Presets are a great way to work through your images in Adobe Lightroom. They are adjustments made to an image and then saved for future use. Some photographers or software manufacturers create these presets. Here, we have collected 37 free Lightroom presets covering most photography topics.

Free Lightroom Presets: Why Use Them?

Lightroom presets are for speeding up your post-processing. They allow you to edit more images simultaneously with a single click. This way, your images can have a uniform tone and atmosphere. All you need to do is paste the settings to all your photos.

It’s perfect when you have a deadline to meet. For example, event photographers almost always use presets.

Everyone can benefit from using Lightroom presets because they are non-destructive. Editing in Lightroom is non-destructive. This means you can always go back to the RAW image at a click of a button. You can remove your adjustments easily.

You might add pre-made adjustments to your image, but these can all be tweaked for a personal look. This also hastens your workflow and, at the same time, teaches you how you can reach different effects.

You can easily install presets in Lightroom and then easily use them. After that, import your images and start working. Plus, it’s great when you can do it for free!

Free Lightroom Presets for Landscape Photography

Landscape images can really benefit from Lightroom presets. Green rolling hills, a mountain in the background, or a water source. Your photo most likely has one or more of these elements.

The following presets help bring out colors. They also bring down the highlights and bring detail out of the shadows. This helps your hills, mountains, rivers, etc., pop!

1. Beautiful Sunrise

When there isn’t enough light yet, colors can appear plain.

So this free Lightroom preset from PresetPro helps you enhance the magical colors of every sunrise.

2. Cinematic HDR

This free Lightroom preset from Loaded Landscapes gives your landscapes a unique cinema-inspired HDR look.

It may look unnatural on some of your images, but you can experiment by trying it on different types of images. Just look for a good fit.

3. Black and White (B&W) HDR

Sometimes your landscape images look great in black and white. A touch of HDR can even make them more dramatic.

This Loaded Landscapes preset also looks good with other genres, not only landscapes. So we suggest you experiment with it.

4. PRO Landscape and Travel Lightroom Presets

This is a BeArt Powerful Collection for travel and landscape photographers. You can get 15 free Lightroom presets with just one click.

Using the same preset on several photos can add another dimension to your personal style. It also makes those images look like they belong together.

5. Rising Star

This free preset from Shutter Pulse on Loaded Landscapes will add a cinematic look to your photos.

It strengthens the contrast and broadens the dynamic range. This way, you can enhance the power of nature.

6. Landscape

Photonify created this landscape preset. Their preset adds contrast to the midtones. The exposure is lightened, and details are pulled out of the shadows.

These adjustments deepen the colors. And they turn images into something more powerful without looking too artificial.

Free Lightroom Presets for Street Photography

Street photography presets are a great way to go through hundreds of photos in one fell swoop. Since you’re photographing many subjects, from people and architecture to daily life, you need something just as versatile.

Here is a selection of street photography presets to make your images bloom.

7. Street View

This free presets called Street View was created by Presetpro.com.

This Lightroom preset’s task is to bring out the details, especially in high-lit areas such as the sky. The whole image gets an extra notch of brightness and a warmer feeling.

8. Busy City

Busy City was also created by Presetspro.com, which brought us the street view (above).

This Lightroom preset adds an exposure increase to your image and adds detail to high-lit areas like clouds. It makes the photo pop and be more interesting, even if your original image was a little drab and muddy.

9. Street Blue

The website Preset Love offers this industrial Lightroom preset called Street Blue.

It draws out deep and moody hues suitable for street photography portraits and scenes. If you want to bring out textures and details, be sure to try out this preset.

10. Eric Kim Lightroom Presets

These free presets by Eric Kim can make your street photos edgier.

There is a monochromatic and a color version available. Both of them are high-contrast presets. They make some details disappear from your photos. And this emphasizes the shadows and figures.

Free Lightroom Presets for Portraits

Portraiture, fashion, and boudoir focus on the person rather than the setting. Curved shapes and expressions make them powerful.

Lightroom presets can help with the image’s exposure, mood, and tone. They can add to the feeling or juxtapose it. The outcome is down to you.

11. Portrait Preset

This free Portrait Preset from Photonify makes your images sharper and grittier.

It’s not always a good idea to enhance the skin’s structure this much. But there are images where it fits perfectly and makes them more dramatic and characteristic.

12. Cinema Lightroom Preset

You can get 20 free Lightroom presets from Shutter Pulse.

These will make your portraits more artistic by giving them a cinematic atmosphere.

13. Free Lightroom Mobile Presets

Imaginated (previously Preset Galore) offers free Lightroom presets for your smartphone.

These are perfect for editing your images on the go. They save you a lot of time and enable you to immediately post on your social media.

14. Monochrome

This free preset by Photonify is a black-and-white conversion. It looks great and doesn’t change the overall image too much.

The highlights and whites shift downwards. Whereas the clarity, shadows, and blacks are pushed upwards. Your photos will benefit from this vintage preset. It will save you a lot of tinkering.

15. Shadowze

This black-and-white Lightroom preset was created and shared by Lightroom Look.

It is a great preset for converting color images to black and white. It flattens out color images but ensures a nice contrast between dark and light shadows. This ensures a subtle pop.

16. High Contrast B&W

This preset is one of our favorites. It offers high contrast for portraits, street photos, and landscapes. All may benefit from this black-and-white conversion.

The contrast is what makes them pop. It adds a mysterious tone to the image and drops distracting, small details.

Free Lightroom Presets for Newborn Photography

When it comes to family photos, you want something warm, pleasing, and filled with happy emotions.

Baby photography embodies these qualities with an added “aww” factor. This “fuzzy feeling” is achieved using a preset like the ones below.

17. Newborn

This preset by Photonify brings down vibrancy and clarity. This softens the mid-tone contrast and helps the subject blend more into the setting.

It adds a yellow temperature to the image to make it warmer. The shadows and blacks have also been muted, so the image is much softer.

18. WeEdit Newborn

WeEdit present us a range of newborn photography presets that are great for Lightroom. They offer ten different presets that all suit newborn photography. Each preset has a different aesthetic that works perfectly with this genre of photography. 

We love the Soft Skin and Mahogany presets. WeEdit also provide a description of each preset. These descriptions include the ideal situations to use them in, and also images that shouldn’t use these presets. This is great for photographic beginners. 

19. Newborn Lightroom Presets: Portrait Lightroom Presets

Here, you can find 20 free Lightroom presets by TemaPhoto on Envato Elements for newborn photography.

You can use them for portraiture as well. These are especially great when you do a photo shoot of a newborn and the whole family. You’ll definitely find something for all of your images.

Free Lightroom Presets for Wedding Photography

If you are a wedding photographer, there is a high chance that you will take hundreds of pictures in one day.

This is why it’s beneficial to use Lightroom presets. You can significantly make your post-processing faster with presets.

Of course, you are going to have to adjust them a bit. Usually, a wedding happens in multiple venues and varying lighting conditions. But it’s a good start to try Lightroom presets, which fit the atmosphere of a wedding.

20. Mini Enlighten Presets

These free Lightroom presets from MCP can be used for different genres of photography.

On your wedding images, they will look soft and warm. They add a bit of yellow to the images making the bridal dress look stunningly white.

21. Super Preset Sample Pack

These 10 free Lightroom presets can make your wedding photos stunning. This collection contains five color presets and five black-and-white presets.

You can decide what kind of effect you wish to reach with your images and choose a preset with that in mind. You’ll find everything from warm and romantic tones to more dramatic monochrome.

22. Presets for Portrait, Weddings, and Film

These are 12 of the best free Lightroom presets from Greater Than Gatsby. As you can see, this package contains free Lightroom presets for wedding photography.

But don’t hesitate to try their other products on your wedding images. You can get great results from them too.

Free Lightroom Presets for Food Photography

In food photography, it’s important to find balance during post-processing. You want to make the food look delicious. For example, sometimes, you must saturate your images to make the fruits look appetizing.

But generally, we recommend looking for a rather natural effect. You don’t want the food to look like it’s made of plastic!

23. Dani’s Cookings

These free presets from Daniela Lambova will enhance your food photography.

It was made for food images with low contrast or highlights. She has made ones specifically for specific deserts. And others bring out light tones or blue highlights with smaller adjustments.

As you can see, they are not overly dramatic presets. But they make your food stand out a bit more.

24. Food

This is a free option from PresetLove. It was made to make your food photos more colorful and exciting.

It’s perfect for sharing images on social media. Your photos will pique people’s interest and stop them from scrolling past.

