automated with a preset for the base, highlights and shadow recovery. It makes the process very quick indeed.

[@grahammurphy3360]

@@archiphoto Is that something you could share or demonstrate in a video? I'm heading to the NZIPP show in Christchurch this August but unfortunately won't be there in time to attend your workshop. If you are going to be around the show for the duration though I would appreciate meeting up for a chat.

[@AnthonyTurnham]

@Graham Murphy sounds good. Grab me a coffee ☕️ and I'm yours 😄

[@CharlieOBeirne]

If my exposure range in the scene is too great to match the midtones between the three exposures, do I need to blend more exposures and "blend" the transiton between them? At last I'm getting results with lumenzia that are way better than the LRenfuse plugin I've got used to but I'me really struggling getting past this muddy issue with some situations. Fantastic explanations though - so happy to have discovered you!!

[@archiphoto]

Awesome Charlie. Thanks for the kind words. To answer your question.... I'd be surprised if there's a situation where a shadow shot, mid tones shot and highlights shot couldn't be merged successfully. I'll usually bracket 5 photos but for extremely contrasty scenes I'll go to 7 or sometimes even 9 stops in the bracket just to make sure I've got the elements I need. But, even in these cases I'll still only use 3 photos for the final composite. It's just a matter of selecting the best option for each. The more you do this technique you'll get a feel for which exposure will work best.

[@CharlieOBeirne]

@@archiphoto Thanks so much! I'll keep pressing on - definitely getting a better feel for it now. I usually bracket 5 and go for 7 when things get super contrasty. Some scenarios I feel however look more realistic with the window almost a little blown out, Especially when it's way brighter outside than in. I'll keep experimenting! Thanks for the great videos!

[@archiphoto]

@@CharlieOBeirne You're onto it with the brighter exterior. Sure it's good to bring back exterior information but we need to remember when doing our edit that it IS brighter outside. To make the two exposures the same makes interior shots look super fake. Flick through any real estate website / publication and you don't have to look too far to see this. Yeah, keep pushing forward! Cheers for watching and I'm glad it's been helpful :)

[@chase5860]

Hey buddy! Fantastic video once again. Was waiting for your latest architecture entry! Great tutorial. I noticed that today you used a neutral picture profile to prep your bracket whereas I usually know you to use your camera flat profile. Was there a reason for this change today?

[@archiphoto]

Haha! Good spotting! Yes the reason is... my flat profile has mysteriously disappeared. I need to reinstall it. Yes, the flatter the better for a starting point.

[@chase5860]

@@archiphoto Haha that's unusual! Annoyingly Canon does not have a native flat profile but it was relatively easy to make my own! Just popped into ACR with camera neutral, bump down the contrast a bit more and a little bit of desaturation and voila, new profile.

[@Bob-tu2xg]

I recently purchased Luminar Neo through your 30% discount code, awesome first year price, thank you! How does this compare to processing the same photo in Luminar Neo only? Haven’t had any success finding similar lumenzia features in Neo, any workaround suggestions? Maybe have both lumenzia and Neo?

[@archiphoto]

Hi Bob. Yeah, Lumenzia is unique in what it allows us to do. The key is luminosity masking which currently bit.ly/Luminar-NEO doesn't support. However it does have the exceptional HDR merge extension (exceptional from a results point of view rather than customisation). Both methods can get you to the end result but for sheer control and flexibility doing it this way is my preference. I do still use NEO as an automated finishing step to give the image a bit more life though.

[@mitchellj.oconnor2508]

Why is your lumenzia panel different than the one I purchased?

[@pmolczan]

Do you offer a private online tutorial? Not looking for free training.

[@epectase6314]

Hi Anthony, I usually shoot 3 images 2 stops apart, and the darkest image is get for the highlights is usually way too dark to match the middle expose... is there anything I am doing wrong?? thanks a lot!

[@bboy4life202]

hi would a 14mm focal length be suitable for architecture photography or should i go with a 16-35 like everyone on youtube says? i ask because i already have a 24-70 art lens so im thinking the 16-35 wouldnt make sense idk. thanks

[@AnthonyTurnham]

Hi mate. 14 is pretty wide. And there's a lot of potential between the 16-23mmm you'd be missing out on with a 14mm. I'd go 16-35mm tbh

[@shanemartinphoto2974]

excuse me as I re watch this 10 times straight as I'm editing myself!!

[@AlexSnow47]

merci énormément 🙏

[@archiphoto]

De rien mon ami!

[@anttiranki3690]

Say you go shoot a real estate for a realtor. E.g. a house with 2 bedrooms, living room, etc. How much would you charge for this? I'm only interested as I know the market where I live is really competed and the prices have been driven to the ground. So any extra work in photoshop is just adding up to lost profits.

[@russellwilcox1662]

When you open them into photoshop you very quickly arrange them ie too quickly and don't explain why Anthony as when i do this i'm getting most of the picture pixels deleted so it would be good if you could explain this more sklowly please,

[@yosephamenu2327]

What if it’s says must be in private island

[@archiphoto]

? Not sure what you mean with this comment, sorry.

[@HippyNZ]

faster to just let lightroom HDR them in lightroom. way faster. masking is all done for you. if you insist on sending them to Photoshop you can send from lightroom to photoshop as layers then use autoaline and auto blend

[@archiphoto]

Thanks for the thoughts on LR mere to HDR. Funnily enough my most recent vid starts with that approach kzbin.info/www/bejne/nHvbfmepZbV6o68 . Not sure what you mean that tha masking is all done for you though? It's only creating a 32bit HDR file. Apart from using the hacky auto settings globally, as editors it's still our job to bring back that dynamic range where we want it. Personally I don't find pulling the silders around on a global edit gives me the refined results my clients expect or deserve. But that's just my approach.

[@UnapologeticGeek]

this seems like something AI will be doing in 10 years

[@archiphoto]

I hope so.

[@joecalabresi4072]

Can someone finally explain wtf “Muddy” actually means!?!?

[@dwightsbeetfarms3611]

No

[@archiphoto]

A dirtying of pixel value, particularly in the midtones, resulting in a lifeless photo that doesn't have the brightness or vigour you'd expect from the real scene. Something like that anyway 😜