Focus of Episode: Using the HSL Panel in Lightroom

In this episode of The FIX, I show you the editing behind a shot that was posted as Photo of the Week on August 6th, called Island Lake Reflection. I took the photo in the summer of 2016 on a quick trip to Fernie, BC.

If you ever find yourself in Fernie, of the many cool things to do in the area, make sure that you check out Island Lake. It’s a short drive up a gravel road but when you arrive you feel like you’re in the middle of nowhere. There’s a small lodge and some cabins where you can stay the night. The lodge also serves food for lunch and dinner which I would highly recommend. There are also several different hikes that you can do in the area and, even though I’ve only done a few of them, I am sure that they are all equally amazing.

On the particular day that I took this shot, I was down at the lake and was amazed by the calm of the lake. The surface was like a perfect mirror, so I put on a telephoto lens and zoomed into the shoreline across from me to capture the trees reflecting in the lake. The shot itself is quite boring and I never really planned to do much with it, but when I got home, I decided to play around with it in Lightroom and ended up with quite a cool effect.

This episode really features the HSL Panel in Lightroom. If you’re not sure what that it, it’s the Hue, Saturation, and Luminance panel, which ultimately controls all of the colours in the photo. I’m always amazed at what you can do with these sliders and you can totally transform a photo as you’ll see in the video. Hopefully this tutorial will give you some ideas of pictures of your own that you can get creative with by changing the colours around and having some fun.