Make Artificial Lights Glow Naturally in Luminar
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A street full of lamps can look promising when you’re there, yet feel less atmospheric in the finished photograph. Giving those lights a little more presence can help. The challenge is that the brightest treatment isn’t necessarily the best one for every lamp in the frame.
Luminar’s Magic Light tool is useful for scenes with several artificial light sources. I think of it as a finishing touch: something to shape the atmosphere after deciding which lights should draw the eye.
Choose the Right Kind of Photograph
Magic Light works particularly well with point sources such as street lamps, lanterns, and other artificial lights in a cityscape or street scene. It finds individual sources and adds glow or starburst effects around them.
That doesn’t make it a tool for every photograph. I wouldn’t reach for it on a landscape with only the sun; I want the sun to look like the sun. In a scene filled with lamps, though, a little added glow can bring back some of the ambiance that made me stop and photograph it.
Start with the Overall Feeling
It’s easy to get caught up in Magic Light’s controls for beam width, clearness, brightness, and the number of beams. Those settings can change the character of the effect, but you don’t need to adjust them all to make a useful edit.
I start with Intensity and bring it up a little. Then I compare the before and after views. If the lights have gained presence without taking over the photograph, I may already be close to the look I want.
A small increase in intensity gives the lamps more presence without asking every light to become a starburst.
What Each Magic Light Slider Does
Once you’ve set the overall intensity, the other sliders let you shape the glow and starbursts to suit the photograph. Here’s a quick reference:
Intensity: Sets the overall strength of the Magic Light effect.
Size: Controls how large the glow appears around each light.
Beam Width: Controls how far the starburst beams extend from the light source.
Glow: Adjusts how soft and diffused the glow appears.
Clearness: Makes the light effect look crisper or more diffused.
Brightness: Makes the enhanced lights brighter or dimmer.
Number of Beams: Changes how many rays appear in each starburst.
Rotation: Turns the starburst beams around the light source.
This section fits after “Start with the Overall Feeling” and before “Let Some Lights Lead and Others Recede.”
Let Some Lights Lead and Others Recede
In my example photograph, I like the stronger glow through the central part of the scene. The lights near the top need less of it. If they all receive the same treatment, the upper lights compete with the area I want people to notice.
That’s the real editing decision: which lights help the photograph when they stand out? Magic Light can find the sources, but it cannot make that choice for you.
Adjust Individual Sources When You Need To
Magic Light’s Add control lets you include a light source it missed. The Delete control can reduce the effect on a source that feels too strong, and Restore brings it back. In my cityscape, I use those controls to pull back some of the upper lamps while leaving the central lights more prominent.
This is a straightforward approach when you want to change a handful of individual lights. Each click changes the effect by a set amount, though, so it may take several clicks to get close to what you have in mind.
Toning down a few upper lamps helps the central lights remain the focus.
Use a Mask for a Softer, Broader Change
When I want a more specific reduction, masking feels more natural. For this photograph, I want roughly half as much Magic Light on the lamps in the upper part of the frame. I use an erase brush at about 50% strength and paint broadly over those lights and their glow.
The brushwork doesn’t need to be especially precise. I cover the area of the glow, then check the result. Some of the effect remains in the upper lights, which helps the scene feel consistent. Removing it completely would leave an abrupt difference between the top of the photograph and the brighter central area.
Final Thoughts
Magic Light is most useful when the photograph calls for added atmosphere around artificial lights. Start with a restrained overall adjustment, then look at where the glow helps and where it competes. Whether you adjust individual sources or use a soft mask, the aim is the same: let the lighting guide the eye while still feeling like it belongs in the scene.
Dining Along The River, Kyoto, Japan
Contact Scott to commission a print or license this image.
A cityscape can have plenty of bright lamps and still feel a little flat. Luminar Magic Light tool can bring more atmosphere to those artificial light sources, but applying the same glow everywhere may pull attention away from the parts of the photograph that matter most.
The useful decision is where to let the light shine and where to hold it back. A modest starting adjustment, followed by a few selective changes, can give the scene more life while keeping its lighting believable.