THE BEST LUMINAR TUTORIALS

THE LUMINAR ACADEMY

Welcome to the Luminar Academy where you can learn more about Luminar for free. Apart from video tutorials we also explain more about Luminar in text. In this page you can learn about what Luminar is, why you should (or shouldn’t) buy Luminar and of course how to use Luminar on your Windows or Mac. Since we provide lots of information we created an page index so you can navigate to the right section in an easy way.

ACADEMY INDEX

What is Luminar?
The pros and cons of Luminar 4
A quick Luminar 4 tour
How to organize your photos in Luminar
What are Luminar filters and Luminar looks?
A good basic workflow in Luminar 4
6.1. How to improve the exposure and contrast
6.2. The best way to improve the colors
6.3. The best way to add more structure and sharpening
6.4. The best way to reduce noise in your photos
My favorite Luminar filters
How to export photos in Luminar 4
A to Z photo edits with Luminar
Frequenlty asked questions
More FREE Luminar 4 tutorials
More FREE Luminar 3 tutorials

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WHAT IS LUMINAR?

Luminar is popular photo editing software. After you took your photos you really want to make your photos stand out. Luminar is a great tool to get better results in an easy way. There is a lot of competition in the photo editing industry. Lightroom, developed by Adobe, is the leading post-processing software for many years. Since Adobe decided to sell Lightroom as a subscription only, manty Lightroom users decided to look for alternatives. Luminar, developed by Skylum, is the big winner and has users all over the world.

But this is not the only reason why Luminar is so popular. Skylum dares to do things in a different way and makes post-processing easier for every photographer. Thanks to many smart AI filters you can do the basic edits in just a few seconds. The smart filters know exactly which parts of your photos need improvement and which parts not. Of course this is convenient as a photographer, because you don’t want to waste too much time with photo editing.

THE PROS AND CONS OF LUMINAR 4

The rising popularity of Luminar doesn’t only have bright sides. Skylum launched Luminar 3 too soon, with too many errors and speed problems. For many users Luminar 3 was working fine, but online you can find many complains also. With the new Luminar 4 everything is much much better. Many speed issues are solved and there is no difference anymore between the Windows and Mac version. So both versions have the same features.

Maybe you wonder what are the good and the bad things about Luminar when you compare it to Adobe Lightroom? We made a list of pros and cons so you can make your decision even easier.

Pros of Luminar 4 compared to Adobe Lightroom
– Pricing: you pay a one time fee to get access to Luminar
– The way to import your photos is way easier to understand
– Easier to use and more clear user interface
– Better/faster photo editing results

Cons of Luminar 4 compared to Adobe Lightroom
– Less options in the management of your photos (for example: no keywording)
– No tablet / smartphone app and sync options with other devices
– Limited export options and no export presets possible

More advantages and disadvantages?
Of course there are more differences, but harder to categorize as a pro or con. It depends on the needs of the photographer. Luminar doesn’t have a slideshow, book, print and web module. This can be seen as a disadvantage compared to Adobe Lightroom, but we know many Lightroom users never use those features since they are not the best.

A QUICK LUMINAR 4 TOUR

In the videos below we will give you a quick Luminar 4 tour to get familiar with the interface and the basic features. You can use it as a quick guide if you are new to Luminar.

THE LUMINAR 4 INTERFACE

THE LUMINAR 4 LIBRARY

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

In this section we’ve listed the frequently asked questions. Do you have another question and you can’t find the answer in this page? Ask us at the bottom of the page and we are happy to help you.

Is Luminar better than Lightroom?

Easy question, but hard to answer. According to us it really depends on the photographers needs. We have seen areas Luminar is better than Lightroom, but on the other hand Luminar has less options. For many photographers Luminar has enough to offer so the extra options of Lightroom are not really needed. If you are looking for a cost-effective photo editing tool, Luminar is the way to go.

Is Luminar a good replacement for Lightroom?

We’ve seen many students of us making the switch from Lightroom to Luminar and they are happy with their decision. Others prefer to use Luminar as a Lightroom plugin and keep on working in the Lightroom library to manage their photos.