Free Lightroom Presets for Night and Astrophotography

Night and astrophotography landscapes benefit from presets… in a more serious way than those adjusting images of babies and families.

These presets help dehaze images caused by light pollution.

25. City at Night

PresetPro has our first choice for a free night photography preset. They increase the exposure while keeping the highlights down.

The details are pulled from shadows, and the contrast is present but not overly used. It’s great for street scenes with lots of light sources.

26. Astro Photography

These three presets can really bring out the best in your astrophotography:

• The first preset adds clarity and highlights to make those lights pop.
• The second preset is more muted and not so strong as it subtly increases the detail in the shadows.
• The third adds warmth to the yellow color temperature and light through exposure, whites, and highlights.

Free Lightroom Presets for Travel Photography

Travel photography is one of those all-encompassing photo niches. You’ll take different shots on your travels, be it architecture, portraits, or landscapes.

So you need some presets that are just as versatile. Here are three free Lightroom presets. They will work well with your nomadic travel images.

27. Travel by Nomanbefore

Here are four presets to cover all travel bases:

• Laguna Sunset: Brings details out of shadows and increases the highlights, adding a warmer tone.
• It’s a Jungle Out There: Adds exposure while keeping the contrast low for a warm, light photo.
• Into The Woods: Adds warmth and light to make a forest warm and welcoming.
• Beach Days: Brings out the best of the light and mutes the distractions in the image.

28. Travel Presets

These are Lightroom presets by FilterGrade (via Loaded Landscapes). They help turn those muddy, cold images into something more powerful.

They add warmth and take away that blue tinge of coldness. These can subtly bring out the best in your travel photo while keeping them professional.

29. Travel by Photonify

This preset offers warmth, contrast, and highlights. The adjustments here involve upping clarity and vibrance while keeping saturation low.

This allows a punch of color but not too much. The clarity is the contrast in the midtones.

Bonus: Creative Lightroom Presets

Film photography has lost some footing with today’s technological advancements. But film has subsequently reappeared, with photographers eager to get their hands on the rolls out there.

Luckily, camera manufacturers have found a way to replicate the moods and tones of film with Lightroom presets.

30. Film-Inspired Lightroom Preset

This Lightroom preset was made for you by PhotographyPlanet if you want a film-inspired look.

It can work perfectly with different kinds of photography. So you can also try it on your landscape, still-life images, and portraits.

31. Vintage Film Lightroom Preset

Another free Lightroom preset from PhotographyPla.net. This one gives a vintage look to your image by adding a sepia-like look.

You can also try this for different genres.

32. Holga Lightroom Presets

These 10 Lightroom presets by Dustin Leader on Preset Heaven are for mimicking the images a Holga camera takes.

These will strongly affect your photos, so you probably don’t want to use them all the time. But it’s definitely worth experimenting with them.

33. Historian

This free preset on Preset Heaven by Darya is a black-and-white one. This also has a strong effect but probably fits more images than the Holga presets.

It mimics an old film camera, and your images look like you were shooting on film.

34. Desert Sun

This preset from PresetLove provides an easy way to draw out vivid and warm colors.

Looking at your images after, you can almost feel the heat of the desert.

35. The Editorial Collection v2

These free Lightroom presets from Preset Works make your photos coherent and beautiful.

This collection contains 13 different presets. All of them give your images a deep and serious look.

36. VSCO film

VSCO created this preset to emulate the Kodak Ektacolor Pro 160. It’s a subtle difference in how it only adds contrast while pulling out a little clarity and vibrancy. It’s subtle yet effective.

Conclusion: Best Free Lightroom Presets

We have collected the best free Lightroom presets for almost every genre of photography. So you hopefully found something useful.

Feel free to experiment with modifying these presets. It’s a great way to practice and eventually create your own Lightroom presets. And check out our own Lightroom Presets if you want more simple, one-click presets for jaw-dropping edits!

This is a quick and easy aesthetic to create. We will show you a few ways to achieve the teal and orange style and ways to fine-tune your edits.

What is the Teal and Orange Effect? 

The teal and orange color grading effect became popular through Instagram filters. Since then, it has popped up in hundreds of preset packages across the internet. 

The teal and orange effect is self-explanatory. It puts a teal and orange tint over your photograph. The skies, reflection, and water in your photographs will turn a cool teal tint. The landscapes, buildings, and other elements will turn a orange tint. 

Teal and orange are complementary colors. When most of the image is in these tones, we create aesthetically pleasing photographs. You can use these tones to create stylized versions of your photographs. 

Creating the Teal and Orange Effect in Lightroom vs Lightroom Classic 

Adobe Lightroom now comes in two different versions: Lightroom and Lightroom Classic. Both versions have many of the same functions; what differs are the approaches to editing processes.

Lightroom favors a post-processing workflow that utilizes the cloud. This allows you to work from the same set of images on any device you want. This version also prioritizes simplicity and ease of use through a stripped-back interface. This may be easier for beginners to work through. 

Lightroom Classic has an interface with which any photographer who has used the past versions of Lightroom would be familiar. It provides a wide range of features, some of which you may never need to use. You will find more in-depth controls and attention to detail in Lightroom Classic. 

Both Lightroom versions produce the same results as the algorithms for adjustments are the same. They both allow you to perform the teal and orange effect. So, it will come down to personal preference or whether you need to use a very specific process. This article will outline differences in the processes we touch on in either Lightroom version. 

How To Create the Teal and Orange Effect 

Now, we will show you how to create the teal and orange effect in Lightroom. You can perform this easy process in both Lightroom and Lightroom Classic. 

Color Calibration 

To produce this effect, find the Color Calibration section in the Edit panel in Lightroom. This will be the Calibration section in the Develop panel in Lightroom Classic. 

First, move the Red Primary Hue slider to +50. Then, move the Blue Primary Hue slider to -100. This sets the base for our teal and orange effect. 

Our results will likely be too saturated. To fix this, we will want to use the Saturation sliders below. This is where your personal preference will come in. 

Traditionally, this effect has low levels of saturation. It’s best to keep it that way, as the saturation makes the colors look unnatural. But this is up to you, and you should experiment to find your personal preference. You can always edit the saturation more in the next step.

Basic Adjustments 

Once you have the basic teal and orange effect, head to the Light (Basic in Lightroom Classic) editing section. Here, you can fine-tune your effect to your exact requirements. 

These basic adjustments should be done to your preference, or to support your current photograph. As a rule of thumb, we want to continue with the low saturation aesthetic with a low contrast. 

Instead of adjusting the Contrast slider, you should adjust the highlights and shadows manually. This gives you more control over the type of contrast you want.

At this point, it is useful to have a photo you like as a reference. You can then match these basic adjustments to something similar to your desired image. 

I suggest slightly increasing the Texture, Clarity, and Dehaze to add to the aesthetic. 

Tone Curve 

The Tone Curve is a graph that allows you to edit the different sections of the exposure. Read our in-depth article here on the Tone Curve. 

In this section, I like to raise the bottom left point a bit to reduce the true blacks in the image. If this washes out too many mid-tones, click the line in the middle. You can then drag down this point to the reference line. 

Extra Steps 

Color Grading

If you want high levels of control, I recommend you use the Color Grading section. These adjustment tools allow you to edit colors in the different tonal sections: Shadows, Midtones, and Highlights. 

These controls make grand changes to your image. So, make sure to use these very slightly. Read our full article here to learn how to control these settings. 

Save As A Preset

After all this fine-tuning, you will want to save your custom settings. This will allow you to make the same adjustments to any other photo in your Library. 

Remember that the Basic adjustments were specific to your first image. Once you have applied the preset, you might have to edit these adjustments in each particular image. 

To save your settings as a preset, click the ‘+’ button in the Preset section. To understand the control Lightroom gives you, check out our full article on saving presets. 

Conclusion: Teal and Orange Effect in Lightroom 

From these few steps we can see that Lightroom makes it easy to create this popular effect. We also get much more control than setting a preset over our Instagram photos. 

The teal and orange effect completely changes the feel of a photograph. It adds a dreamy aesthetic that makes us appreciate often overlooked and basic scenes. Check out our other Lightroom effects for more options to apply to your photographs. 

Today, we teach you how to create, use, and save your presets in Adobe Lightroom. By the end of our article, you will know how to create, set, and edit pre-made presets. So, read on to learn more about this useful technique.

In our article, we refer to Lightroom as Lightroom CC to differentiate it from Lightroom Classic. Although similar, these two Lightroom versions have different approaches, interfaces, and extra features.

What Are Lightroom Presets?

