Lightroom Presets & Creative Profiles

Lightroom stores presets in the Presets panel of the Develop module (check our full guide “How to install presets for Lightroom”). To apply a preset, simply click on it, and the sliders immediately adjust themselves to achieve the preset’s style you’ve clicked on. 

Something to know or understand about presets is that when you click on a preset, it moves the appropriate Lightroom sliders to achieve the preset’s look. You can see the sliders that have been affected by looking in the Basic panel. Note that presets sometimes move sliders in other panels as well. 

If you’re not happy with the changes made by the preset, simply move any of the sliders the preset moved. This will change the look you just applied. 

In sum, presets will move sliders to a preset or predetermined location to achieve that preset’s style or look. 

Creative Profiles

Creative Profiles are similar to Presets because they can change an image’s look or style. The difference between them is that when changes are applied by Creative Profiles, they do not change any sliders.