Which Sky Replacement Software Works Best?

Sky replacement is a tool every architectural photographer needs to know. I personally use it very rarely, but there are times when this type of knowledge comes in handy.

If you’ve ever seen Mike Kelley’s Where Art Meets Architecture series, then you know that he talks about sky replacements in-depth in the second part of WAMA 2. Mike shows both simple and complex examples of sky replacements – some requiring lots of photoshop skill and time.

But nowadays there are a couple of software programs and plug-ins that make doing sky swaps much easier.

Anthony Morganti created a video where he compares Luminar AI, On1 Photo Raw 2022, and Photoshop. These programs are getting better quickly, and in many cases, they work fast and flawlessly with good or even great results. Anthony uses images that are particularly tricky and challenge the software while making their strengths and weaknesses visible. The 2nd picture can be particularly interesting from the point of view of architectural photography, based on which of the 3 software programs will probably not be suitable for us.

From the beginning of his educational series, Mike Kelley has talked a lot about the importance of building a solid “sky library”. If you want to use the best collection of skies in your images without spending years building your library, then Mike Kelley’s sky-library will be the solution you need.