Welcome to Tutorial Tuesday, by COAP Online

If Lightroom ever feels like a maze of sliders, it’s usually because the edit started without a goal.

In aviation photography, “pretty good” edits often fall apart in one specific way: the aircraft looks like it belongs to one style, but the background and colour choices belong to another. The result is that slightly uneasy feeling where nothing quite looks wrong, but nothing looks finished either!

The goal is the first step of a reliable workflow

In our 5-step edit workflow, step one is to set the goal. That goal is simply a short sentence that describes what the final image should feel like and what it should emphasise. It gives your edit focus before the technical work begins.

A useful goal template for aviation images is:

“This is a [mood] image of [subject], with [hero element] as the focus, for [output].” 

Examples:

• “A clean documentary edit of a departure shot, with true livery colour, for a registration log.”
• “A dramatic edit of a fast jet, with the aircraft separated hard from the sky, for a portfolio.”
• “A moody ramp scene, with controlled highlights and calm colour, for a cinematic story post.” 

Why aviation images benefit more than most

Aircraft are full of “tell-tale” surfaces: bright whites, reflective canopies, polished metal, and saturated liveries. If the goal isn’t clear, it’s easy to over-correct globally and end up with broken highlights, crunchy contrast, or colour that feels cartoonish.

A goal also prevents the common trap of editing in the wrong order. When you know what you’re building, you can move with intent through crop and correction, then light, then colour, then finishing touches, instead of bouncing around and guessing.

A practical exercise that improves fast

Take one RAW and make three virtual copies: Documentary, Dramatic, Moody. Edit each to match the label. You’ll quickly notice that the same sliders get used differently depending on the goal. That’s the point. The sliders don’t create the style. The goal does.