Even when the sky looks blue to your eye… sometimes it completely disappears in photos.

Bonnie, here, with one last Lightroom trick that can make a huge difference in your photographs. Take a look at this waterfall shot I took near my home in Bend, Oregon:

How to restore a dull sky to a blue sky in Lightroom...

I swear, the sky was REALLY blue that day, even though this photo doesn’t show it.

If you want to sell your photos, they’ve got to look professional. And washed-out skies are a sure mark of an amateur.

Lucky for us, this is an easy fix in Lightroom.

Here’s the same photo after a quick, 5-second edit:

How to restore a dull sky to a blue sky in Lightroom...

Here’s how to bring back the blue sky in Lightroom:



First, try moving the “highlights” slider to the left to bring some detail back to the bright areas. Then, move your “dehaze” slider to the right just slightly. That’s where you’ll see the magic start to happen.

How to restore a dull sky to a blue sky in Lightroom...

And if you need a little more blue, go down to your “HSL” section, and move the blue “luminance” slider to the left to really bring out the blue in the sky.

How to restore a dull sky to a blue sky in Lightroom...

Here’s another example, with a photo I took in Tanzania:

No sky…

How to restore a dull sky to a blue sky in Lightroom...

Blue sky!

How to restore a dull sky to a blue sky in Lightroom...

I have countless photos that I’d never be able to sell if it weren’t for Lightroom, like this giraffe shot, above, that’s selling on Shutterstock. And I’d be willing to bet that you have tons of photos on your hard drive that you could sell, too, with no more than three minutes of edits each.

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