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Photographer Dustin Abbott explores the Luminar Mobile App photo editing suite to see if it is worth using. Find out the features and his conclusions here. | Click https://skylum.evyy.net/QjZ2BM to purchase the mobile app, or click https://skylum.evyy.net/c/1302817/3722994/3255 to get a package that includes both the mobile and desktop versions and use code DUSTIN20 for 20% off.
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Table of Contents:
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0:00 - Intro
2:33 - Basic Edits
4:09 - Presets
5:11 - Sky Replacement
6:50 - Object Removal
8:41 - Portrait Editing
9:49 - Conclusion and Pricing
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Oben Tabletop Tripod shown in video: https://bhpho.to/3vL8YWy
My Cameras:
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0:00
[Music]
0:05
Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott and I'm here today
0:07
to give you a review and a look behind
0:09
the scenes at Luminar's mobile photo
0:12
editing app. The uh Luminar mobile is
0:15
available for both iOS, which I've used
0:18
here, and then also for Android. I
0:20
haven't spent a lot of time in the past
0:22
with uh either mobile photography or
0:25
mobile photo editing because neither one
0:28
of those things has been necessarily my
0:30
cup of tea. I'm still of the opinion
0:32
that the best kinds of photography are
0:33
done with dedicated photo making gear.
0:36
At the same time, however, I recognize
0:38
that uh the vast majority of the world
0:41
doesn't have the same opinion as I do.
0:43
And of course, mobile photography is
0:45
very much a part of our culture today.
0:48
This past summer, I was on an extended
0:51
road trip and I had determined because I
0:54
had bought the year before I bought an
0:56
iPhone 15 Pro because I wanted just a
0:58
little bit better um photo making
1:01
potential and the ability to get native
1:03
raw images and to see how those would be
1:05
for manipulating as B-roll, which I
1:08
sometimes use my phone for, or you know,
1:10
just having something to at least get
1:11
photos on the fly. But I had an
1:14
opportunity because I was taking some
1:16
photos along this road trip and then
1:18
also having some long hours spent in the
1:20
passenger seat where I began to see what
1:22
was available as far as photo
1:24
manipulation and editing on the fly.
1:28
Now, in years past, I reviewed a number
1:30
of Skylum's Luminar products and uh
1:33
various iterations of their desktop
1:35
software, but I'd never spent any time
1:37
with their mobile software before. And
1:39
so, I found that I actually quite liked
1:41
what I could do there. and was surprised
1:43
by how much you can accomplish in an app
1:46
these days. Things that just a few years
1:48
ago would require you definitely to have
1:50
a desktop-based app. Things like
1:53
Photoshop and the ability to even do
1:55
some things that we couldn't hardly do
1:56
very good in Photoshop even a few years
1:58
ago. For a long time, Luminar has been
2:01
leaning into AI and obviously that has
2:05
served them well as I believe that they
2:07
are ahead of the curve in some ways when
2:09
it comes to the amount of things that
2:11
you can do and the AI assistance to help
2:14
to edit and to manipulate your photos.
2:16
So today we're going to dive into some
2:17
of the various aspects of the things
2:19
that you can do and I'll give you some
2:21
screen recording looking behind the
2:22
scenes of what I'm doing and so you can
2:25
see it for yourself and we'll explore
2:27
whether or not this app is something
2:29
that you should consider for your mobile
2:31
photography. Let's dive in. Let's take a
2:33
look. So the first area that we will
2:35
explore is just the idea of what you can
2:38
do in terms of the basics. And so, first
2:40
of all, I was interested in seeing I'll
2:43
open up a photo that I took recently in
2:46
uh in Florida. And you can see this shot
2:48
of the morning ocean that I was
2:50
interested in seeing what the very first
2:52
slider you get to, which is just
2:53
basically an AI assist. What you can do,
2:56
very simple. It's just a a wheel that
2:58
you rotate back and forth with your
3:00
finger. And so, you can adjust the
3:02
amount of kind of just AI manipulation
3:05
or AI editing that comes in doing that.
3:08
And you can accomplish a fair bit of
3:10
improving the look of your photo with
3:11
just that alone. But if you want to dive
3:13
in deeper, you have a full range of
3:16
various possibilities of things that you
3:19
can cover. You have more advanced
3:20
controls that give you control over the
3:22
levels, the curves, contrast, exposure,
3:26
your color details, the ability to edit,
3:29
um, you know, the depth of the photo, to
3:32
manip manipulate the details itself, to
3:35
go into the color balance, all of those
3:37
various things. a broad range of of
3:40
control and all of it is designed to
3:42
where you can simply do it with a
3:44
fingertip. And so as far as the
3:46
implementation, it works well. And best
3:48
of all, with all of these manipulations
3:50
all throughout, you have a real time
3:52
feedback on what you're doing and the
3:54
ability to have a history there to go
3:56
back if you don't like the way that
3:58
things are turning out. And so a pretty
4:01
good depth of control there that
4:03
definitely goes beyond what the
4:05
included, you know, iOS type controls
4:07
would have in my iPhone. Now, another
4:10
area that Luminar has been famous for in
4:13
the past is their use of presets and the
4:16
ability to go through a broad range of
4:18
presets that give a predefined look. And
4:20
as I went through that, I found that
4:22
there are a total of 34 different
4:25
filters as of the date of this review.
4:27
And each one of them is completely
4:29
scalable. you can go through and
4:30
determine whether or not you want to
4:33
have a strong amount of the effect or a
4:36
weaker amount of the effect. And then of
4:37
course you have the ability to go in
4:39
beyond that and to tweak the look of the
4:41
photo more individually beyond that. And
4:43
so a broad range of different presets
4:46
all bearing a unique name and so you can
4:48
remember what they are. And certainly
4:50
that is an aspect that works quite well
4:52
and you may find something that really
4:54
suits your own sense of personality or
4:56
maybe a look that suits a you know
4:59
particular set of images and it's easy
5:01
to apply those and to control with
5:03
finite control the amount of intensity
5:06
that you're going to apply from those
5:08
presets. So this is something that works
5:10
easily and works well. going years back,
5:12
one of the pieces of a kind of techn
5:15
technological advancement that was
5:17
unique to Luminar in its first iteration
5:20
was the idea of AI sky replacement. And
5:22
this was something that was
5:23
controversial at the time. Of course,
5:25
these days AI has gone much deeper down
5:28
the rabbit hole of what you can
5:29
manipulate. And you know, there's some
5:31
debate as to whether or not it's doing
5:34
this is is ethical or real photography.
5:36
I will say this, when it comes to mobile
5:37
photography, uh there is so much uh
5:40
digital manipulation that's already
5:42
going on in the process of taking
5:43
images. I'm a little less vexed over it
5:45
on this front. But what you do have the
5:47
ability is the ability to easily go
5:50
through their own presets and to apply
5:53
different skies. And I what I found in
5:56
this process is that the AI edge
5:58
detection is just getting better and
6:00
better. And it happens really really
6:01
quickly. first times that we did the sky
6:03
removal. It would be a slower process,
6:05
but now it's basically instantaneous.
6:07
The edge detection is very good, but you
6:09
do have the ability to manipulate those
6:10
edges. You have the ability to tweak the
6:13
lighting to make sure it all works with
6:15
the image. And what's more, you have the
6:17
ability even to upload your own sky
6:20
textures. And that can be a really
6:21
interesting application because if
6:22
you're intentionally looking for
6:24
opportunities to uh maybe capture a
6:27
really unique sky, you take pictures of
6:29
those, you add them to your own
6:31
collection and it just gives you more
6:32
unique options that will give you your
6:35
own look to images and so it doesn't
6:37
look necessarily like everyone else
6:39
that's using those same Luminar presets.
6:42
And so it is something that is really
6:43
well executed. It's there. You don't
6:45
have to use it if you don't want to, but
6:47
it's certainly in the right setting can
6:48
add some pizzazz to images. You've
6:51
probably all seen ads at some point for,
6:54
you know, one one phone or another that
6:56
shows the ability to just magically
6:58
remove objects from it. And of course,
7:00
those ads would lead you to believe that
7:02
all things are possible when it comes to
7:04
quick and painless uh object removal. In
7:07
reality, none of them quite work to that
7:09
same level as you might expect. Now,
7:11
Luminar does have an object removal
7:13
option in here. It's, you know, works
7:15
very simply. You basically just go in,
7:17
you paint over that, uh, object with
7:20
your fingertip and you can remove it.
7:21
And so, uh, it works to varying degrees.
7:25
So, for example, in this shot where I I
7:28
was shooting along a the boardwalk this
7:31
summer in Quebec City, it's a really
7:33
gorgeous setting, but there is one lady
7:35
here on the right that's just a little
7:36
bit too prominent in my photo. I don't
7:38
mind the people a little bit further
7:39
back. And so, I wanted to see how it
7:40
would work in removing her. And you can
7:42
see that it removed her no problem, but
7:45
it's a little bit, you know, kind of
7:47
messy in the bench that was behind her.
7:49
Go back for a second layer and it cleans
7:51
up a bit. It's not going to be flawless,
7:53
but probably good enough that most
7:55
people aren't going to notice. Now, if I
7:57
went to a even simpler setting and in
8:00
this particular shot, let's say I wanted
8:02
to remove the reflection of the lights
8:04
out of the window, I can go and I can
8:06
paint that area and, you know, it's
8:08
pretty much instant and flawless. No
8:10
problems with that. However, if I try to
8:12
manipulate something more prominent and
8:14
more complicated in the scene, like the
8:16
A on the table itself, you'll see that
8:19
that doesn't work nearly as well. And if
8:21
I go back and try to clean it up in
8:23
subsequent passes, I can get it better,
8:25
but it's never really going to be
8:27
flawless. And so, object removal does
8:29
work, but within limits and within
8:32
reason. So, just know realistically that
8:34
you may not be able to perfectly remove
8:37
all of those ex-boyfriends and
8:39
ex-girlfriends out of your old photos.
8:42
One other area where you can really
8:44
tweak things is when it comes to
8:46
portraits. Now, obviously, you have all
8:49
of those same basic degrees of editing
8:51
that we have already examined
8:52
previously. But when it comes to
8:53
portraits, you have a few different
8:55
options there. First of all, you can go
8:57
through and you can manipulate the basic
8:59
things with the lighting and the
9:01
background and things like that. But you
9:03
can also go in and you can deal with
9:04
things like skin blemishes. You can do a
9:07
little bit of manipulating to the the
9:09
shine or the amount of detail that's on
9:11
the face. And you even have some degree
9:13
of some body shaping that is a part of
9:16
the app. Now, obviously, you need to
9:18
exercise some caution when it comes to
9:20
that, and you're not going to have quite
9:21
the degree of control you would have in
9:23
something like Photoshop, but you do
9:25
have the ability to go in, do a little
9:27
bit of body morphing to, you know, make
9:30
yourself look a little bit more
9:31
Instagram worthy. But at the end of the
9:33
day, what matters more to me is that I
9:36
was able to do just kind of basic
9:37
portrait edits and end up with an end
9:40
result that I liked better. I didn't
9:42
love the lighting of this portrait shot
9:43
to begin with and I like it much better
9:46
after going through the editing uh
9:47
process with Luminar. So, finally, what
9:50
about the price for this app? It is not
9:52
a free app and so it's available either
9:54
on a subscription or through a one-time
9:57
purchase. You can get it in subscription
10:00
for $4.99 a month or a little bit
10:03
cheaper at $19.99 for 6 months or $29.99
10:08
for the year. There is a lifetime
10:11
purchase of $59.99.
10:13
And with all of those things, you can
10:16
get them cheaper. Uh it being Skylum,
10:19
they run frequent promotions and sales.
10:22
You can always get those cheaper if you
10:24
watch out for deals. In fact, there is a
10:25
discount code available right now in the
10:28
description down below. So, it is, I
10:30
would say, reasonably priced. It's
10:32
certainly not a deal breakaker. And I
10:34
will also note that if you're interested
10:36
in their products more broadly, if you
10:38
get one of the perpetual licenses to
10:40
their desktop software, it often will
10:43
come with the mobile app included in
10:46
that one-time purchase. And so if you're
10:48
interested in working on a couple of
10:50
tiers, and by the way, you can go back
10:52
and forth with images, you could start
10:54
editing something on mobile and you can
10:57
uh then, you know, go to the desktop and
10:59
complete the work there. And so they do
11:01
work, you know, pretty seamlessly
11:02
through the cloud in that regard. But
11:04
just be aware that you can get them at a
11:07
get this app at a reasonable price if
11:09
you kind of pay attention on how to do
11:11
it. So the question is then should you
11:13
buy the app? And obviously that's going
11:15
to be a personal decision. I will say
11:16
this, I think that it's a really
11:18
welldesigned interface that's the
11:21
learning curve is pretty easy. I also
11:23
found that the fact that everything is
11:25
real time and you have a history where
11:27
you can go back if you don't like the
11:29
most recent change that you've made.
11:31
It's very well designed to be just done
11:32
with a fingertip and you can do a
11:35
surprising amount of things there within
11:37
the software. And so I do think that
11:39
it's a very well-executed app that goes
11:42
far beyond what your basic iOS or
11:45
Android controls are going to allow you
11:46
to do. So you'll have to determine
11:48
whether or not you would use such an app
11:50
enough to, you know, to pay for it. But
11:52
I do think that you're getting good
11:53
value within the app itself. It's
11:55
welldesigned, well supported, and they
11:57
do uh, you know, updates, firmware
11:59
updates that give you, you know, in or I
12:02
should say software updates that are
12:03
giving you, you know, more capability
12:06
and more features that are added over
12:08
time. So, at the end of the day, I
12:10
actually have found this to be quite a
12:11
bit of fun. And it's uh for me it gives
12:13
me one more thing to do on a road trip
12:15
to to edit and manipulate photos to
12:18
allow them to get that little extra bit
12:20
of sparkle that makes them more
12:22
shareworthy.
12:24
If you want more information, you can
12:25
check out the link in the description
12:27
down below. As always, thanks for
12:29
watching. Have a great day and let the
12:31
light in.
12:32
[Music]