Denoise, Masking, and “Edit-In Photoshop” Updates in Lightroom Classic (v12.3)

Adobe Lightroom Classic

Lightroom Classic (v12.3) introduces Denoise, Masking updates, new Edit-In Photoshop options and more! 

Denoise — Denoise was designed to remove noise with the help of Artificial Intelligence in photographs taken in low light situations that require high ISO settings without loosing sharpness and detail. Denoise does a noticeably better job than the traditional Noise Reduction tools, removing noise while maintaining color separation, preserving details in an image, and cleaning up noise in shadow areas. Currently, Denoise can be applied to Bayer and X-Trans raw files. For additional information, be sure to check out the video below:

There are several ways to access Denoise.

  • In the Library or Develop module, select Photo > Enhance. 
  • Rt-click in the image area and select Enhance from the context sensitive menu.
  • Use the keyboard shortcut Control + Option + I (Mac) | Control + Alt + I (Win)
  • Click the Denoise button in the Detail panel. 

When Denoise is enabled, Lightroom Classic also applies Raw Details. 

Click and hold in the preview area to toggle between Enhanced and Without Enhance.  

  • Click the magnifying glass to zoom out, then click in the preview are to zoom to a specific location. 
  • Use the Hand tool in the preview area to scroll the image.

The default Amount is set to 50, but you can use the slider to tone down or amplify the amount of Denoise in an image. To reset the slider to the default of 50, double click on the circle. Note: applying the minimum amount of Denoise will not look the same as unchecking the Denoise option because some aspects of noise reduction (especially color noise) are still applied when Denoise is enabled (even when the value is set to 1).

When applying Denoise, the resulting file will be saved as a new DNG and the file name is appended with “-Enhanced-NR”.

Denoise carries over any enhancements made to the source image. However, I would suggest that you apply Denoise early in your workflow so that you’re making adjustments on the cleanest file possible. Otherwise, enhancements that you’ve made (Sharpening and Texture for example), may need to be revisited after running Denoise. 

  • Content Aware Healing spots don’t preview in the Enhance dialog. However, Lightroom Classic will automatically update any healed areas after applying Denoise. Note: if you have a lot of healing spots, it might take a bit longer to render the new document and you’ll want to be sure that you review the results.
  • Masking will also be automatically updated after applying Denoise. 

To batch process images, select them in the Filmstrip and choose Denoise to adjust the Amount slider in the Enhance dialog.  Or, press Option (Mac) | Alt (Win) and click the Denoise button to apply Denoise to all selected images without displaying the Enhance dialog (Denoise will apply the same Amount value as the previous time Denoise was applied).

You can’t apply Denoise on an image more than once, although you can return to the original raw file to apply Denoise using different settings.  

All of the legacy Manual Noise Reduction features are still available in the Detail panel if you want to add “additional” noise reduction, either globally or locally.

If the resulting image looks too smooth after running Denoise, use the Effects panel to add Grain.

While you can’t apply Denoise on images created by Photo Merge, you can apply Denoise on the individual images before applying Photo Merge to create Panoramas and HDR images. 

Currently, Denoise and Super Resolution can not be used together. However, you can first run Denoise on any Bayer/X-Trans raw file, export the results to an output-referred format (such as TIFF), then running Super Resolution on the TIFF file.

Updates to Masking — Lightroom Classic’s Masking tools have been updated to include Curves, new People masking categories and adaptive presets, as well as preview options. 

  • The new Curves section in Masking means that you can apply the most subtle (or dramatic) adjustments to masked areas in your images. And, if you create and save a custom curve in the global Tone Curve panel, you can apply those custom settings using the Curve section in masking. Note: you can also Rename and Delete Curve Presets using the global Tone Curves panel.
  • Lightroom Classic now offers the ability to use AI/ML to automatically generate two new types of People masks based on facial hair (beard & mustache) and clothes. 
  • There are three new presets in the Adaptive Portrait preset group: Darken Beard, Polished Portrait, and Enhance Clothes.
  • Click and hold the eye icon in the Tone, Color, Curve, Present, and Detail sections of the Masking tools to toggle the visibility of the adjustments in that section.   
  • The History steps now display the name of the mask.
  • Icons under each tool in the Develop module indicate which tools have settings changed. If there is a red dot under the Masking/ Healing icon(s) it means that there are AI Mask/Healing Spot(s) that need to be updated.

Previewing Global Adjustments — In the Develop module, Option -click (Mac) | Alt -click (Win) the eye icon next to a panel header to swap from the the eye icon to the “light switch” icon. Clicking the “light switch” shows/hides the visibility of changes made within the panel whereas clicking the eye icon only toggles the visibility of changes on mouse-down.

Edit-In Updates — There are two new options for managing external editors and opening multiple images from Lightroom Classic into Photoshop. 

  • To select the version of Photoshop that you want to set as your default editor, choose Preference > External Editing. In the Edit In Photoshop section, choose the version of Photoshop that you want to be the default. This will be helpful for those needing to work with multiple versions of Photoshop for different projects (including the Photoshop Beta). Note: the default editor is what will be used when using the shortcut Command + E (Mac) | Control +E (Win). 
    • To quickly open files into another version of Photoshop, choose Preference > External Editing, and use the Additional External Editor section to choose another version of Photoshop as the applicatio. Then, use the Preset drop down to save the current settings as a new preset. Additional External Editor presets appear in the Photo > Edit In menu as well as the context sensitive menus, making it easy to choose between different applications.
  • To open multiple files from Lightroom Classic into a single document in Photoshop as layered Smart Objects, select the desired files and choose Photo > Edit In > Open as Smart Object Layers in Photoshop. 

There have also been a number of  performance enhancements including faster grid scrolling on macOS when importing and viewing Publish Services and People views. The Metadata > Purge Unused Keywords command has also been optimized. 


Adobe Lightroom Classic

Posted on 04-18-2023


Comments

  • By Gerd Reuter - 10:41 PM on April 24, 2023  

    It seems that denoise does not work with tif or jpg. Is this correct and will it be changed soon?

    • By Julieanne Kost - 4:19 PM on April 27, 2023  

      Currently only RAW files from Bayer and X-Trans sensors work with Denoise.