Lightroom presets are pre-determined edits that can be applied to your photograph in a single click. In contrast to auto adjustments, presets always apply the same value for every change. This means an image’s color temperature and exposure affect a preset’s appearance on different photos.

Lightroom also provides its users with a wide range of preinstalled presets. A few of these presets are called Adaptive Presets. Using AI, these unique presets detect elements like a subject, portrait, or sky. The AI then applies the preset to these specific elements only.

Presets are most helpful when you have shot a big batch of images on the same day under similar shooting conditions. They are also helpful for creating your signature style. After your preset is applied, you can fine-tune each edit.

Presets can save you hours of editing time and let you share your signature style with others. Adobe Lightroom has a great preset process.

Lightroom Presets in Classic vs CC

Presets in the two Lightroom programs are similar but have some slight differences. Let’s outline these differences so you can decide which version is best for you. If you ever decide to change your presets, you can always send them across the versions.

Both versions let you set the preset with a general slider. This slider ranges from 0 to 200. The preset examples are set at 100. This means you can immediately increase or decrease the preset intensity.

Lightroom Presets in Classic

In Lightroom Classic, the main Presets panel is in the Develop section, clearly positioned in the left-hand panel. If it is not there, click on Windows > Panels > Presets in the top menu so they are shown.

The presets are divided into sections. Each section contains several click-down headings and presets.

You can hover over the different presets to see their effect on your image. This is helpful because you can quickly get a rough idea of the style best suited to your photograph.

Lightroom Presets in CC

In Lightroom CC, the Presets panel is an icon along the right-hand toolbar. The icon looks like two circles slightly overlapping, like a Venn diagram. You can also click View > Presets in the top panel.

There are three different headings—Recommended, Premium, and Yours. Each one has different subheadings that can help you find the ideal preset. The Premium and Yours sections contain the same presets found in Lightroom Classic.

The Recommended section is unique to Lightroom CC. This section features a range of specific presets picked by an AI readout of your image! These recommendations are displayed in thumbnails, but you can still hover to see the effect in full size.

This AI preset feature is great. It is particularly helpful if you’re unsure about your desired editing style. In this case, you can use a Lightroom preset as a jumping-off point or solution.

How to Save a Preset in Lightroom

We will now guide you through creating your own Lightroom preset in Classic and CC.

Step 1: Make Your Edit

First, open your image and make the edits you want to copy to make a preset. The best way to make the edit is to work down Lightroom’s adjustment panels and change the relevant fields for you.

You can even use a preexisting preset as a starting point. Applying a preset will change all the sliders. You can then go in to fine-tune the look for your perfect preset.

Step 2: Create the Preset

You then want to go to the Preset panel and click the plus (+) icon at the top right. This is in the same location in the respective Lightroom CC and Classic panels.

You can then choose which adjustments to save to your preset. This is helpful if you only want particular options copied from a preexisting photograph.

The two Lightroom versions have different approaches to setting your preset parameters. Lightroom Classic clearly lays out your options. You simply tick all the relevant fields you want to copy over (first image below).

Lightroom CC makes this process slightly easier. It is less overwhelming because all the adjustment sub-categories are in drop-down menus (second image below).

The Select drop-down lets you choose what you want to be preselected. The Modified option is great as it only selects the adjustments you have touched. Lightroom CC also lets you copy over masks, a feature not found in Lightroom Classic.

Step 3: Finish Your Preset

You now want to title your preset to something relevant to the actions. If it’s for a particular event, name it after the event. If it’s for a particular style, describe it in a word.

You can choose the group your preset is filed into. It is set to be in User Presets, which is normally best. But you can create your own group if you like. Click Save at the bottom, and you now have your custom Lightroom preset!

How to Apply Lightroom Presets to Multiple Images

You may also want to know how to apply your Lightroom presets to multiple photos. We will now take you through the Lightroom Classic and CC processes.

Applying Presets to Multiple Images in Lightroom Classic

In Lightroom Classic, you can apply presets in the Library panel. To do so, select the relevant photos you want to edit. Use Command or Ctrl+Click to pick particular images and Shift or Alt+Click to pick all pictures between your first and last photograph.

You then go to the Quick Develop section. Next to Saved Preset, you will see a drop-down menu. This menu displays all the presets you can apply to your photo.

Applying Presets to Multiple Images in Lightroom CC

Lightroom CC does not let you edit in any viewing mode other than its Detail View (D). So, to copy over your settings, you must switch to the normal editing view (View > Detail). Then, apply the preset and any other edits to the first image.

Click the Copy Edit Settings button below the filmstrip. Then, select the photos from the filmstrip to which you want to apply the same preset. The same button will have changed to Paste Edit Settings. Click this and the same adjustments will be applied to all your images.

How to Import and Export Lightroom Presets

Sharing presets is another easy action that Lightroom allows. This is great because some of your favorite photographers may sell their own presets so you can replicate their style.

Importing Lightroom Preset Settings

Importing a preset is easy in Lightroom. In Classic, press the same plus (+) icon and then choose Import Presets… In Lightroom CC, click the three-dots (•••) icon at the top-right of the Presets panel.

You’ll then need to select your preset from your computer. Lightroom lets you import both XMP and LRTemplate files. Your preset will be saved to the User Presets section.

Exporting Lightroom Preset Settings

Exporting a preset is simple. Find your desired preset, right-click it, and select Export. The process is the same for Lightroom Classic and CC. You can then decide where to save the file so it won’t be lost.

Conclusion: How to Save a Preset in Lightroom

Now you know how to save Lightroom presets and use all the settings the photo editing software offers. You can even sell your preset style online or share it with friends!

Using Lightroom presets can be a godsend for many photographic genres. It is particularly useful for photographers who edit big batches of images. Now, you can send a big batch of photos to a client with preliminary editing before you go into more detail.

Check out our article on the best free Lightroom presets. We also list the best presets for portraits, landscapes, and street photography. And finally, we have The Preset Collection, a simple way to drastically improve your images!

This article will go through how to create Lightroom presets to sell step-by-step. Along the way, we will give you tips on making the most marketable presets and how to package your creations.

Market your presets on social media. Use your presets to edit photos and post them on Instagram. Be sure to include before and after photos. Emphasize the look you get with this preset and how easy it is to use.

How to Price Presets

Pricing presets is tricky. Preset packs sell for a wide variety of prices. Some cost hundreds of dollars—others are just a few dollars. Plus, there are many free presets out there.

Photographers with a reputation or a large social media following can charge more for presets. These photographers have a unique look to their photos that others want to emulate.

There is no fixed way to price your preset pack. Look at other presets on platforms to find a general price range. Price your product competitively but on the high side. You can always add a discount or have a sale.

It all comes down to what photographers will pay. Remember, photographers value quality presets that make photo editing easier.

Conclusion

Lightroom presets cut to the chase and create a mood with one click. If Lightroom editing comes easy to you, you may be able to market your abilities and sell them. All you need to learn is how to sell Lightroom presets effectively.

An amateur photographer may like a look but not know how to achieve it in Lightroom. They will pay money if presets help them find their vision. Busy professional photographers who have dozens or even hundreds of photos to post-process also value presets. Using a preset saves time, and time is worth money!

Try The Preset Collection to drastically improve your photos with one click!

Online Marketplace

Etsy

Looking for tips on how to sell Lightroom presets? Check out this step-by-step guide that includes valuable information on creating marketable presets. Plus, discover a unique and customizable marketplace to sell your presets on.

What is Color Grading in Lightroom?

There are a lot of ways to change the colors in your image. Lightroom’s Color Correction tool fixes optical halos. White balance makes your image warmer or cooler. Or you can use the HSL/Color panel and re-tint individual colors. Blues are more purple or reds more orange. All these Lightroom color correction tools change the colors across your image.
In color grading photography or color toning, you individually add color to a range of light. Highlights can hint at one color while shadows are tinted a different color. Many color grading Lightroom presets set a particular mood.

Color Grading vs Split Toning

In 2020, Adobe replaced the Split Toning tool with the Lightroom Color Grading tool. The tools are similar in what they do. Split toning divides light two ways into highlights and shadows. Color grading separates light three ways, adding midtones.
The Split Toning panel was organized differently, with the colors along a spectrum. In theory, the linear color graph wraps around like a circle. Notice that red tones appear on both ends of the spectrum. The colors in the Color Grading tools are on a color wheel. This helps you choose colors that go well together.

How to Use Color Grading in Lightroom

Let’s start with a tour of the Color Grading tool in Lightroom. Then we can use it to add color to an image.

Step 1. Open the Color Grading Panel

The Color Grading tool is the same in Lightroom Classic, Lightroom CC, and Adobe Camera Raw (ACR):

• In Lightroom Classic, Color Grading is in the Develop module, under the HSL/Color panel.
• In Lightroom CC, the tool is in the Color panel.
• In ACR, Color Grading is under the Color Mixer.

If you still see the Split Toning panel in your menu, upgrade to the newest version of Lightroom.

Color Grading Panel

In the Color Grading panel, you have five circular icons across the top and three main color wheels with a few sliders below.
The icons across the top let you edit one color wheel at a time. From left to right, the icons are three-way, shadows, midtones, and highlights. There is also a global color wheel option. This larger tool lets you choose your colors more precisely.
The separate color wheels below change the tint of your shadows, midtones, and highlights. Sliders under the color wheels control luminance. The eye icon toggles color grading on and off. This lets you see the change in your image. The Blending and Balance sliders control how the three light ranges interact.

Step 2. Choose a Color Grade

You can choose any colors you want to tone your image. For this sunrise, I used color grading to emphasize the tones already in the scene. I made the sun rays warmer by adding yellow and cooled down the forest shadows with a little blue. I added a little more pink to the clouds and brought the color into the foreground by adding it to the midtones. The subtle changes make the tones pop.

Setting Colors

To set a color, grab the circular target from the center of the color wheel. Drag it towards the edge. The further out you go, the more saturated the color.
As you move the target around the wheel, the colors in your image change. A dot appears outside the wheel to show you exactly what color you select. Double-click in the center of the wheel to reset the tint.
The target is very sensitive and moves quickly. Hold the Option key (Alt key on a PC) to slow it down. You can also use sliders to choose your colors. Click on an icon across the top of the panel to isolate the color wheel you want to use. Click the triangle icon to reveal the Hue and Saturation sliders.

Hold the Shift key to change only the saturation. The Command key (Ctrl on a PC) locks onto saturation to let you change only the hue.
Try moving the target to the outside edge of the wheel so you can see the color clearly. Once you decide on a tint, pull the target towards the center to reduce the intensity. A little color grading goes a long way.
You can be very precise and use color theory to choose the colors in your image. Or you can let your eye guide you.

Step 3. Adjust Luminance Sliders

Once you make a color selection, move to the Luminance sliders under each wheel. Luminance sliders are new to Color Grading.
The Luminance slider brightens or dims the tones in the selected light range. For instance, moving the slider under the Highlights wheel to the right lightens the brightest highlights. Moving the slider to the left darkens the lightest areas. The Luminance under the Highlights wheel does not affect midtones or shadows. Lightening reduces the intensity of the color.
These two images have the same color grading. In the right-hand photo, I brightened the highlights and midtones and darkened the shadows. But we are not done. There are more tools that help fine-tune the look…

Step 4. Adjust the Blending Slider

Blending lets you control how gradual or abrupt the color transitions are. By default, the slider is in the middle at 50. There is some overlap between highlights and midtones, midtones, and shadows.
To blend the colors more, move the slider to the right. This pulls colors into a broader range of light. To reduce the amount of blend, move the slider to the left.
Here’s an exaggerated example so you can see the change. The image on the left is the original. I color graded the right photo with blue shadows and yellow highlights at 100% saturation. I left Blending at 50 and Balance at 0.

Step 5. Adjust the Balance Slider

The Balance slider changes the division of luminance across your image. Move the slider to the right if you want to focus on highlights. More pixels take on the tint you have set in the Highlights wheel. Move the slider to the left if you wish to treat more pixels as shadows.
In the first image, I changed the Balance slider to -100. More tones take on the blue of the shadows. In the second, I set the slider to +100 making more pixel highlights.

Step 6. Adjust Global Color Grading

The icons across the top of the Color Grading panel isolate the color wheels. But there is one extra. The icon on the far right is for Global color grading. Use this tool to add a color tint to your entire image. For instance, if you want to add a sepia tone to a black-and-white image.

Color Grading—Lightroom vs Photoshop

Lightroom is one of the best tools for Color Grading. But you can also color grade in Photoshop by adding a Color Balance adjustment layer. You can use the ACR filter if you primarily photo edit in Photoshop. Color Grading in ACR works just like the Lightroom tool. But for many photographers, the process is not as intuitive as the Lightroom color wheels.

How to Color Grade in Photoshop

Go to the Image drop-down menu and select Image > Adjustments > Color Balance. You can choose Shadows, Midtones, or Highlights in the Color Balance window. Use the three sliders to add a unique color profile to the light. The three sliders in the Color Balance adjustment panel replace the color wheels used in Lightroom and ACR.

Conclusion

Color Grading in Lightroom is a powerful photo editing tool. It sets the mood of your image. The Lightroom tool is easy to use and packs a lot of creative punch. With a few spins of the color wheels, your photos take on a whole different look. Ideally, you want the toning to be subtle. But if you like extreme toning, go for it! Color Grading gives images personality.
Try out the Creative Photography Cookbook e-book to create technically perfect and beautiful images!

Top Wedding Presets for Lightroom

10. Be Art Presets – Vintage Collection

• Number of Presets – 50
• Price – $

This set of wedding Lightroom presets is the cheapest you will find on this list. There are plenty of presets to choose from that will satisfy most wedding photographers.
These presets produce a sharper style of aesthetics. So be sure this is how you want to portray the whole wedding.
I think these could be fun to try out. But it may be worth paying extra for other wedding presets made by highly experienced photographers.

9. Preset Pro – Portrait Bundle

• Number of Presets – 300
• Price – $$

This option is great if you want to produce different aesthetics for each wedding you shoot. Or maybe you’re not sure how each Lightroom preset will work on your pictures. You get so many options!
Inside the 300 portrait presets, there are 80 dedicated wedding Lightroom presets. Most of the presets will give you soft edits.
Make sure you study the list of the different Lightroom presets before buying. You will get a lot of presets for your money. But I cannot confirm that dedicated wedding photographers made them.

8. Trey Wallace – Atlas

• Number of Presets – 9
• Price – $

Wallace’s Lightroom presets are primarily made for landscape photography. But they can work great for wedding photography if you shoot weddings in beautiful locations.
When used for portraits, the colors and tones draw you right into the subject’s face. Some of the presets will turn natural greens brown. This is a stylistic choice that could work out in your favor. It would make the wedding scene seem a bit unrealistic. But it will also reflect the uniqueness of the special day.

7. LKO – Sierra Presets

• Number of Presets – 13
• Price – $$

The key in Lukas Korynta’s set of presets is softness. As wedding photographers know, the key to great wedding photography is taking out the rigid “realness” of photographs and making them look relaxed.
These Lightroom presets aren’t just easy on the eyes. They also remain surprisingly natural. It is due to the tones he chose, where each image looks as if it’s been shot during golden hour.

6. Cody + Allison – C&A presets

• Number of Presets – 18
• Price – $

Cody and Allison are wedding photographers who shoot in a dramatic style. If you photograph in a similar style, these wedding Lightroom presets could be the right choice for you. But the look could be a bit overboard for photographers who don’t use this documentary-like style when shooting.
If you want a Lightroom preset with darker contrasts, this one could be perfect. It gives rich tones where the skin tones pop out of the darkness. This puts more focus on the subjects in your images.

5. Archipelago – LXCR

• Number of Presets – 8
• Price – $$

This wedding Lightroom preset gives you a range of moody tones to play with. Archipelago did a great job of providing unique Lightroom presets that work successfully with wedding pictures.
All of the presets in this series have a deep tonal range. This is particularly evident in the black-and-white presets, which are very dramatic.

4. India Earl – Honey

• Number of Presets – 1
• Price – $$$

Now, we look at Honey. It is a high-end preset created by India Earl. And the name Honey perfectly describes this wedding Lightroom preset. It adds a rich, warm, golden cast to your images—not to mention soft highlights and deep shadows.
As the most expensive Lightroom preset on this list, be sure this is the aesthetic you want before buying it. It may be worth the money if you know you want to use this aesthetic for several jobs.

3. White In Revery – Dolce Presets

• Number of Presets – 6
• Price – $$

This set of six wedding Lightroom presets will set a calming tone for your images. The presets mimic a fairytale-like aesthetic, which would go well with any wedding story. This dreamy aesthetic adds a soft touch to the scene, amplifying the intimate emotions of the event.
I am a fan of Dolce 2. I like how the preset handles the highlights, pushing them close to the limit. This makes the image reminiscent of an angelic dream. Who wouldn’t want that to reflect the photos of their day to remember?

