In short: Select an image, then Appearance in the left inspector, then Adjustments.
Adjustments are the corrective layer: getting an image to look right before any styling goes near it.
There are twelve sliders, and knowing which does what saves a lot of dragging.
Exposure, Brightness and Contrast
Exposure moves the whole image, brightness is gentler, contrast separates light from dark. Start with exposure.
Highlights, Shadows, Whites and Blacks
The tonal controls. Recover a blown sky with highlights, open up a dark subject with shadows, and use whites and blacks to set the ends of the range.
Temperature and Saturation
Temperature moves warm to cool, which fixes most colour that looks off. Saturation is the one to use sparingly.
Clarity and Sharpness
Clarity adds local contrast and gives an image bite. Sharpness works on edges. Both look worse at full strength than they do at half.
Gamma
Adjusts the midtones without moving the ends, which is often the subtler fix when an image looks flat.
There is no hue, vibrance, curves or levels control. If an image needs that much work it is better fixed before it comes into the library.
Last updated 14 August 2026
