In this article and video, I’m going to show you how to change the look of the sky in a  photograph using a basic layer mask that we attach to a curves adjustment layer, so we apply a different lighting to the sky portion of a photograph. You can also use this same technique to change any other parts of the photo as well.

In addition, you’ll notice that I open my RAW and TIFF files in Photoshop as Smart Objects. To learn more about how to do that, check out the article “Settings for Photoshop Camera RAW and a quick look at the adjustments brush and dehaze filter” here.

Watch the video

Conclusion

So now that you know how to create a layer mask for the Curves adjustment, you can use the same method and use it for other adjustments like Brightness/Contrast, Levels, Vibrance and Hue/Saturation. In future articles, I’ll talk more about Layer Masks and how to use them in your photographs.

Find out more about Adobe Creative Cloud here.