2. Benj Haisch – Cascade Presets

• Number of Presets – 12
• Price – $$

I am a fan of Haisch’s wedding Lightroom presets. He manages to give each image a warm tone without going over the top. Even the photographs taken in the snow seem to have a slightly warm touch.
There is a common theme of blowing out the highlights in these Lightroom presets, which I think works well. This is especially true in indoor settings. The highlights make the lighting look perfect.

1. Pablo Beglez – PBX Presets

• Number of Presets – 8
• Price – $$

When it comes to choosing wedding Lightroom presets, the tint and tone of the color is the most crucial factor. You are given a rose-tinted view of the world with the PBX set. This fills your image with romance and positive connotations.
These Lightroom presets work wonderfully on all skin tones. Wedding portraits pop, and there is a soft, warm tone throughout the photographs.

Conclusion

After looking through this selection of professional Lightroom presets, you can see that the choice will come down to your personal preference. Wedding photos often benefit from a slightly unrealistic color tone, whether subtle or obvious.
Choosing this color tone is entirely up to you. As you can see by this list, I tend to lean toward warmer tones. This gives the viewer an instant uplifting feel.
The best way to find the best wedding preset in Lightroom for you is to study examples of each preset. So go through this list and find the right aesthetic to match your shooting style!
Try out our Dreamy Childhood Portraits e-book to capture joyful photos you will cherish forever!

Six Street Photography Lightroom Presets Applied to the Same Beach Scene

Think of a Lightroom preset as a photo editing recipe. It is a unique combination of settings, including tone curves and color grading.
When you apply a preset, Lightroom sliders will change automatically. But you can still grab a slider and tweak it if you don’t like something about the result.
Using a Lightroom preset is not cheating. It is a quick way of achieving a look or style in your image.
You may not have created the recipe, but you choose the look. No one is going to notice if you used a preset. Professional photographers might use presets, and we would not know the difference.

Benefits of Lightroom Presets

Presets speed up your workflow. You do not have to tweak every slider for each image to get the look you want. Presets make the photo editing process easy. Thus, you are more likely to edit your photos and share them because the process is painless.
They are also great for learning how various sliders interact to create a look. Even if you have been editing photos in Lightroom for years, there is always something new to discover. Presets give you a new perspective on how your image can look.

Where to Find Lightroom Presets

At last count, there were over 150 presets included in Lightroom. They are grouped in folders defined by a look (i.e. cinematic) or a type of photography (i.e. food).
Don’t get too tied to the labels. There’s nothing wrong with using a food preset on a street photograph. A travel preset may look good on an image of food.
Lightroom presets are in different places, depending on whether you use Lightroom Classic or Lightroom CC.

• Lightroom Classic: Open the Develop module. The presets are in the left-hand column in the Presets panel.
• Lightroom CC: Open the editing workspace. Under the histogram, click the Presets button. A column appears with both Premium presets and any other imported presets.

Best Lightroom Presets – Street Photography

The best preset for urban photos depends on the scene and what you like. You can choose color or black-and-white presets. The look can be modern or vintage. The image can have grain that simulates film or be bright and airy.
Contrast and color play a big part in how a photo looks. Some presets create high contrast or saturated colors. Others mute colors or add a tint to simulate old film.
Adobe numbers their Lightroom presets, so there are no memorable names. We will list the folder and preset designation. The original photos in the comparison examples below have only had lens correction and cropping applied.

Auto+: Retro – AR06

There are eleven presets included in the ‘Auto+: Retro’ folder. The Retro presets create a classic vibe. Most add a matte look and a bluish tint without taking away from your original colors.
With street photos, AR06 is a good place to start. If the blue is too strong, try AR08.
See how this night street scene of three women reflected in a restaurant window changes with the AR06 preset applied.

Style: Black and White – BW07

If you think converting an image to black and white only means removing color, you are in for a surprise. There are as many black-and-white presets as stars in the sky.
Each of the twelve in Lightroom creates a different black and white look. Some have a toned color cast, like sepia.
If you want a modern black and white conversion with clean contrast, you can’t go wrong with BW07. If the look goes too dark, brighten it up by moving the exposure slider to the right.
This street photo of musicians in London’s Camden Market becomes classic with the BW07 black-and-white conversion applied.

Style: Black and White – BW03

Sepia adds a yellow or brown tone to your image for a vintage look. For a high contrast sepia look, try BW03.
You may want to brighten the image by moving the exposure slider to the right. If the brown tint is too strong for your taste, try BW02.
Here is a modern scene of a man seated alone in a restaurant window with the vintage look created by BW03.

Style: Cinematic – CN09

There are eighteen cinematic presets in Lightroom divided into two folders. There are a lot of different looks available.
A favourite is CN09. This has a slight green tint and muted colors. For a grungier look with teal shadows and orange highlights, try CN01. CN12 gives you a brighter, more natural look.
The bright colors of London’s Camden Town take on a classic cinematic look with CN09 preset applied.

Style: Futuristic – FT02

There are twelve Futuristic presets. If you want a modern-color pop, you can’t go wrong with Futuristic FT02. This preset clarifies and brings out textures. If you want more muted colors, try FT12.
This red phonebooth on a London street pop with the FT02 preset applied.

Style: Vintage – VN09

There are ten vintage presets that create old film looks with muted colors. VN09 gives your photos a soft, vintage flavour without an overwhelming color cast.
The VN09 preset makes this image of a mother and daughter out for a summer stroll in London’s Borough Market look like it was taken in the 1990s.

Subject: Food – FD04

The eleven presets in the food folder are not designed for street photography. But that doesn’t mean they won’t work well with your images. The FD02 preset brightens your image and brings out the colors.
But FD04 is the winner. Notice how it creates a sepia look to the highlights but retains the original colors.

Subject: Lifestyle – LF03

Lifestyle photographs are natural moments in everyday life. Thus, they’re perfect for street photographs.
The look is often relaxed and light. The LF03 preset lightens the midtones and adds a slight haze for an airy look.

Subject: Travel – TR18

Lightroom includes eighteen travel presets divided into two folders. Many of these presets work for street images. Both TR03 and TR18 will give you bright photos. TR16 is a bit more neutral with less color pop.
The TR18 preset brings out the colors and adds contrast. The highlights are a warm yellow and the shadows a cool blue.

Free Lightroom Presets – AI Recommendations

Lightroom comes with a lot of good presets for street photography. But if you don’t find one you like, Lightroom CC users can ask Adobe’s AI to find more.
Click on the Recommended tab. Lightroom searches through shared user-created presets to find ones that fit your image. You can choose a moody atmosphere or an edgy HDR effect.
This feature is only available in Lightroom CC and Lightroom mobile. It is not in Lightroom Classic.

Conclusion

Lightroom presets make it easy to edit your street photographs. You can go for urban grunge or a soft vintage look. You may even choose different presets depending on the scene and lighting conditions. Even if you prefer to edit your image one slider at a time, seeing a preset applied to your photo opens a world of possibilities!
Want to know more? Try out our Effortless Editing with Lightroom to rapidly improve your post-processing skills.

What Exactly Are Lightroom Preset Settings?

Lightroom presets are a series of editing instructions carried out in consecutive order. They are a saved set of adjustments that you can apply to any photo to achieve a particular look.
Presets can consist of any combination of edits that you make to an image. These are then saved to be available at a later time.

Where Can I Find Lightroom Develop Presets?

Lightroom comes with several built-in presets. You can import presets or create your own.
To find the presets, open the Develop Module in Lightroom. The preset box is in the left-hand panel. If you cannot see this, press F7 on your keyboard. Or you can click the triangle in the middle of the left side of the program window.
Open the drop-down box to reveal the pre-installed presets. These include categories such as Color, Black and White, Sharpening, and Classic.
There are two Classic categories. These include presets for a retro film look or more general image enhancements.

How Do I add Presets to Lightroom?

Lightroom Develop presets are available for free and as paid packages. A quick online search will reveal many websites where you can download them.
Photographers often create these for a specific look and feel. You can import these Lightroom users’ presets and add them to yours.
Download the preset you have chosen. After this, find your Lightroom folder and open the Develop Presets folder. You can copy any downloaded presets here. Once you restart Lightroom, they will appear in the Presets tab of the Develop module.

In case you can’t find the Lightroom folder, you can add the presets one by one. Right-click on User Presets and choose Import. You will need to select the preset from the folder you downloaded it to. The file extension has to be “lrtemplate” or Lightroom won’t recognize it as a preset.

Move your mouse over the name of each preset. This way, you can see the effect the develop preset will have on your selected image.

Why Use Lightroom Develop Presets?

