A light and warm portrait of a woman in a black top

Hazy Pop


Hazy Pop is a free Lightroom preset that gives outdoor portraits a soft matte look. It has an undersaturated look that helps enhance the mood in portraits and even fashion photography. Its tones also add a touch of elegance to any image.

Collection: Soft Matte Presets, Portrait Presets
Best for: Portraits, Diffused Lighting
Style: Soft, Light, Airy

You can experiment with the preset’s matte aesthetic in all kinds of photography. It is, however, good to note that it works best on photos taken under diffused natural light. The colors look richer when there is a generous amount of sunlight, especially in skin tones.

Softens Highlights for a Matte Look

A soft film outdoor portrait of a woman wearing a light gray dress

Soft Matte. Hazy Pop creates its appealing matte look by lowering the intensity of highlights. This means that light regions look muted, soft, and not too illuminated. You can examine the result in the After photo above. Pay attention to the background and the light cast on the subject.

This matte style looks beautiful on Instagram! Try Hazy Pop as an Instagram filter for a stylish aesthetic, and to give your photos a professional and cohesive look. It is even better on images that feature your OOTDs! After all, this aesthetic gives you that much-desired fashion blogger look.

Lightens Dark Regions

A soft film outdoor portrait of a woman wearing a pattern red shirt

Rich Grays. To complete its soft style, Hazy Pop lightens both blacks and shadows. It sets the lower range of tones by first increasing some blacks. From there, it lightens shadows further. As you can see in the photo above, this means that there are no heavy blacks.

This effect is ideal for portraits with an accent or uneven lighting. This will help you eradicate unwanted shadows on the subject’s face that would otherwise get in the way of his or her expressions.

Creates a Gentle and Cozy Atmosphere

A soft film outdoor portrait of a woman wearing a white long-sleeved top and black skirt, standing in front In-N-Out Hamburgers

Tender and Inviting. In the After photo above, also try to notice how the gentle tones transform the overall mood of the photograph. You can find most of the dark regions on the woman’s patterned skirt and her facial features. These now look more detailed yet delicate. All in all, these make a tender and inviting mood.

Notice how the preset alters textures and tonal intensity, but not the colors. Hues still look natural and appealing. This is another reason why the preset is perfect for headshots, selfies, and other forms of portraiture.

Reinforces Color and Midtones

A soft film outdoor portrait of a woman holding a cup of coffee

Vibrant. To bring out more photographic elements despite its softening adjustments, Hazy Pop reinforces clarity to add definition, and vibrance to amplify colors. These serve as nice accents, set against the preset’s tender motif.

You can examine the results in the After photo above. Look at the woman’s clear features and the natural vibrance of her skin tones. This portrait also shows how the preset generates its distinct soft matte look without compromising much detail.

Hazy Pop is for Lightroom Mobile, Desktop and…

Like all our presets, you can absolutely use Hazy Pop preset as is, right out of the box. With any preset, you might need to make adjustments to accommodate your specific camera, settings, lighting and subject matter.

If you want more presets like this, be sure to check out our soft matte presets and Lightroom presets for portraits.

  • Entirely Adjustable
  • Compatible with Lightroom 4, 5, 6 and CC
  • Performs with both PC, Mac, and Mobile
  • Applicable to both RAW and JPG images
  • 100% Free
Portrait Free Lightroom Presets

Free Lightroom Preset by Rachael Towne

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *