This video is not about the merits of replacing a sky; it is about demonstrating the Luminar 4 does an effective job of automating that process IF YOU WANT TO DO IT!
Good review. I have preordered it. Hoping that stability and speed has improved over L3. A suggestion on your videos. I found it very distracting watching when you were constantly moving your mouse all over the screen. My eye kept trying to follow the mouse instead of focusing on the overall image.
Dustin, thank you for this. Looks an incredible bit of software and as you say, if used sparingly and with care it can assist the artistic outcome. Brilliant tutorial, thanks
I purchased Luminar 3 on the strength of your review ( and others ). Overall it's a good editing software however I mainly purchased it for its ability to quickly create sunrays. I don't often replace sky's but this Luminar 4 looks like it does a very good job. The fact that I can use my own sky images so easily is perhaps it's main strength. I wouldn't want to use the supplied presets, no doubt we'll see every other image on Instagram featuring one of these lol. I believe Luminar 4 is also coming with skin enhancement AI too. All in all its looking to be a worthy upgrade.
I have a large amount of travel photos, sometimes in groups, but always with family. Then you don't have to wait for ours to get the right sky over the temple of Abu Simbel in Egypt. I shoot the photos, but then ... boring sky. now I have a tousand photos where I need to replace the sky. But I never found the time to do so. I have pre-ordered Luminar 4 and I hope to get this important and huge job done within reasonable time. Maybe we should propose Luminar 4 as a divorce saver ??? And pay them a small fraction on how much a lawyer would cost :)
@@DustinAbbottTWI while this may happen, one can still manipulate the preset and move the sky in the image. Those really concerned will of course create a self made bundle of skies for appropriate use.
Great video Dustin! Do you know if I purchase from your link if I will get the standalone version AND the plug-in? Also, can you move the sky around(or zoom in) as if it was a layer in Photoshop? (PS you misspelled the word tutorial in your keywords)
My very valid use of sky replacement - photos I took many years ago. My photographic efforts go back 50 years - right back to my Kodak Instamatic 25! I used to take primarily colour slides (transparencies). Not only were there many limitations on the photographic gear I was using, but also the slides have deteriorated in the up to 40 years since I took them. The skies represented in the slides were also not accurate to what I saw with my own eyes in many cases. The vast majority of photography "how to" videos on UA-cam are concerned about working with very recently taken shots. That's great. But, as a somewhat keen amateur photographer (a KAP??), I like to spend a lot of my time "revitalising" old photos. Mostly my photos, but often photos that friends & family have given me as their skills are limited compared to mine (and most people who are reading this). So ...... I say, "Cheers Dustin!!" (and Luminar) from folks like me trying to breathe life into their photographic memories.
Hey Dustin, I was one of the first "pre-orderers" and have downloaded the "advance release" Luminar 4 and am wondering if a later update will allow us to manipulate the skies in our original photos. Right now, unless I replace the sky I've got, it will not let me edit the original; all the sliders are greyed out and it would be nice to be able to edit without changing the whole sky.. . .
I think those tools are specifically designed around targeting a new sky, though your suggestion isn't bad as the same Ai masking could work on the existing sky in an image.
I bought Luminar 3 and have a constant problem with program crashing. Just throwing me at Desktop and closing down. When I load it again, it starts quickly and the edit done so far is not lost, but it's annoying. It's an advanced program, with a lot of features, but stability is not one of them. I don't use it professionally, so I don't care that much, but still - be aware. In my eyes it's more of a toy to play with, than something to rely on.
That’s curious, as I’m not sure I’ve had Luminar ever crash on me, nor have I head that as a common indictment of the software. I think you are dealing with a local issue that might be a configuration problem or something that needs to be solved with a fresh install of the software (not that I do tech support for them, so I’m out...)
I bought Luminar 3, turned out to be a nightmare to use. Took 2 to 3 minuets to load to my desktop and then each time i performed an action i had to wait around for Luminar 3 to finalise that action. My PC is built up from an i7-3770 cpu@3,40GHz, 16 GB ram, AMD Radeon hd 7700 series graphics card. Powerful enough to run Photoshop cc in real time with out any delays.Thought it would run Luminar 3 but sadly no luck there.Total waste of cash from my pension.
@@jdunne1000 My PC has 1700X Ryzen CPU, 16GB fast RAM and nVidia 1060 GPU. Lightroom and Photoshop are a breeze, even 4k video gets edited without skipping many frames on the timeline or rendering for a long time. It's not about the hardware. Apparently the software is not optimized for all possible configurations out there. It makes a problem on your comp and my comp and runs smoothly on others. But that's exactly a sign of not good enough software. It's ridiculous us, the users, to be forced to identify which part is causing the problem and 'reinvent' our computers, in order to run 1 application smoothly. The good software runs on everything, if the minimal hardware requirements are met, ofc. Now, is it that BAD? It's not a drama for me. I'm not a professional photographer or editor and stable software is not a MUST. But like with everything else, you get what you pay for, more often than not. Lightroom and Photoshop are pretty much the industry standard. In the long run, the subscriptions are WAY more expensive than what I paid in a single payment for Luminar 3. Well, it shows...
@@DustinAbbottTWI I like Luminar but it has been filled with issues for me from inception. Never did get updates to install from the updater so Luminar would send me the .exe. L3 was a nightmare so Luminar was removed from the taskbar. I hope 4 will be better but I might also wait for 5. I have been retired for 20 years after a 33 year career of taking and teaching wedding a portrait photography so while older I think I can still wait but the sky enhancement of as they say "the bees knees".
Hey Dustin, I'm very interested in Luminar 4 (for the new portrait tools as much as the sky replacement), but I'm concerned by the number of complaints about the performance of Luminar 3 in Windows 10. What is your view of the way Luminar 4 performs in Windows?
It seems improved, but the problem for me is that my standard has changed as I’ve upgraded to a very powerful workstation. In the case that I demonstrated the photo is actually back in Lightroom in 3-5 seconds.
Thanks Dustin for an informative vlog. I've pre ordered Luminar 4 and like you I like to use Luminar as a plug-in from Lightroom. Do you recommend a build up of personal 'sky' shots in addition to the Skylum collection in L4? Their dramatic shots look great. Hope you can advise. Mike in Oz
Great review. But I think you should do all editing on L4, instead of running it as a plugin and finishing the edit on LR. After all, you said that kind of software may be interesting to people, like me, that dislike the Adobe's signature model. As result, I am not convinced the L4 is capable of doing everything is necessary to achieve the result you want or if I still need to keep LR around.
I explained clearly that this was my preferred workflow, and it allowed me to highlight new features in L4 while retaining my own workflow. I quickly demonstrated the L4 workflow in the beginning for those that prefer that method.
this is what I look for initially with software. Being an Affinity Photo user, it would be nice to have it work with AP. Also, there are many users of L4 that create videos using L4 alone so just poke around. Always something to be learned from the tutorials.
All I can say is wow. Never heard of Luminar before this video and even the AI Skin Enhancer they show in their advert page is worth the price of admission.
It seems a lot better now, but I’ve also upgraded my workstation to a very powerful one, so my metric has changed. It happens pretty quick on my new machine, with the image returned to Lightroom in a 3-4 seconds
@@DustinAbbottTWI HI Dustin. I enjoyed this review. One question: how "powerful" is your new workstation? I have been using Luminar since 2017, and working with Luminar 3 now, but the performance is insanely slow. And it crashes. Even though the specs I have are significantly better than what is required by Skylum. I have a 1TB SSD, 16 GB of RAM and an intel Core i7 processor. I have tried all the technical tricks with their support but nothing worked. So I was just curious as to how high we should go with the specs to get the performance that you're getting in this video. Thanks.
Hello professional I purchase Luminar 4 But the problem still I have The same software No 3 Not 4 I pay for upgrade but it’s not change until now so advise me please what I should do
2 QUestions, do you know if they will update Flex with the same features? The other thing, do ypou know if it will work with a night sky? Lets say I have a picture of the milky way and waant to add it to a night sceen.
It does work with stars...I've done it. I don't know if Flex will be updated with the new features, but I suspect that either it will or they will release an upgrade version.
I don't know if DA has done a video related to his comment but I have seen something done by Jim Nix. Remember, the tutorials are being done by those that Skylum provides the BETA version to and while the release likely will be available with minor changes, there is certain to be many more tutorials showing more aspects and samples of how image editors are using L4.
@@DustinAbbottTWI I've tried out a trial version of Luminar 3 just out of curiosity today and checked out how a raw file of a portrait taken by Sony a7III was rendered - and it was quite aweful. Capture 1 and Lightroom did a much better job - detail and sharpness were much better. I've tried the resharpening tool but it didn't help either. Seems very unprofessional. Is it any better with version 4 ?
A very interesting tool. Imagine such a situation... you are in a great location, but between the sky and the earth there is such a big difference in brightness, that you have to make two exposures. Nothing new right??? No problem. You make the first exposure to capture what you want to capture on the ground... and the second exposure to capture the sky. With this application you will put it all together in a few seconds! There is no dishonesty in it. Simply a great tool to shorten your work :) There are many ways to use it. Cheating is a very outdated term here.
@@DustinAbbottTWI Maybe not entirely HDR, because it is a bit different... but generally yes. I just think Luminar should do it faster than I do manually. We'll see... I bought Luminar 4 in the preorder, by the way. Not only because of the sky editing function... there are many interesting tools inside. Thanks for the recommendation.
Thanks a lot for this review! A plugin here, a special software there; it is hard to keep track of all the new opportunities. On the one hand I like all the new abilities in post but on the other hand I miss the restrictions of the analogue days. How does Luminar compare to Landscape pro?
Luminar 4 is much much better than Landscape pro. The blending is much cleaner and doesn't take all of the time to do the prep for adding the sky that landscape pro requires. No more pink, blue, green painting first. If you have landscape pro then you know what I mean.
I'm an avid supporter of Luminar 3. I have quite a few issues with the approach they're taking in L4. 1. Machine learning is overrated 2. I spoke to Skylum and apparently filter stack is no longer guaranteed in terms of effect application order, so most presets will probably not be compatible with Luminar 4 3. If I can replace skies, tune faces and do all of this fancy crap in one click, but the app still takes 3 months to export a single photo, product priorities are wrong 4. The UI looks like Lightroom Mobile. Toy-ish UIs are insulting to advanced users. The only software I've seen doing it right is Logic Pro which has a toggle for all the advanced shit, but you can hide it behind "smart features" if you're a beginner. L4 just seems to be aimed at beginners, especially with the whole "one click AI" shtick they're pushing so far 5. Skylum intentionally puts out the vaguest info possible for L4 and dodges direct questions. We still don't know if LUTs organization is in it, if it's faster, is the export faster (I recommended FCP-style background pre-rendering to them months ago and they "took note", but idk), are the workspaces gone, etc. Reeeeeally not a fan of the approach Skylum is taking with this
I agree that this is an incredible feature. My biggest challenge is post processing milky way shots. I like to take 10 shots at ISO 6400 of the stars and stack them plus take a foreground shot perhaps at ISO 800 or 1200 and them merge them in photoshop. This is a major pain and depending on the trees, mountains, buildings etc. can be quite a challenge. It looks like with Luminar 4 I will be able to take my stacked star shot and my foreground shot and merge them easily. If so this is an incredible advancement.
I'm not sure you can make a generalization about the purpose of taking pictures. People take pictures for a lot of different reasons with an intent of many different outcomes.
Thanks for the interesting preview. I use Luminar 3 and have preordered Luminar 4. What excites me is the prospect that Luminar 5 will give us complete control of bokeh in post from sharp images. We live in exciting times! Cheers
It is a RAW converter. Some have said that it doesn’t handle the new Canon .CR3 files, but I can’t verify that as I don’t have a camera that records with those files.
It has its time and place, but for me the entire point of photography is to BE there just as much as it is to create the photo. I want to directly witness something beautiful and capture it, not capture something ordinary/boring and change the story later on a computer. A fake sky will even distort your own memory of what you actually saw that day.
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@@JeremyGalloway Ansel Adams greatly enhance his photographic images using darkroom technique, filters etc. to create masterpieces that are considered photographic art.
@@DustinAbbottTWI Could not disagree more. Today's world is being entirely too detached from reality, instant gratification, lack of mindfulness. There is a massive and fast growing body of evidence of the problems for society (google, for example, mindfulness, problems with virtual living) This just takes my breath away to see this software in a negative sense. Can you imagine any professional landscape photographer being exposed for using this app ? Hopefully, they would discredited on the spot.
Maybe useful for commercial advertising work, but I personally do not accept it to be used as photographer advantage. Photography is also about luck, if your sky is boring at place, just try it another day, if is not possible to come back again, e.g. far destination, simply bad luck for you.
I would say that the combination of CaptureOne and Luminar 4 could eventually give Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop a run for its money! Ever since Adobe adopted that stupid subscription based model, many photographers, graphic designers and artists have been trying to find alternatives. What I've seen, both CaptureOne and Luminar 4 are phenomenal alternatives!
@@DustinAbbottTWI I think it's relevant. ON1 Photo Raw and Luminar were first released around 3 years ago both being marketed as Lightroom alternatives. Fast forward to now and Luminar (v3) is a slow, crash prone, gimmicky AI mess, with a useless Library module, poor masking tools, laggy UI and is pretty much unusable for me. ON1 has concentrated on giving photographers a genuine Lightroom alternative (and have succeeded in my opinion), Skylum has focussed on the Insta-crowd who want their quick fix "one-click wonder" filters (and are a mile off being a Lightroom contender). Luminar 4 seems to be more of the same unfortunately. But we all have a choice what we use, so if Luminar's your thing, then great.
As someone who primarily does video I want to understand the whole “cheating” narrative that old school photographers want to put out there. I mention video because once you color grade, add transitions from scene to scene, add music and sounds nothing looks like the day you “shot it”, when putting together a wedding or music video you often time are left with a much larger than life artistic creation meant to evoke an emotional response by telling a story than what things were that day you filmed it.
I went from video to photography, and personally I don’t feel that editing (transitions, color grading, etc) is dishonest in the same way as sky replacement in a photograph is. It is obvious to a someone viewing a video that an editor has intervened and added music and transitions to a scene. It is not obvious to someone viewing a landscape photo that the sky has been completely replaced with a stock photo, so in this case there is an abuse of trust between the artist and the viewer. Just in the same way that there is a difference between photographing a model with a soft focus gel and perfect lighting to make them look more beautiful, as opposed to just sculpting/reshaping their body in photoshop to look like something they are not in real life.
@@JeremyGalloway , so basically you're all about judging people and criticizing people. Why do you have to care so much if a photographer changes the sky in "their" photo. If they did a believable job and it makes them happy, then leave them alone. Who cares? Try being less judgmental and the world will be a better place, actually you yourself might be a happier human being too. Have you ever slowed down your shutter? Placed an ND filter on your lens? Edited a photo at all? I could go on, seriously, just chill already. Just because you want YOUR photo to look like what you saw when you were on location, does not mean the entire world should create their art exactly like you do. It's really not that hard to just accept that people are different, we all make different decisions - it's what should make the world a more interesting place.
Photography is a 2D interpretation of 3D space so in a sense, all photography is fake. I'm guessing when you could start purchasing oil paints in stores there were some people that complained that it wasn't "real painting" unless you ground your own pigments. Sheesh
Your e-mail said " Dustin shows how you can use Luminar as a plugin and save time by avoiding tedious editing with masks." But he spends no time at all about integrating Luminar as a plug-in. He just says it is easy to do. Also, I want to put in a sky I SHOT, not a general sky. Is a "custom sky" one that you can shoot yourself? No explanation. Please slow down and be specific.
Ummm, I specifically demonstrated using several of my own sky textures and showed how to load them. You are clearly making your accusation without having watched the whole video. BTW - that wasn’t my email; that was an email from Skylum Software. I haven’t sent out any such email.
@@DustinAbbottTWI I saw it. I didn't think you spent much time on it and it is important to note as early reports said this option wouldn't be available. Overall, your report is fine but the points I was interested in didn't get much time. Do a few more.
I am wondering if anyone stops and thinks if it is weird (or sad..) that we get excited over something that will very easily make our photographs fake in a considerable degree
A lot of people have had this debate. I think a feature like this should be used sparingly, but at the same time, this is something that many of us have been able to do for years.
Although it looks impressive I won't be wasting any more money on Luminar products until CR3 files are supported. Luminar have been promising this for ages but must be the only photo editing software that still cant handle CR3 files. Luminar 3 is still so slow to load and work with. They should concentrate on getting the basics right before charging us again for new features.
Skylum rising in popularity? Maybe among Mac users, but among Windows users they are probably one of the most disliked companies out there. Luminar 3 still doesn't work properly on the Windows platform, there are features that are in the Mac version that have not yet been implemented in the windows version and there is functionality that was promised for Luminar 3 that have not been delivered. Go have a look at the Luminar for Windows forums over at skylum to see what I mean.
I’ve only ever used it on Windows. I use it (as noted in this demonstration) more as a plugin for specific tasks. I hear both kinds of anecdotal feedback from users. Some love, some hate it.
Maybe you're suffering from Mac envy. I love it on my windows. I don't pay attention to what is going on for the Mac users. That way I don't get jealous.
As of 12/14/19 Luminar 4 is a complete disaster, I followed your link to download the software and it does not preform anywhere near what is advertised . You should be more circumspect on things like this that you recommend.
That would be true if you are solely using the built-in preset skies or overusing (abusing) the feature. I’ve had the capability of doing this in Photoshop for a long time using my own skies, but I don’t abuse the concept.
Even in Dustin's video he showed examples of different skies... How are you getting the same dramatic sky. Wouldn't that a user error. If u want different looks, shoot different skies samples. Geez, I don't think that's too hard to comprehend.
@@TVe200 stupid only to you, the clients love it. No different that airbrushing a portrait... We can leave it natural, or aim to make it as perfect as possible.
3:45 4:08 4:25 ... Looks most of the time really unnatural. Sun direction doesn't match with the illuminated clouds. It seems to be that are two suns in the frame (left & right).
It seems like you've cited examples where I was just demonstrating different sky looks, several of which are automatic ones. I make the point later in the video (you probably didn't watch that far), I press in further to the concept that a natural result will require utilizing a sky that works with the scene.
It's annoying that there even needs to be an ethics disclaimer about editing photos. I like to keep life simple. Either I like a photo or I don't. I don't need to justify those likes or dislikes by bringing in techniques of how it got there.
Killer app: "a feature, function, or application of a new technology or product which is presented as virtually indispensable or much superior to rival products."
Great review but it has left me a little frustrated. I have entered photo contests where my photos were pure and you got what I saw. Then there were images entered where stars overlapped trees because others messed with their photos so much. It's almost like computerized paint brushes for people that can't paint. They just piece together an image that is pleasing to the eye. Weird science piecing together a woman. If you could change the sky, you could change the trees to desert and the road to a stream. Future generations won't know what is truly real. Why spend thousands for Yellowstone trips while I could just copy and paste in a third party bear image? No more bear attacks on photographers. I guess it just seems like cheating. Then there's the threat of people changing the past pictures to make people think certain things are normal. Like certain things may have been around for years while they have not. Like how they add images to old movies to make it look like certain things are normal. As a photographer I am trying to think of places to go to get better images while some might just piece together their images in their living room. Never leaving their home. Everything has just become so computerized and fake.
To be fair, people with good photoshop skills have been able to do all of this for a long time. The debate whether or not this is “pure photography” is another, but I was very specific in my intro that this is a technique that I rarely use...but Luminary’s 4 does it very well.
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This video is not about the merits of replacing a sky; it is about demonstrating the Luminar 4 does an effective job of automating that process IF YOU WANT TO DO IT!
Using luminar4 with a mac - and so far it is doing great - luv the ease of use especially on photos which were too dark
I'm glad you are enjoying it!
If Skylum cooperates with Phase One to create a plugin for Capture One then I will buy it. It seems to be a powerful tool for creativity.
I know they are monitoring this video, so hopefully they will see your suggestion
Good review. I have preordered it. Hoping that stability and speed has improved over L3. A suggestion on your videos. I found it very distracting watching when you were constantly moving your mouse all over the screen. My eye kept trying to follow the mouse instead of focusing on the overall image.
Thanks for the feedback.
Dustin, thank you for this. Looks an incredible bit of software and as you say, if used sparingly and with care it can assist the artistic outcome. Brilliant tutorial, thanks
Good perspective
One more vote here for Luminar as a plugin for CaptureOne!
I purchased Luminar 3 on the strength of your review ( and others ). Overall it's a good editing software however I mainly purchased it for its ability to quickly create sunrays. I don't often replace sky's but this Luminar 4 looks like it does a very good job. The fact that I can use my own sky images so easily is perhaps it's main strength. I wouldn't want to use the supplied presets, no doubt we'll see every other image on Instagram featuring one of these lol. I believe Luminar 4 is also coming with skin enhancement AI too. All in all its looking to be a worthy upgrade.
Your point about seeing the built-in preset skies everywhere is so true.
I have a large amount of travel photos, sometimes in groups, but always with family. Then you don't have to wait for ours to get the right sky over the temple of Abu Simbel in Egypt. I shoot the photos, but then ... boring sky. now I have a tousand photos where I need to replace the sky. But I never found the time to do so. I have pre-ordered Luminar 4 and I hope to get this important and huge job done within reasonable time. Maybe we should propose Luminar 4 as a divorce saver ??? And pay them a small fraction on how much a lawyer would cost :)
@@DustinAbbottTWI while this may happen, one can still manipulate the preset and move the sky in the image. Those really concerned will of course create a self made bundle of skies for appropriate use.
Hi Dustin. I have seen a few videos of yours over time and I love your reviews compared to others. Great video. Thank you. Subscribed. 👍🏻
Welcome on board!
Great video Dustin! Do you know if I purchase from your link if I will get the standalone version AND the plug-in? Also, can you move the sky around(or zoom in) as if it was a layer in Photoshop? (PS you misspelled the word tutorial in your keywords)
Hi Eric - the answer to that is yes. It works either standalone or as a plugin from several popular pieces of software.
My very valid use of sky replacement - photos I took many years ago. My photographic efforts go back 50 years - right back to my Kodak Instamatic 25! I used to take primarily colour slides (transparencies). Not only were there many limitations on the photographic gear I was using, but also the slides have deteriorated in the up to 40 years since I took them. The skies represented in the slides were also not accurate to what I saw with my own eyes in many cases. The vast majority of photography "how to" videos on UA-cam are concerned about working with very recently taken shots. That's great. But, as a somewhat keen amateur photographer (a KAP??), I like to spend a lot of my time "revitalising" old photos. Mostly my photos, but often photos that friends & family have given me as their skills are limited compared to mine (and most people who are reading this). So ...... I say, "Cheers Dustin!!" (and Luminar) from folks like me trying to breathe life into their photographic memories.
What a great perspective, and one I hadn’t considered.
Hey Dustin, I was one of the first "pre-orderers" and have downloaded the "advance release" Luminar 4 and am wondering if a later update will allow us to manipulate the skies in our original photos. Right now, unless I replace the sky I've got, it will not let me edit the original; all the sliders are greyed out and it would be nice to be able to edit without changing the whole sky.. . .
I think those tools are specifically designed around targeting a new sky, though your suggestion isn't bad as the same Ai masking could work on the existing sky in an image.
This is incredible.
It's pretty cool!
great review :-) Thank you for taking the time to produce the review.
My pleasure.
Are you using this on pc? If so, how is the performance? Ver. 3 was bad on pc.
I am using it on PC. Performance seems slightly improved, but still not lightning fast.
Well explained ! Thanks for making this useful video.
My pleasure.
I bought Luminar 3 and have a constant problem with program crashing. Just throwing me at Desktop and closing down. When I load it again, it starts quickly and the edit done so far is not lost, but it's annoying. It's an advanced program, with a lot of features, but stability is not one of them. I don't use it professionally, so I don't care that much, but still - be aware. In my eyes it's more of a toy to play with, than something to rely on.
That’s curious, as I’m not sure I’ve had Luminar ever crash on me, nor have I head that as a common indictment of the software. I think you are dealing with a local issue that might be a configuration problem or something that needs to be solved with a fresh install of the software (not that I do tech support for them, so I’m out...)
I bought Luminar 3, turned out to be a nightmare to use. Took 2 to 3 minuets to load to my desktop and then each time i performed an action i had to wait around for Luminar 3 to finalise that action. My PC is built up from an i7-3770 cpu@3,40GHz, 16 GB ram, AMD Radeon hd 7700 series graphics card. Powerful enough to run Photoshop cc in real time with out any delays.Thought it would run Luminar 3 but sadly no luck there.Total waste of cash from my pension.
@@jdunne1000 My PC has 1700X Ryzen CPU, 16GB fast RAM and nVidia 1060 GPU. Lightroom and Photoshop are a breeze, even 4k video gets edited without skipping many frames on the timeline or rendering for a long time. It's not about the hardware. Apparently the software is not optimized for all possible configurations out there. It makes a problem on your comp and my comp and runs smoothly on others. But that's exactly a sign of not good enough software. It's ridiculous us, the users, to be forced to identify which part is causing the problem and 'reinvent' our computers, in order to run 1 application smoothly. The good software runs on everything, if the minimal hardware requirements are met, ofc. Now, is it that BAD? It's not a drama for me. I'm not a professional photographer or editor and stable software is not a MUST. But like with everything else, you get what you pay for, more often than not. Lightroom and Photoshop are pretty much the industry standard. In the long run, the subscriptions are WAY more expensive than what I paid in a single payment for Luminar 3. Well, it shows...
@@DustinAbbottTWI I like Luminar but it has been filled with issues for me from inception. Never did get updates to install from the updater so Luminar would send me the .exe. L3 was a nightmare so Luminar was removed from the taskbar. I hope 4 will be better but I might also wait for 5. I have been retired for 20 years after a 33 year career of taking and teaching wedding a portrait photography so while older I think I can still wait but the sky enhancement of as they say "the bees knees".
Thank you again for your videos! Do you if FLEX will also have this feature?
That’s a good question, but not one that I have an answer to yet.
Hey Dustin, I'm very interested in Luminar 4 (for the new portrait tools as much as the sky replacement), but I'm concerned by the number of complaints about the performance of Luminar 3 in Windows 10. What is your view of the way Luminar 4 performs in Windows?
It seems improved, but the problem for me is that my standard has changed as I’ve upgraded to a very powerful workstation. In the case that I demonstrated the photo is actually back in Lightroom in 3-5 seconds.
Thanks Dustin for an informative vlog. I've pre ordered Luminar 4 and like you I like to use Luminar as a plug-in from Lightroom. Do you recommend a build up of personal 'sky' shots in addition to the Skylum collection in L4? Their dramatic shots look great. Hope you can advise.
Mike in Oz
I absolutely do. I’ve done it for years, and what it helps you to avoid is the problem of a bunch of other images having the same sky as your image.
Great review. But I think you should do all editing on L4, instead of running it as a plugin and finishing the edit on LR. After all, you said that kind of software may be interesting to people, like me, that dislike the Adobe's signature model. As result, I am not convinced the L4 is capable of doing everything is necessary to achieve the result you want or if I still need to keep LR around.
I explained clearly that this was my preferred workflow, and it allowed me to highlight new features in L4 while retaining my own workflow. I quickly demonstrated the L4 workflow in the beginning for those that prefer that method.
this is what I look for initially with software. Being an Affinity Photo user, it would be nice to have it work with AP. Also, there are many users of L4 that create videos using L4 alone so just poke around. Always something to be learned from the tutorials.
All I can say is wow. Never heard of Luminar before this video and even the AI Skin Enhancer they show in their advert page is worth the price of admission.
I'm going to do another video on the Ai Skin Enhancer in a couple of weeks.
@@DustinAbbottTWI Great, can't wait. Just pre-ordered version 4 and entered your code. Thank you for your channel and your no-nonsense reviews.
Do we still have time for two or three cups of coffee while saving a picture?
It seems a lot better now, but I’ve also upgraded my workstation to a very powerful one, so my metric has changed. It happens pretty quick on my new machine, with the image returned to Lightroom in a 3-4 seconds
@@DustinAbbottTWI HI Dustin. I enjoyed this review. One question: how "powerful" is your new workstation? I have been using Luminar since 2017, and working with Luminar 3 now, but the performance is insanely slow. And it crashes. Even though the specs I have are significantly better than what is required by Skylum. I have a 1TB SSD, 16 GB of RAM and an intel Core i7 processor. I have tried all the technical tricks with their support but nothing worked. So I was just curious as to how high we should go with the specs to get the performance that you're getting in this video. Thanks.
@Danny Deluxe Thanks for your response Danny. I will check my CPU and RAM as you suggested and will let you know. And I use Windows 10.
Thank you for covering this software. I am highly interested in the portrait applications of Luminar 4. Will you be doing a video on that?
I plan one for the latter part of this month a little closer to the actual public release of the software.
Is this a PS or LR Plug-in as well as a stand alone program?
Either or.
Hello professional I purchase Luminar 4 But the problem still I have The same software No 3 Not 4 I pay for upgrade but it’s not change until now so advise me please what I should do
The new version doesn't release to the public until the middle of November.
Dustin Abbott Thank you so much you are so kind
Can the sky placement file be raw or is it jpeg?
I used JPEGs. That’s a good question, and not one I can answer at the moment as I’m on the road with no access to the program.
2 QUestions, do you know if they will update Flex with the same features? The other thing, do ypou know if it will work with a night sky? Lets say I have a picture of the milky way and waant to add it to a night sceen.
It does work with stars...I've done it. I don't know if Flex will be updated with the new features, but I suspect that either it will or they will release an upgrade version.
I don't know if DA has done a video related to his comment but I have seen something done by Jim Nix. Remember, the tutorials are being done by those that Skylum provides the BETA version to and while the release likely will be available with minor changes, there is certain to be many more tutorials showing more aspects and samples of how image editors are using L4.
Wow ! That's amazing !! I pre-ordered ! :)
Enjoy. It's pretty cool!
@@DustinAbbottTWI I've tried out a trial version of Luminar 3 just out of curiosity today and checked out how a raw file of a portrait taken by Sony a7III was rendered - and it was quite aweful. Capture 1 and Lightroom did a much better job - detail and sharpness were much better. I've tried the resharpening tool but it didn't help either. Seems very unprofessional. Is it any better with version 4 ?
Thank you Mr Abbott
You're welcome.
A very interesting tool. Imagine such a situation... you are in a great location, but between the sky and the earth there is such a big difference in brightness, that you have to make two exposures. Nothing new right??? No problem. You make the first exposure to capture what you want to capture on the ground... and the second exposure to capture the sky. With this application you will put it all together in a few seconds! There is no dishonesty in it. Simply a great tool to shorten your work :) There are many ways to use it. Cheating is a very outdated term here.
Bracketing photos for HDR is essentially what you describe here, but you could use the technique here, I guess.
@@DustinAbbottTWI Maybe not entirely HDR, because it is a bit different... but generally yes. I just think Luminar should do it faster than I do manually. We'll see... I bought Luminar 4 in the preorder, by the way. Not only because of the sky editing function... there are many interesting tools inside. Thanks for the recommendation.
Thanks a lot for this review! A plugin here, a special software there; it is hard to keep track of all the new opportunities.
On the one hand I like all the new abilities in post but on the other hand I miss the restrictions of the analogue days.
How does Luminar compare to Landscape pro?
I’m not familiar with that software.
Luminar 4 is much much better than Landscape pro. The blending is much cleaner and doesn't take all of the time to do the prep for adding the sky that landscape pro requires. No more pink, blue, green painting first. If you have landscape pro then you know what I mean.
Any actual date available for launch?
Mid-November is what I'm told.
Amazing! #NEXTLEVEL 🙌🏻⚡️💪🏻💥👏🏻
For sure.
where do I purchase the skies?
There are skies included in the software. I haven't made my personal ones available for sale.
Dustin, does Luminar 4 open canon new raw files "CR3"?
I'm not entirely sure, as I don't currently have any cameras that utilize CR3. Send the Luminar people an email and ask that question.
Does it work with night sky?
It does - I've played with that.
Thanks heaps. Appreciated.
You're welcome.
I'm an avid supporter of Luminar 3. I have quite a few issues with the approach they're taking in L4.
1. Machine learning is overrated
2. I spoke to Skylum and apparently filter stack is no longer guaranteed in terms of effect application order, so most presets will probably not be compatible with Luminar 4
3. If I can replace skies, tune faces and do all of this fancy crap in one click, but the app still takes 3 months to export a single photo, product priorities are wrong
4. The UI looks like Lightroom Mobile. Toy-ish UIs are insulting to advanced users. The only software I've seen doing it right is Logic Pro which has a toggle for all the advanced shit, but you can hide it behind "smart features" if you're a beginner. L4 just seems to be aimed at beginners, especially with the whole "one click AI" shtick they're pushing so far
5. Skylum intentionally puts out the vaguest info possible for L4 and dodges direct questions. We still don't know if LUTs organization is in it, if it's faster, is the export faster (I recommended FCP-style background pre-rendering to them months ago and they "took note", but idk), are the workspaces gone, etc.
Reeeeeally not a fan of the approach Skylum is taking with this
Interesting feedback. I would say that thus far I find import/export a little faster.
Dustin Abbott do Luminar 3 presets work without issues?
I’m worried about the new unpredictable stack
Luminar is not my main software platform, so I haven’t invested in additional presets to test that.
this tool does drop the appreciation and value for a photography.
I think that is overselling its impact. Many of us knew how to do this a long time ago; this program just does it better.
@@DustinAbbottTWI and quicker..
and Picasso's funny looking people just killed the value of painting.
When will it be available?
Zeppy November
I agree that this is an incredible feature. My biggest challenge is post processing milky way shots. I like to take 10 shots at ISO 6400 of the stars and stack them plus take a foreground shot perhaps at ISO 800 or 1200 and them merge them in photoshop. This is a major pain and depending on the trees, mountains, buildings etc. can be quite a challenge. It looks like with Luminar 4 I will be able to take my stacked star shot and my foreground shot and merge them easily. If so this is an incredible advancement.
It sounds like it would work to me.
Bought it, incredible tool.
It's pretty cool
REALLY? HOW COME YOU BROUGHT IT YET IT HASN'T BEEN RELEASED YET?@@DustinAbbottTWI
thank your video...Let's not forget, the purpose of taking pictures ~ we need real, natural portraiture
I'm not sure you can make a generalization about the purpose of taking pictures. People take pictures for a lot of different reasons with an intent of many different outcomes.
@@DustinAbbottTWI Everyone has a different purpose, HaHa,,,
Thanks for the interesting preview. I use Luminar 3 and have preordered Luminar 4. What excites me is the prospect that Luminar 5 will give us complete control of bokeh in post from sharp images. We live in exciting times!
Cheers
There’s definitely some serious progress being made in automation.
Luminar 5? Four hasn't yet been released yet. Do you suggest we hold off buying 4 and wait for version 5 to come out then?
@@michael-lt2lf if you hesitate that much after such a revolution, wait for Luminar 6 or 7 :(
Do you process JPEGs or raw?
RAW, though in this case they are DNG files in Lightroom that are converted to TIFF in the handoff between the two pieces of software.
Can you add a raw file as your sky replacement
quick question is the standalone luminar 4 a raw converter too ? Or do I need to use a raw converter before apply filters ?
It is a RAW converter. Some have said that it doesn’t handle the new Canon .CR3 files, but I can’t verify that as I don’t have a camera that records with those files.
If only luminar works with capture one. I dont sky replace at all but I can recall times where I wish I did
I just don't think that Capture One has broad enough ownership to really attract a lot of third party support.
I can’t help but think that sky replacement is like cheating, especially when done with a sky image that the photographer did not create.
It is cheating if your goal is to be true to what you saw in a scene. If your goal is artistic expression, it is just another tool.
It has its time and place, but for me the entire point of photography is to BE there just as much as it is to create the photo. I want to directly witness something beautiful and capture it, not capture something ordinary/boring and change the story later on a computer. A fake sky will even distort your own memory of what you actually saw that day.
@@JeremyGalloway Ansel Adams greatly enhance his photographic images using darkroom technique, filters etc. to create masterpieces that are considered photographic art.
@@JeremyGalloway Exactly my thoughts!
@@DustinAbbottTWI Could not disagree more. Today's world is being entirely too detached from reality, instant gratification, lack of mindfulness. There is a massive and fast growing body of evidence of the problems for society (google, for example, mindfulness, problems with virtual living) This just takes my breath away to see this software in a negative sense. Can you imagine any professional landscape photographer being exposed for using this app ? Hopefully, they would discredited on the spot.
Maybe useful for commercial advertising work, but I personally do not accept it to be used as photographer advantage.
Photography is also about luck, if your sky is boring at place, just try it another day, if is not possible to come back again, e.g. far destination, simply bad luck for you.
that's one approach (and the one I usually take), but there are times I'm feeling creative and want to do more.
I would say that the combination of CaptureOne and Luminar 4 could eventually give Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop a run for its money! Ever since Adobe adopted that stupid subscription based model, many photographers, graphic designers and artists have been trying to find alternatives. What I've seen, both CaptureOne and Luminar 4 are phenomenal alternatives!
They are solid alternatives, though years of workflow leave me favoring Adobe still.
looks like this will become a very streamlined way of easily creating astro-landscapes.
I suspect that it already is.
looks like it would work well if that is someone's cup of tea. Not something I would do in my photos but nothing against those who do.
Exactly
I love ON1
Relevance?
@@DustinAbbottTWI I think it's relevant. ON1 Photo Raw and Luminar were first released around 3 years ago both being marketed as Lightroom alternatives. Fast forward to now and Luminar (v3) is a slow, crash prone, gimmicky AI mess, with a useless Library module, poor masking tools, laggy UI and is pretty much unusable for me. ON1 has concentrated on giving photographers a genuine Lightroom alternative (and have succeeded in my opinion), Skylum has focussed on the Insta-crowd who want their quick fix "one-click wonder" filters (and are a mile off being a Lightroom contender). Luminar 4 seems to be more of the same unfortunately. But we all have a choice what we use, so if Luminar's your thing, then great.
I like turtles
As someone who primarily does video I want to understand the whole “cheating” narrative that old school photographers want to put out there. I mention video because once you color grade, add transitions from scene to scene, add music and sounds nothing looks like the day you “shot it”, when putting together a wedding or music video you often time are left with a much larger than life artistic creation meant to evoke an emotional response by telling a story than what things were that day you filmed it.
Very true!
I went from video to photography, and personally I don’t feel that editing (transitions, color grading, etc) is dishonest in the same way as sky replacement in a photograph is. It is obvious to a someone viewing a video that an editor has intervened and added music and transitions to a scene. It is not obvious to someone viewing a landscape photo that the sky has been completely replaced with a stock photo, so in this case there is an abuse of trust between the artist and the viewer. Just in the same way that there is a difference between photographing a model with a soft focus gel and perfect lighting to make them look more beautiful, as opposed to just sculpting/reshaping their body in photoshop to look like something they are not in real life.
@@JeremyGalloway , so basically you're all about judging people and criticizing people. Why do you have to care so much if a photographer changes the sky in "their" photo. If they did a believable job and it makes them happy, then leave them alone. Who cares? Try being less judgmental and the world will be a better place, actually you yourself might be a happier human being too. Have you ever slowed down your shutter? Placed an ND filter on your lens? Edited a photo at all? I could go on, seriously, just chill already. Just because you want YOUR photo to look like what you saw when you were on location, does not mean the entire world should create their art exactly like you do. It's really not that hard to just accept that people are different, we all make different decisions - it's what should make the world a more interesting place.
JaneCP3 I just wanted you to know that I read the first two sentences or so of this obviously toxic response and then stopped. Have a good one!
Photography is a 2D interpretation of 3D space so in a sense, all photography is fake.
I'm guessing when you could start purchasing oil paints in stores there were some people that complained that it wasn't "real painting" unless you ground your own pigments. Sheesh
The real killer with this is that you can use your own skys !..
Exactly. Otherwise there would be a lot of similar looking images before lone.
Your e-mail said " Dustin shows how you can use Luminar as a plugin and save time by avoiding tedious editing with masks." But he spends no time at all about integrating Luminar as a plug-in. He just says it is easy to do. Also, I want to put in a sky I SHOT, not a general sky. Is a "custom sky" one that you can shoot yourself? No explanation.
Please slow down and be specific.
Ummm, I specifically demonstrated using several of my own sky textures and showed how to load them. You are clearly making your accusation without having watched the whole video. BTW - that wasn’t my email; that was an email from Skylum Software. I haven’t sent out any such email.
@@DustinAbbottTWI I saw it. I didn't think you spent much time on it and it is important to note as early reports said this option wouldn't be available. Overall, your report is fine but the points I was interested in didn't get much time. Do a few more.
@@timrock01 Pretty demanding words considering Dustin is putting out free education. Maybe figure it out for yourself if you want to know something.
@@sigmapete1 As near as I can tell I am having a discourse with Dustin. I would prefer that you keep it that way.
Tim Rock Last I checked this is a public comment forum, not a private message.
I am wondering if anyone stops and thinks if it is weird (or sad..) that we get excited over something that will very easily
make our photographs fake in a considerable degree
A lot of people have had this debate. I think a feature like this should be used sparingly, but at the same time, this is something that many of us have been able to do for years.
I did not intend to move from L3➡L4, but now...who knows😎
It's definitely a very interesting feature.
Although it looks impressive I won't be wasting any more money on Luminar products until CR3 files are supported. Luminar have been promising this for ages but must be the only photo editing software that still cant handle CR3 files. Luminar 3 is still so slow to load and work with. They should concentrate on getting the basics right before charging us again for new features.
That’s a valid criticism
Take a picture is catch a moment....
Yes, though sometimes there's more to it than that.
Skylum rising in popularity? Maybe among Mac users, but among Windows users they are probably one of the most disliked companies out there. Luminar 3 still doesn't work properly on the Windows platform, there are features that are in the Mac version that have not yet been implemented in the windows version and there is functionality that was promised for Luminar 3 that have not been delivered. Go have a look at the Luminar for Windows forums over at skylum to see what I mean.
I’ve only ever used it on Windows. I use it (as noted in this demonstration) more as a plugin for specific tasks. I hear both kinds of anecdotal feedback from users. Some love, some hate it.
Maybe you're suffering from Mac envy. I love it on my windows. I don't pay attention to what is going on for the Mac users. That way I don't get jealous.
As of 12/14/19 Luminar 4 is a complete disaster, I followed your link to download the software and it does not preform anywhere near what is advertised .
You should be more circumspect on things like this that you recommend.
Hi Mark, I can't account for your personal experience, but I demonstrated my experience, which was and is fine.
I don't like this at all. Every picture will end up with the same dramatic sky.
That would be true if you are solely using the built-in preset skies or overusing (abusing) the feature. I’ve had the capability of doing this in Photoshop for a long time using my own skies, but I don’t abuse the concept.
Even in Dustin's video he showed examples of different skies... How are you getting the same dramatic sky. Wouldn't that a user error. If u want different looks, shoot different skies samples. Geez, I don't think that's too hard to comprehend.
@@TOKSVISIONZ If you take a picture on a day with no clouds, live with it. To put clouds or elephants into a picture is stupid.
@@TVe200 stupid only to you, the clients love it. No different that airbrushing a portrait... We can leave it natural, or aim to make it as perfect as possible.
@Crim Sin People only look for new reasons to complain.
All these references to Lightroom and Photoshop negates the fact that Luminar 4 is supposed to be a standalone product.
That might be your perception, but I demonstrate Luminar the way that I personally use it.
@@DustinAbbottTWI Then to get anything out of this demonstration, we need to do it your way!
Like all tutorials you pick and choose what you find useful and toss the rest.
3:45
4:08
4:25
...
Looks most of the time really unnatural. Sun direction doesn't match with the illuminated clouds. It seems to be that are two suns in the frame (left & right).
It seems like you've cited examples where I was just demonstrating different sky looks, several of which are automatic ones. I make the point later in the video (you probably didn't watch that far), I press in further to the concept that a natural result will require utilizing a sky that works with the scene.
Why is this not highlighted as sponsored?
Because it’s not. I received no compensation for doing this demonstration and didn’t even do it at Skylum’s request.
It's annoying that there even needs to be an ethics disclaimer about editing photos. I like to keep life simple. Either I like a photo or I don't. I don't need to justify those likes or dislikes by bringing in techniques of how it got there.
Fair enough. People have differing opinions on this issue.
Hardly a killer app if it's not an app even on an iPad pro. Someday, but not today.
Killer app: "a feature, function, or application of a new technology or product which is presented as virtually indispensable or much superior to rival products."
Great review but it has left me a little frustrated. I have entered photo contests where my photos were pure and you got what I saw. Then there were images entered where stars overlapped trees because others messed with their photos so much. It's almost like computerized paint brushes for people that can't paint. They just piece together an image that is pleasing to the eye.
Weird science piecing together a woman. If you could change the sky, you could change the trees to desert and the road to a stream. Future generations won't know what is truly real. Why spend thousands for Yellowstone trips while I could just copy and paste in a third party bear image? No more bear attacks on photographers. I guess it just seems like cheating. Then there's the threat of people changing the past pictures to make people think certain things are normal. Like certain things may have been around for years while they have not. Like how they add images to old movies to make it look like certain things are normal. As a photographer I am trying to think of places to go to get better images while some might just piece together their images in their living room. Never leaving their home. Everything has just become so computerized and fake.
To be fair, people with good photoshop skills have been able to do all of this for a long time. The debate whether or not this is “pure photography” is another, but I was very specific in my intro that this is a technique that I rarely use...but Luminary’s 4 does it very well.
@@DustinAbbottTWI Yes, you were clear and then I shared my feelings about the product. My comment wasn't directed toward you specifically.