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: 

[simonsaith]

Would you be able to share the source and the settings with us? Share an exported DNG would work.

[Rodrigo323995028dz4]

Works great!! Very useful feature. 

[peterg71787476]

Hi there, 

Just tried the Lens Blur function in Camera Raw and my word how easy it is to apply and get the effect you want as it does really make it so easy to make the subject to stand out giving it the dead easy to finetune with alsomst immediate response. 

Currently used with a Dell Prescision M4800 with dual gfx cards, Intel for the laptop and using Nvidia for my external screen via HDMI. way to go. Thank you. 

[Amelia Hart]

I've tried the Blur lens depth of field tool - and it looks like it's going to be awesome - but it's not there yet. Caused a lot of glitches in a big LR file that I had to strip down completely and start again. It's very difficult to back out of the effect - and erase areas where you don't want it. And when you try to do this, it just gets really funky - weird glitchy pixely stuff going on. But i hope you work it out bc it would be great. 

[Noah33838696ul60]

This is a fantastic tool. The only problem is it appears too artificial around the edges of the subject.

[jjaylad]

Have you tried the focus/blur brush to go over those areas? It is
adjustable and cleans that up nicely.

[Dave33839154xqpu]

I am working on wedding party pictures, the lens blur is having a hard time detecting blonde hair and hat edges of a cowboy hat, the two side of the hat was blur as the same as the backgroud. The AI also having a tough time detecting the subject who wears a black suit behind a whtie wedding dress. The lens blur works well but is not good enough to detect/define a subject who might be too close to the background of people that needs to be blur, the hand was blur but not the face and body. 

[simonsaith]

You can touch up these cases via the Refine tool. Checkout Julieanne's nice tutorial video.

[RobBell]

This was exactly what I was looking for on a picture with a seagull with a fish in his beak and a bunch of gulls chasing after him. I shot it with a big depth of field, but wanted to really focus only on the gull with the fish and the other above screeching, blurring the others and the ocean behind. It worked perfectly and easily, especially for someone (me) who is not an near expert.

[EthanKMunsterman]

How the blur tool looks and works has been good. I just find that on the images that use it, it drastically drops the performance while editing the image.

[bobco]

i love it...i don't know PS...LR is it for me....with little effort i can blur background....as i said...i love it

[fulviopetti]

Quando lo utilizzo dopo qualche minuto si bloca lightroom.

Mi piace molto come funzione, ma dovete risolvere o se ha questo problema è meglio non utilizzarlo.

[simonsaith]

Segui la risposta appuntata in alto per aggiornare il driver GPU del tuo computer.

[Plankoskop]

Great new feature! Perfect and often astonishing results in 9/10 cases.

[vineet26944995ly5e]

Blur is making my raindrops disappear. Please make the algorithm exclude raindrops from blurring

[Plankoskop]

Just asking: How would you possibly make raindrops not disappear when taking a photo with a wide open lens???

[vineet26944995ly5e]

You should enable auto-sync for blur feature also

[max_sr]

It would be nice, if you could adjust the strength of the effect for foreground and background seperately.

[williamf87131398]

I've just tried this out on several images, but it appears to be a really effective and useful tool. A quick perusal of the images from a recent shoot indicate that more than half of the images will benefit from the lens blur tool.

[LewisLevin]

I would like to see a subject selection by detection or brush.  Currently seems to be fooled by color range.

[simonsaith]

Have you tried the Point/Area focus tool?

[brynl44302093]

Worked on one image, then came back with 'No photo seleted' on the next. Tried it again on another image, and had the same issue. But if I go back to library view and re-select it, it shows in developer with the blur applied?

[brynl44302093]

My mistake...  I would delete this entry if I knew how...     I had an unedited filter on, so as soon as the lens blur was applied it was nolonger unedited so dropped off the 'selected' list.  School boy error. 😞

[vincentr36861937]

I dont know if I just can't see it, but i'd like to be able to draw where i need blurred to adjust it slightly. I thought I saw it in the camera raw side but I can't find it in the Lr side. Otherwise, I love it!

[simonsaith]

Maybe you are referring to the Point/Area focus tool or the Refine tool? 

Checkout Julieanne's nice tutorial video.