Using Lightroom Develop presets saves you time. You can make the same series of edits instantly on more than one image. Once a preset is applied, you can export the image or make further edits.
Presets can also help you develop a consistent look and style for your photo editing. By using several Lightroom presets, your photographs can be:

• Colorized
• Sharpened
• Dehazed
• Corrected
• Or edited otherwise

I recommend you limit the number of develop presets you use. This method will build a portfolio of photographs that have a coherent look concerning post-processing.

How To Create Lightroom Develop Presets

You can look for an appropriate preset online, or you can create your own develop preset in Lightroom. To create your own Lightroom Develop preset, you have to save a series of edits you’ve made. Once you have them saved, you can click on the preset and apply the edits to one or more photographs.
Creating your own presets is straightforward. It’s even easier when you have a particular series of edits you make to your photos.

When you plan to make new Lightroom preset settings, it’s good to have a clear idea of the outcome you want. It is more efficient than making more changes than necessary.
Choose a photo—preferably a RAW file. Open it in the Develop Module in Lightroom. Using the editing panel on the right-hand side, make the edits you want until you are satisfied with your photograph.
To save the preset, you can:

• Go to Develop in the top menu and choose New Preset
• Click on the + beside the Preset box in the left-hand panel and select Create Preset
• Hold down Ctrl/Cmd+Shift+N on your keyboard.

This will bring up a dialog box where you can name your new Develop preset and choose a category you want to store it under.
You can also work through the checkboxes and decide which of the edits you made that you want to include.

Generally, you will keep all these boxes checked except for the Lens Profile Corrections. It would not be a good idea to apply the incorrect lens profile. The only way you would want to have this box checked is to make Lightroom Develop presets for each lens you use.
After applying the preset, you will see the sliders on the right sidebar adjusting themselves automatically.
Applying presets may not give you the precise look you want for your photo. So you might find you want to make changes to some images after applying a preset. You can further refine your edits in the Develop module just like you would typically do.

How to Apply A Preset to Multiple Photos in Lightroom

When you have a series of similar photos, you may want to add a Lightroom preset to them all. Sets of photos taken with the same lighting conditions can be treated with the same preset.
To apply a preset to multiple photos in Lightroom, begin with the Grid view in the Library module.

Select the photos you want to apply the preset to by holding the Ctrl/Cmd key and clicking on the thumbnails.
Once you have made your selections, open the Quick Develop box in the right-hand panel. Here you will see a drop-down menu called Saved Presets. Default Settings is the item it will show.
To select another saved preset, click on the drop-down to reveal the list of all your saved presets. This will include the presets Lightroom came with and any you have imported or created yourself.
When you make your preset choice, it will be applied to all the photos you’ve selected.
You can also apply Lightroom presets to one image and then copy the Develop settings. To do this, right-click on the photo and select Develop Settings > Copy Settings. Or you can use Ctrl+Shift+C on your keyboard.
Then select the images you want to apply the settings to and select Develop Settings > Paste Settings when you right-click the image. Or use Ctrl+Shift+V on your keyboard.

Go through these batch-edited photos after applying the preset. You will most likely find that the pictures give the same overall impression. This is what you need to build up a consistent portfolio.
You can easily create your own style and impress everyone with your beautiful photo collection by creating new presets.

Conclusion

Applying presets can be a huge time saver when you are editing large batches of photographs. Using a limited number of Lightroom Develop presets can emphasize style throughout your portfolio.
You can also save them as your own presets if you make the same type of edits when post-processing in Lightroom.
We hope that this article has helped you with creating and using presets in Lightroom. You’re now one step closer to having a stunning and stylish photography portfolio.
Try out our Effortless Editing course to master all the secrets of professional editing in Lightroom!

We’ve collected some free and paid presets for sports photographers. Read on to find the best Lightroom presets for sports photography and learn how to use them.

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• Learn to use every tool for quick, professional edits.
• Discover seamless subject selection with a single click.
• Unlock hidden details in photos with our unique method.

What Are Lightroom Sports Presets?

Lightroom sports presets are a way to change an image or a batch of images with a single click in Adobe Lightroom. If you download a preset, these adjustments were made by other Lightroom users and are available for you to use.

Lightroom is an excellent editing software program that lets you tweak your digital shots. You can raise and lower the exposure, play with the colors, and even change the perspective. But presets can help save you some of that time and effort!

Some presets might only increase an image’s sharpness. The majority act as a filter over your scenes, letting you edit them quickly and efficiently. These “filters” adjust different details. They change everything from highlights and shadows to clarity, color, and saturation.

Having your own preset can help define your unique style. Luckily, Lightroom also lets you create your own!

Installing, Using, and Creating Presets

Installing Adobe Lightroom presets is easy and requires only a few steps. There are also several ways to do this. We have a step-by-step tutorial for installing Adobe Lightroom presets you can check out. This tells you how to add presets you download to Lightroom.

Read our article about adding your own Lightroom presets to learn how to use or create them. We also have a post about selling presets!

10 Best Lightroom Sports Presets

Sports photography is a broad field encompassing team sports like soccer, basketball, and baseball. It also includes events involving fast-moving vehicles like airplanes.

It might be difficult to find presets that cover different types of sports. Each one concentrates on different details in a photo.

You want to look at what connects all the images you will likely take. For example, most might need a boost in contrast and clarity. This can help separate the many parts of your scene.

Many sports make use of distinct colors. So perhaps you want to find a preset that tweaks this to strengthen your images. The presets you need depend on the aesthetic you want. You can even use your favorite preset to help define the look of your social media account!

Let’s look at the best sports photography presets out there. There are ones for Lightroom (CC), Lightroom Classic, and Lightroom Mobile.

1. Workout Lightroom Presets

This workout package by 123Presets contains 11 Lightroom desktop presets. These presets make your photos appealing by creating a clear and airy atmosphere. They also soften your subjects’ skin and separate them from the background.

This makes it easier to focus on the people in your images. And it’s why it’s great for capturing workouts, where the focus is on the people, not their environment. There is even a mobile version of the Workout Lightroom Presets.

2. Canon Sports Photography Presets

These Canon Lightroom presets by sports photographer Ben Lumley are for Lightroom, Lightroom Classic, and Lightroom Mobile.

This FilterGrade package contains Lightroom presets for black-and-white and color images. And they improve your images without making them look too artificial.

Turning a color image into a black-and-white photo is not easy. Color images focus on how colors work together. But black-and-white ones focus on contrast and texture. This set of Lightroom presets can help you play around with both.

3. Ten Sports Model Presets for Lightroom

Eldamar Studio’s Lightroom presets are cheap and great for many types of images. This Adobe Exchange package includes 10 presets.

This variety lets you try several and decide which preset is best for your image. These presets are suitable for action photography and sports models.

4. Vibrant Colors HDR Lightroom Preset

The Vibrant Colors Lightroom preset is a free one by Preset Kingdom. It is best used for water sports, like swimming. It’s also perfect for any sport near water or under a blue sky. This is because it enhances blues while reducing highlights and reflections.

By adding +100 to the Shadows setting, they become darker, adding more contrast between them and lighter areas. Whites and blacks are reduced to add detail and remove the chance of highlights being blown out.

The added vibrancy and saturation make the colors pop. And the clarity separates the subject from the background.

5. Black & White Lightroom Presets

This elegant set of Lightroom presets by Luxe Lens is not specifically for sports shots. Still, they can be great for sports photography.

Changing photos to black and white can enhance motion because all the distracting colors have been removed. These presets help images look more dramatic. It can also be easier to freeze motion without colors. And you will also create a more timeless image.

6. Sport (Preset Love)

There are a lot of adjustments in this free Lightroom sports preset by Preset Love compared to others on our list. They increase the quality and “punchiness” of the scene and subject.

First, the color temperature and tint changes add a touch of blue and green. This preset’s cinematic feel benefits most sports, indoors or outdoors.

The raised contrast and blacks give the subject more presence. The whites are pushed up while the highlights fall, giving a little more light without overdoing it.

7. Sport Preset (Photonify)

The Photonify Sport Preset can be used for different kinds of sports. This free Lightroom preset doesn’t change the exposure value. It sharpens your images and strengthens clarity, vibrance, and saturation.

It nicely emphasizes the orange parts, which look especially nice on running tracks. It also separates people from the background. So it’s great for enhancing motion.

It makes your sports photos grungy and gives them a dramatic effect. We recommend it for advertising or a smaller photo collection. It takes away from natural colors, so it’s not the best option for documenting a sports event.

8. Skate Lightroom Presets

These are custom-developed Lightroom skateboarding presets from action photographer Forest Dempsy. This FilterGrade pack has 10 different Lightroom presets. So you’ll likely find one that fits your sports image.

These are great for brightening your images and increasing their clarity. Lightening the background draws the viewers’ attention directly to your subject. They work for skateboard photography and more!

9. Light and Bright

As you may have guessed, the Light and Bright Lightroom preset adds light to your scene! This free preset by Exposure Empire pulls more detail from the darker areas. It lowers the strength of the blacks and shadows.

The reduced contrast helps to set the subject in the scene. Raising the saturation and lowering the vibrance keep hints of color without going over the top.

10. Grungy Sports

This Grungy Sports Lightroom preset by Nuugraphics is short and sweet. There are only four adjustments. But they make all the difference to a wonderful sports shot.

The added contrast punches up the subjects, and its high clarity separates them from their stage. But the lack of color is what makes this preset special. Use this free preset for cinematic sports shots where teams or sides don’t need to be clearly defined.

Conclusion: Best Lightroom Sports Presets

Lightroom presets can be used in almost any field of photography. After you select one or multiple images, editing them only takes a few clicks, speeding up your workflow.

You might need to test several Adobe Lightroom presets for your sports photography. Sports are played in many different locations and lighting conditions. So, there is no such thing as one ultimate Lightroom sports preset. But we have given you some top ones!

Many of these Lightroom presets are free, but even the paid ones are affordable and worth the investment. And if you’re a sports photographer who uses Lightroom professionally, you can create your own presets!

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Effortless Editing with Lightroom

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• Learn to use every tool for quick, professional edits.
• Discover seamless subject selection with a single click.
• Unlock hidden details in photos with our unique method.

Thankfully, you can find tons of Lightroom presets online without paying for anything. And there are so many, there’s a preset for everyone, no matter the type of photography you shoot! Continue reading for the 25 best free Lightroom presets for portraits.

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Effortless Editing with Lightroom

Master the art of photo editing with this comprehensive video course:

• Learn to use every tool for quick, professional edits.
• Discover seamless subject selection with a single click.
• Unlock hidden details in photos with our unique method.

Using Lightroom Presets For Portraits: What Is a Lightroom Preset?

Before we dive in, let’s find out what a Lightroom preset is and what you can do with it.

You can think of Lightroom presets as filters. They change your image’s colors and other exposure settings for creative effects.

Lightroom presets create a mood to further improve your portraits. Not to mention that they give your images a coherent look.

So, are there free Lightroom presets? The simple is yes, and there are tons of them out there.

So what’s the catch? A lot of photographers share them to help market their name. Meanwhile, others use them to introduce you to paid versions.

Most free Lightroom presets are easy to download. On the other hand, some require you to subscribe to the photographer’s website or social media channels.

Below are some of the best free Lightroom presets for portraits on the web!

1. Fixthephoto’s Light and Airy Pastel

Fixthephoto’s preset collection is worth trying if you want to add subtle touches to your portraits.

This preset package creates a soft glow on the skin without changing the skin tone. At the same time, it makes the colors in the images look vibrant.

The effect it creates may be subtle. But you’ll definitely notice how it makes you feel—light and airy!

2. PresetLove’s Warm Cinematic

PresetLove’s Warm Cinematic is the best option for photographers who love that moody look in some movies.

Warm Cinematic deepens the shadows and creates beautiful contrasts. It also uses a warmer color temperature to produce a sunny atmosphere in your images.

This preset is perfect for photos with bright lighting. Using it on dimly lit images may produce dark and grainy results. So it tends to make some pictures look muddy. But you can easily fix all these issues with a few adjustments.

3. Creativetacos’ 10 Free Professional Presets

People like to use the term “professional” a lot these days to make their products seem legitimate. But more often than not, many of them fail to deliver quality results.

Thankfully, Creativetacos means what it says about its 10 free professional presets. Each variation delivers quality tones and realistic effects that true professionals deserve and love.

The collection gives you various choices, from adding a soft look to creating realistic film effects. And each option produces vivid colors and beautiful contrasts that don’t scream, “It’s a filter!”

This collection of free presets is definitely one of my favorites!

4. Creative Presets’ Ultra Pop

If the colors in your images always look dull, Creative Presets’ Ultra Pop must be in your preset collection.

Surprisingly, this collection of eye-candy presets now sells for $29 on Creative Presets’ website. But you can still get a free version at Pixel Buddha, which we linked above.

Ultra Pop does a great job of making the colors in your images vibrant. But at the same time, it doesn’t oversaturate your image.

You may have to tweak your contrast and other exposure levels every once in a while. But for the most part, Ultra Pop renders colors accurately.

5. Photonify’s Forest Preset

Photonify’s free Lightroom preset covers your photos in a beautiful, cool, hazy look. We recommend using it on portrait photos with neutral, warm, or soft light.

When you activate this free preset, prepare for an impressive image transformation. It’s not for all types of photos. But when it works, it really works!

You can access the free preset by submitting your email address.

6. Altphoto’s 10 Free Presets Pack

Altphotos has created a pack of 10 free Lightroom presets for portraits. Nine of them are color presets, and one is black and white.

The color presets have a variety of effects. You can use them to either warm the colors of your portraits or cool them down.

These free Lightroom presets also enhance your portraits’ browns or blues. The result creates a subtle retro look.

A nice thing about this pack is that you can find descriptions on its website. This way, you know what effects each preset creates before you use them.

And the best part is you can download these Lightroom presets without needing to submit your email address.

7. Warm Retro Preset

PresetLove offers many free Lightroom presets for portraits. And the Warm Retro Preset is one of its most popular collections.

You can download the free preset by itself. But you do need to give them your email address. Once you subscribe to the newsletter, the website will send the file to your mailbox.

Warm Retro gives your portraits a soft vintage look. It increases both warmth and brightness and mutes the colors slightly.

The difference with other muted presets is that Warm Retro enhances the portrait’s sharpness. It’s crisp and detailed. I recommend this preset for a charming retro look that still looks natural.

If you prefer, you can also download a bundle of 290 Lightroom presets from the website. The catch is that it’s not free. But in my opinion, Warm Retro would be enough for most of your photos.

8. Urban Cool Lightroom Preset

This is another one of the free Lightroom presets for portraits from Presetlove. But it’s different from Warm Retro.

The Urban Cool preset is perfect for urban and street portraits. It enhances the cool colors by adding greens, blues, and violets to the shadows.

To balance the cool colors, it saturates the warm tones. It also increases the clarity and sharpening, giving a pop to your photos.

The great thing about this preset is that it adds a film look to the urban backgrounds of your portraits. At the same time, the skin color remains natural.

9. Free Lightroom Shadow Crusher Preset

Presetlove’s Shadow Crusher preset saturates a portrait with intense tones. It increases the exposure and shadows and adds a dark vignette. All of these adjustments result in dramatically dark photos.

The “tough and dangerous” look it creates makes it perfect for urban photos. It’s also perfect for competitive or extreme sports photographers.

When you use this preset, keep in mind that it pulls the midtones toward the extremes (especially dark). It also creates a tint of magenta in the image.

This preset is perfect for photos with a widespread histogram. But you should also ensure your photo doesn’t have too many purples and magenta.

10. All Gold Everything Preset

If you want to give your portraits an ’80s twist, check out Presetlove’s All Gold Everything preset. This is one of the free Lightroom presets nostalgic millennials will love.

All Gold Everything brings out your images’ warm tones and gives them a yellow cast. It will make them look like they were captured on a Kodak Gold film.

11. Antique Bronze Free Lightroom Preset

PresetLove’s Antique Bronze preset for portraits is an awesome sepia preset with a grainy effect. It adds intense tones and a subtle vignette to photos.

This is yet another free Lightroom preset that creates a beautiful vintage look. But it keeps and even enhances the details and sharpness of the image.

Unlike black-and-white monochromatic presets, this preset’s sepia tone lets the viewer see more hues. It completes the effect by increasing clarity and whites.

This free Lightroom preset works well in a variety of scenarios. It performs well in almost any scene, from nature and the outdoors to urban environments.

This free Lightroom preset works best with intricate textures that it can emphasize.

12. Luc Besson Preset for Portraits

Freelightroompresets is one of the best resources for free Lightroom presets. They offer you 39 stunning options. And most of them work great for portraits.

You can even filter the Lightroom presets according to your needs. You can search for presets for portraits, cinematic portraits, black-and-white ones, and others.

I like most of the 39 free presets for portraits. But my favorite would have to be the Luc Besson preset. Its name comes from the famous French director famous for his distinct movie look.

