In Lightroom, you can use the correction brush to make local optimizations to your photos. You have the option of using the brushes already provided in the program or importing additional brushes. The following shows you how to import and use brushes in Lightroom.

Importing Lightroom brushes (LRTEMPLATE format)

You can call up the existing brushes in the Develop modulevia the correction brush and then in the Custom drop-down menu. To add further brushes there, proceed as follows:

1. Open the preferences .
2. Open the Presets tab in the Preferences.
3. Click on Show all other Lightroom presets.
4. This will open a window in which you will find the Local Adjustment Presets folder.
5. Copy the brushes (LRTEMPLATE format) that you want to add to the Local Adjustment Presets folder.
6. Close the window with the folders. Close the presets.
7. Restart Lightroom.
8. You will now find the newly added brushes in the Develop modulevia the Adjustment Brushes in the Custom drop-down menu.

Apply Lightroom correction brushes for local corrections to photos

You can now use the brushes to make local corrections in your photo. This means that you only edit areas you have selected. To work with the brush, activate the correction brush in the Develop moduleand select the desired brush. Click or drag with the correction brush in the areas of your photo where you want to apply the brush.

Tips for working with the correction brush

Here are a few tips to make it easier for you to work with the correction brush within Lightroom:

• If you want to apply another brush, click New in the Adjustment Brush panel.
• As soon as you start working with a brush in your photo, a circular, gray icon will appear. If you want to call up the editing process again later, click on this icon so that you can change any edits you have made.
• To see in which areas you have worked with a brush, activate the checkbox next to Show overlay for selected mask.
• By holding down the Alt key, the brush switches to negative mode (represented by a minus symbol). This allows you to undo any edits you have made, i.e. apply the brush negatively.

• When working with brushes in particular, it is often about the details in your pictures. Activate the zoom for the view window of the photos to quickly zoom in and out of your image.
• The before and after view can also be helpful. You can call this up in the view window for the photos via the book-like symbol with the YY. By clicking on it several times, you can switch between different before and after views.
• You can easily change the size of your brushes using the dot (larger brush) and comma (smaller brush) buttons.

Are you interested in our best Lightroom brushes and presets for really effective photo editing? Here they are: