How to Add a Realistic Lightning to Your Photo

In this quick tutorial for beginners I will show you how to add a lightning to your photo using Lightning Overlays in Photoshop.

For this tutorial I will use these resources:

• Castle Stock Image
  
• 10 Lightning Overlays (Free Photoshop Overlays)
• Turn Day to Night (Photoshop Tutorial)

Add your photo in a new layer.

Lightning effect is more visible on a night sky. So let's turn this daytime photo to night photo. Read also the Turn Day to Night in Photoshop tutorial.

Add a Gradient Map using a night sky gradient. Use these colors for the gradient: #000000 and #276591.

Download the sky gradients for Photoshop here.

To increase the contrast of the photo let's add a Levels adjustment layer.

Add a Layer Mask to the Levels adjustment.

Make sure you are in the layer mask of the Levels adjustment. Go to Image menu and choose Apply Image

Again make sure the layer mask is selected and not the layer. Go to Image > Adjustments > Levels and increase the contrast of the channel mask to your liking.

Duplicate the Levels adjustment and modify the channel mask to increase the contrast on the highlights.

In a new layer add one of these Lightning Overlays and set the blend mode to Screen.

The Lightning Overlays are in black and white. To colorize the lightning, add a Gradient Map. The colors for the gradient are: #000000 (location 13%), #038fdf (location 55%) and #ffffff (location 97%). You can choose any color tones you like for the gradient.

Right click on the Gradient Map and choose Create Clipping Mask.

Now you know how to add lightning to a photo in Photoshop. These lightning overlays are really useful and easy to use and customize.