This wonderful Lightroom preset mattifies your portrait while maintaining contrast and brightness. It also lowers the saturation of all the colors, especially greens.

At the same time, it does a good job of keeping the skin tones natural and flattering. And if you’re fond of grain, it is one of the free Lightroom presets for portraits that delivers.

13. Photonify Free Lightroom Portrait Preset

Dramatic color and lighting are trendy looks these days. And Photonify’s Portrait Preset is one of the best free Lightroom presets for portraits to achieve that edgy look.

This preset will help you to get a gritty street photo look that works well for dark and intense portraits. For example, it is perfect for magazine covers or urban portraits.

I don’t recommend it if you want to soften the skin of your models. This Lightroom preset does precisely the opposite.

It sharpens your image quite a lot. It increases detail and contrast and emphasizes textures. In other words, this makes skin imperfections and shadows stand out more.

So, if you’re looking for free Lightroom presets for newborns or beauty shoots, this is not for you.

14. Super Preset Sample Pack 

To get this free portrait preset pack, you must join Photography Concentrate‘s Explorers Club. You need to sign up and register your email. But that’s a small price for what you get from the website.

The most interesting thing is that they give you access to the Freebie Library. You can find preset packs and other resources here, like eBooks.

This pack consists of 10 Lightroom presets for portraits. It includes five color presets and five black-and-white presets. They have straightforward names, so it’s easy to know what effects it will produce. 

These free Lightroom presets for portraits are versatile and subtle. They give a wide range of skin tones a natural look.

15. Hollywood Collection

If you want to put glamor into your portraits, check out this collection of free Lightroom presets.

If you want to get the entire collection of presets for Lightroom, you’ll have to buy it. But at least you get 70 varieties inspired by old Hollywood movie posters.

But even if you don’t have the budget, you can still try two free Lightroom presets for portraits. You don’t need to give them your email address.

These two presets affect portrait colors. The Technicolor preset gives you a nice, soft, warm look. It has an orange-yellow tint in the highlights and a blue tint in the shadows.

The Stage preset is more dramatic. It lowers the vibrance of all the colors to zero. It works well for indoor portraits with artificial lighting. Keep in mind that it also turns the blues to purples.

16. Dark Moody Lightroom Preset

Signature Edits is one of the best sources for free Lightroom presets for portraits.

The great thing about it is its tutorial explaining exactly how it was created. The tutorial is helpful if you want to adapt the preset to your own style.

The Moody Lightroom Preset adds a bit of contrast to your portrait with a dark, faded mood. Be aware that it creates a cooler look in images. On one side, it warms both yellows and greens. But it also desaturates the pictures.

As the last step, this preset adds an orange coloring to the image using the Calibration panel. This really contributes to the dark mood.

The preset works great to give your photos an autumn or winter feel. As the author says, it might not work with all your portraits. But it gives you a nice start.

17. Sunset Desert Free Portrait Preset

Creativetacos is a website that offers you a lot of well-designed free Lightroom presets for portraits. One of my favorites is the Sunset Desert.

As the name suggests, this preset adds a beautiful, warm glow to photos. It’s perfect for portraits shot during golden hour when the sun is low on the horizon.

The natural warm colors pop while keeping skin tones natural. Sunset Desert is one of the most versatile presets for Lightroom out there.

You can use it in wedding photos, travel photos, urban photography, and many more. It also works on Lightroom Mobile.

18. Caramel Wedding LG Preset

This Caramel Wedding preset is different from other free Lightroom presets for weddings and portraits. It adds brightness to photos while increasing the contrast a bit.

This preset also enhances the whites, making them pop. This is usually nice for wedding photos if the bride wears a white dress.

The free Lightroom preset creates a slightly matte effect. As a result, it gives portraits a bit of mood but without exaggerating it.

The only problem with this preset is that it might change some colors drastically. You’ll notice it, especially with blues.

Consider whether these color changes are relevant before applying the preset. You don’t want to change the color of some family member’s suit or dress!

19. Elegant Wedding Preset

Chicpreset’s Elegant Wedding is one of those free Lightroom presets for portraits that improve bland wedding photos. It keeps a classic look that makes your snapshot look timeless.

The Elegant Wedding preset brightens your photos. It enhances the contrast and vibrance and sharpens the details.

This free Lightroom preset is perfect for photos taken on cloudy and grey days if you want to give them a bit of extra light.

This preset is especially useful for weddings because it keeps the photo’s original colors. You don’t need to worry about changing the colors of the wedding guests’ clothes or the flower decorations.

20. Free Night Life Lightroom Preset

If you are a night portrait photographer, you will love this free Lightroom preset by Creativetacos.

It is perfect for nightclubs, concerts, and street photos. You can also use it for your wedding photography and party photos. This preset enhances night lights, making them pop.

It increases the contrast in photos and modifies the colors to emphasize blues and warm colors. It also recovers details from both the highlights and shadows.

This is one of the best presets if you are just starting with night photography. It gives you a starting point to experiment with the colors of your portraits and night shots.

21. Grainy Matte Portrait Preset 

You should check out the Grainy Matte preset to give your photos a nostalgic, vintage effect.

As the name suggests, it increases the amount of grain (noise) in your images. But it also creates a washed effect you usually see in old photos.

As with all presets, you might need to adjust it to fit your portrait and taste. But this free preset gives you a good starting point.

22. Color Pop Preset

The Color Pop Preset lives up to its name. It’s a vibrant preset that makes your photos pop. Its specialty is livening up photos taken on a cloudy day or in bad lighting conditions. It’s excellent for portraits in the city or nature.

You can create an impressive effect by converting the image to black and white and then combining the free preset with a mask to have only one item in color.

Remember that this preset also decreases the luminescence of blue and aqua colors. So, it might not be the best choice for seaside photography.

23. Sun Flares Preset

Sun Flares is one of the best free Lightroom presets for outdoor photos, travel photography, or weddings.

As with most free presets, you must provide an email address to download it. But it’s worth it, especially if you like taking sunny photos a lot.

The free preset works perfectly for outdoor portraits. It gives your photos warmth and clarity and creates an awesome sunny effect.

24. Black & White Bundle 

Fix The Photo has 10 fantastic free Lightroom presets if you like black-and-white photography. This bundle covers a lot of the needs of a portrait photographer.

The Soft and Soft Skin presets make your subject’s skin look softer. The second preset in the bundle even applies a skin color correction.

You will also find presets to soften your portraits, adding an elegant pinkish tone or a matte effect. Others add drama, create an HDR effect, or enhance photos taken in harsh light.

You even have Lightroom presets, such as Chocolate or Old Film, for elegant and artistic effects.

25. Teal and Orange Preset

Teal and orange photos are very popular these days. They work well with landscapes such as the sea or a mountain ridge with a lot of sky.

If you want to try the orange and teal look, then this Teal and Orange preset is for you. As you would expect, it uses contrasting oranges and blues with high exposure and sharpness.

These help you to give more life to your portraits. But you may have to make a few adjustments to keep skin tones accurate.

Best Lightroom Portrait Presets (FAQs)

These are answers to frequently asked questions about how to use Lightroom portrait presets.

How Do I Download Lightroom Presets?

When you find a preset you like online, download it into a folder on your computer. If the file is zipped, unzip it.

Then open Adobe Lightroom and find the Presets panel under the Develop module. Click the plus sign (+) and then click Import Preset.

Next, navigate to the folder where you saved the downloaded presets and press Import. After that, the downloaded presets will appear in the Preset panel.

How Do I Download Lightroom Presets for Free?

There are many sources online that offer free Lightroom presets. Search for “free Lightroom presets.” Then, follow the steps above to download them.

Can I Apply a Single Preset to All of My Images?

Technically, you can. But some presets work better than others for certain photos. For instance, some options may be better for portraits, while other presets perform well with landscapes.

You may have to use a variety of presets to achieve the best results. And you may need to get preset bundles if you want a coherent look. That way, you have better options for different types of images.

Can I Use My Presets on Lightroom Mobile?

Yes! Your Lightroom desktop version syncs with Lightroom Mobile. After you add the preset to Lightroom, you should see it in both versions.

Conclusion: Best Lightroom Portrait Presets

Presets are a great tool to make your editing workflow quicker. You can use them as a base for editing your portraits and adapt them to your photos and personal style.

These 25 best free Lightroom presets for portraits suit almost any portrait scenario. You only need to offer your email address to access most of them.

Decide which amazing, free Lightroom presets for portraits you want. You can also check out our post on importing and installing Lightroom presets or Lightroom Mobile presets.

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