You may also want to check out the Free Lightroom Presets directory.
Most of us use and love Adobe Lightroom. One of my favorite features is presets. One click WOW & workflow for our photo’s. I even make some very popular preset collections that I sell over on Seim Effects.
So there’s a couple of ways to install Lightroom presets and today I’m gonna show you both, including the guru method.I’m talking about develop presets, but it should be noted that these methods are essentially the same with any user preset, such as print presets, gallery presets etc. If your installing brush presets see this article. Also, I’m using a Mac, but the same process will work on Windows.
Start by going into the Develop Module (shortcut D) On the left panel you'll see your presets.
Wanted to post up a free preset for everyone today. This is Vintage I, and it’s a neat Lightroom preset to give a nice vintage tone to a photo. There’s actually three vintage presets I just made that will come with my Power Workflow Lightroom Presets.
This a good general purpose vintage, and more than just a saturation reduction. Just start with standard photo and add this for a great vintage effect. I notice that sometimes with darker photo’s it helps to bump the exposure up just a little before you run this. Other cool variations are now included with my entire collection. Note that this preset is now included in the Power Workflow Fantasy Sampler which is also a free presets download.
Hey tribe it’s Gavin Seim and it’s 2022. This post was a pretty old list and most of the presets here are for older versions of Lightroom but if you install them they will update and work in the newer version. See my Lightroom presets install videos.
I’m going to start adding new free presets for Lightroom and Photoshop RAW, Free Styles for Capture One, and more to this list and get it up to speed again. I’ll need your help by adding your favorites in the comments so I can curate them.
I’m best known for my carefully formulated Lightroom presets. You’ll find a lot of these paid and fully supported packs here on this site. But many of my packs have free mini versions so you can get some of my best Lightroom presets free. I’ll start the list with those and keep adding more.
The new Free Lightroom Presets and Capture One Styles list…
Free Film Emeulatuion presets for LR and C1. My films pack goes really deep and in the free mini-pack I included 9 free film presets including the Fuji Classic Negative preset. (LR Presets New and legacy + C1 Styles + LUTS)
You’ve just found the biggest, best-maintained list of free LR presets anywhere. I hunt the web for these, trying to add the best and filter out the dead ends. There’s plenty to browse. And feel free to share your favorites in the comments (freebies only).
LR4 and LR5 Presets: The develop module changed in LR4 and most LR3 presets will not fully function under the new process. As more LR4 presets are becoming available I’ll add to the list. I’ll also note listings that I’ve been able to verify are LR4 Compatible. Non-marked listing may be LR1,2 and 3 only.
There are also loads of freebies (linked below). I’m fanatical about quality and honored that they’ve become so well regarded my peers. OK, now on to the goodies. Oh and if you use Apple Aperture, here’s the free Aperture presets list.
Preset Heaven(LR4 Compatible).
This is a blog where you’ll find a large variety of presets. I won;t list them all, but there a lot. A nice place to get some sweet goodies.
Lightroom Killer Tips Presets(LR4/5 Compatible).
Aside from a great LR video cast, Matt Kloskowski from Photoshop TV posts presets on the site for free. His latest works are LR4 compatible.
Jack Davis’s Perfect Presets Collection (LR 2-3).
This is a download from our friends over at OnOne Software. A large preset collection that is organized in a tidy list. Well put together with lots of effects.
Wonderland Free Presets (LR1-3).
A free sampler pack from their Lightroom Presets collections. It looks like they have LR4 presets coming so we’ll keep watching.
More Free Presets Worth Noting: These may not be large sets but they may have potential…
If you read the main PPS site you may well have already picked these up, but since this is my official effects blog I wanted to post them up. These are some free samples from my Power Workflow Preset Collection. Cruise Control set can be a huge time saver when it comes to correcting large batches of images, I needed something that I could start out my workflow with automating image corrections I made these. Both include JPEG & RAW version just like the Power Workflow collection.
The fantasy sampler includes a few of my favorite special effects that are included with the Power Workflow preset collection that I’ve made for lightroom.
400, based on the very popular “300? series by Mikelao. Their not really the same, so if you don’t have 300 then you’ll want to get it.
Fantasy is a preset I started some time back and have found it to be very useful. Fantasy Basic is a great lightweight general use effect that gives a nice gentle look.
Vintage is also included and is one of 3 vintage presets from Power Workflow.
There are more variations of them in the full Power Workflow, but this should give you a cool start.
This set includes is the results of me wanting something to apply to large batches of images, and have them basically auto correct and look great out of the gate. I’ve spent a lot of time playing with this type of preset and I’m pretty excited about them.
Since images vary I ended up with four presets, and choose depending on the project. There’s only three here, but all four come with Power Workflow. With some of these I manually edited the xml of the preset to get what I wanted. I also found that Lightroom’s auto tone feature (used in Full Auto) can be good, but often is makes images too bright, or too dark because it miscalculates exposure. You should find that as long as your exposures are pretty close to correct you can apply “Semi Auto” to them at import and have most images look rocking from the start. Here whats inside the set.
Semi Auto WB. This is my latest, and I believe my favorite general use batch preset. It auto corrects some things, and adjusts others, to try and make an image that pops, and just generally looks good. A great batch tool.
Full Auto. This is just what it says. Applies auto settings to main elements like exposure, contrast etc. I find that while it can be great, it sometimes miscalculates. For those situations I turn to Semi Auto.
-WB. versions of each preset are the same except they auto correct white balance. Theres no golden rule for WB, and really it come down to what you think looks good.
I use using Lightroom Presets like crazy. I’ve decided to add to the mix of free Lightroom presets, with a few of my favorites that come from my Power Workflow2 Lightroom presets.
On to the free stuff. These have both RAW & JPEG versions just like you’ll find in my PW2 collection. You can also find more of my free presets right here.
These are a few of my favorite special effects from my Power Workflow. 400 is loosely based on the very popular “300”series by Mikelao. It’s a cool fantasy effect that adds some snappy drama to a scene.
Fantasy is a preset I use all the time, and have found it to be very useful since it gives a creative look. Fantasy Basic is a great lightweight general use effect that gives a nice gentle look. It works great on nearly any image. There’s more variations in the my complete set but this should get you rocking!
