P: New AI-powered Lens Blur (Early Access) available across all surfaces.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

This post applies to Camera Raw, Lightroom Classic & the Lightroom Ecosystem products.

The Lightroom team is sharing an early look for AI-powered Lens Blur–giving you the ability to apply optical blur on any image regardless of how it was taken. Lens Blur is now available to try on all Lightroom surfaces.

How does Lens Blur work?

• Lens blur applies a depth-based blur effect, similar to what can be achieved with real-world optical lenses, by using AI-generated or device-captured depth data (when available).
• Lens blur will automatically prioritize focus for the detected subject, but you can also interactively adjust the focus distance. Precise focus range tuning is also available (currently desktop only: Lightroom Desktop, Lightroom Classic, and Camera Raw).
• You can also further customize the Bokeh shapes, highlight Boost (desktop only), and make depth map refinements (desktop only).

Will my Lens Blur adjustments on one surface be synced to other surfaces? I.e. mobile to web to desktop, and vice versa?

• Yes, all edits will sync. To revert settings, you can go back to previous versions or history steps, or un-apply Lens Blur settings.

Can I add Lens Blur settings to my presets?

• No, presets and copy + paste workflows are not currently enabled for Lens Blur during Early Access.

For more information, please check out Lens Blur. 

Please give it a try and share feedback in this thread as we continually improve this feature.

Lisa Ngo: Lightroom Product Manager

Current Popular Lens Blur Feature Requests:

• Add Noise Option
• Custom Bokeh

Stop by and give them a vote if they're of interest to you!

Posted by: 

[BrittanyGamblinPhoto]

I agree, ability to brush off certain areas may help. 

[Jada30085111wdmu]

Yes i agree with all  this!

[Pradeepto332341886ck9]

It would be very helpful if we can use a brush to add or subtract particular portions from the depth map. If there are similar tones in FG and BG, Sometimes, the masking is improper. 

[9LTStudio]

One easy fix to this issue is, use the feature that allow you to visualize the selection adn you can make that non existient. Another great addition to this addition. No pun intended there. THis feature will allow you refine the selcetion as well. Good Look and great shooting, and editing. 

[James3361443190f8]

I  keep getting an unspecified error message. It does not work. I just recently purchased a new computer. Its OS is Win 11. I don't know if this has anything to do with it.

[PacerFan]

FWIW, I use it on a PC as well, with Windows 11. But I do not get such an error message when using the LB feature.

[Simon S Chen]

Please follow the pinned reply at the top to get your GPU driver updated. 

[Nate PA]

I agree, the brush tool is very funky, It doesn't allow me to add focus/blur, it seems tempermental, sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't. 

[Georges JoJo]

Fantastic +++

[elmanaguita]

At first glance , it is amazing. I think will benefit to add a tool to modify its mask to add or subtract edges where the blur is, that at this stage are not perfect

[justinw74800426]

You can already do that...there is an option to "refine" the depth map in the lens blur panel. You can basically paint the depth map with a brush. Works pretty well if not a bit basic.

[MrApricots]

I find the brush painting of blur or focus to result in a partial shift that doesn't "build up" as I paint over it more and more. Even with '100' for the amount and 100 flow, the depth map only shifts so far according to the Visualize Depth colors when that is turned on. The painting doesn't approach either full focus or full blur as I would expect as I paint over again anad again.

[Joshua Bury]

The corrections made to the depth map are relative to the current focal range that is set and they will automatically update if you make changes to the focal range. For example, the Focus brush will change the depth values to be just inside the current focal range (and therefore no longer blurred).

The Blur brush will change depth values to be outside of the focal range and similar to surrounding "background" depth values so that the amount of blur matches. For the Blur brush, you can extend the Amount to 200 to set the brushed depth values all the way to the furthest background depth.

[LarryLMMMTT]

That is exactly what I want, but I am not finding this brush on the lens blur panel.  I see a "subject focus" icon and a "point/area focus" tool, but no brush.  What am I missing or where should I be going for this?

[daleducatte]

Click the icon to the right of "Refine" to expand the panel, then you will see "Focus" and "Blur" buttons. Select either one and you should see a brush when you mouse over your image. 

[LarryLMMMTT]

Just found the refine tab.

[Doug Hansgate]

Especially the abilty to erase from the defined selection of the subject

[DerekRBMorrison]

Yes, you can do this with the Refine menu and it has feather and flow so actually very useful. I had some flyaway hairs I could paint back in then blend the blur back across – all within ACR – I like that. A very useful tool for certain images.

[quirky_idea15A8]

are you going to support Canon's Dual Pixel raw files to facilitate depth mapping ?

[justinw74800426]

Just played around with lens blur a bit. Really excited about this and need to practice a bit more. Would love to see a few things moving foward:

-the integration of the "refine edge" tool from photoshop select and mask workspace. In my initial experiements I had a lot of trouble with fly away hairs looking very un natural with the lens blur added. A refine edge tool could fix this quickly when refining the depth map

-Some way to fine tune the quality of the blur. some images it looks good, some not so much. I tried on a shot with my om system 40-150 f4 pro lens and the blur added to the background softened the background but in an un natural way. A person in the background got blurrier but the contour edge around them got more distinct (images attached). Not sure how to describe it in words further. Didn't compete with bokeh straight out of a fast aperture lens just yet.

Otherwise, this seems like an amazing feature that could really change how I work with images once it gets refined a bit further. Really will make a big difference if using a small aperture lens (ie: f/4 or f/5.6 or smaller) or shooting with small formats such as micro four thirds. Now we can easily simulate more shallow depth of field. 

[snaphappymemphis]

I can't make it a preset. I can't copy and paste it. I can't sync it across multiple photos. Guys, it's really really good. I just want to sync it across dozens, maybe hundreds, of photos and answer a few emails while it runs in the background

[John R Ellis]

@snaphappymemphis, "I can't copy and paste it. I can't sync it across multiple photos."

The Copy Settings plugin can copy/sync Lens Blur, though due to LR limitations, it can't copy any lens-blur refinements.

[JD27266218lz0i]

Needs a "refine edge" function when multiple subjects are close together.  

[Sean McCormack]

Have you tried using the Refine brushes zoomed in with Auto Mask on? 

I'd love more refine options as well though. 

[JD27266218lz0i]

Not yet. First time using it. I'll give a shot. Thx