Mastering Light with Intersecting Masks in ON1 Photo RAW 2026

Editing photos can often feel like trying to color inside the lines with a giant, messy paintbrush. You want to darken a building to make it look dramatic, but suddenly the sky behind it turns into a muddy mess, too. The new "Intersecting Masks" tool in ON1 Photo RAW 2026 is the perfect solution to this frustrating problem. By allowing you to combine two different masks, this tool gives you surgical precision over your edits. The benefit is a professional, fine-art look that used to take hours of manual "painting" but can now be done in just a few clicks.

If you are wondering what on earth an "intersecting mask" actually is, think of it like a double-security system. Imagine you have a key to a building (your first mask) and a specific room number (your second mask). You can only enter the space where both of those things match. In photo editing, the "intersect" mode tells the software to only apply an effect in the exact area where two different shapes overlap. It’s the ultimate way to keep your edits from "bleeding" into parts of the photo where they don't belong.

In the video, Chris demonstrates this by editing a beautiful bell tower. He starts with a "Quick Mask AI" to select the entire building. This creates a "coloring space"—essentially telling the computer, "Hey, only look at the tower." However, if he just used that mask, any change he made would hit the whole tower at once. To make it more artistic, he needs to be more specific about where the light hits, and that is where the second layer comes in.

Next, Chris adds a gradient mask over the top. Usually, a gradient would affect everything from the top of the image to the bottom, including the sky. But by simply clicking a button and changing the mode to "Intersect," something magical happens. The gradient only shows up on the tower itself. The sky stays perfectly clean, while the building gets that cool, fading light effect. It’s like having a spotlight that refuses to shine on anything except your main subject.

This tool is a massive win for anyone who loves "crafting light" in their images. You can use it to create a sharp transition between a dark, moody side of a building and a bright, sunlit side. Before this update, doing this required a lot of careful hand-brushing, which usually led to "halos" or weird glowing edges around the subject. Now, the AI does the heavy lifting of finding the edges, and the intersecting mask handles the artistic placement of the light.

A great workflow tip Chris shares is to build your complex masks in the "Local Adjustments" section first. It’s a bit more logical and easier to see what you’re doing when you’re just working with basic exposure. Once you’ve built the perfect "keyhole" for your edit, you can simply copy that mask and paste it into any of your fancy filters in the "Effects" tab. It’s like prepping your ingredients in small bowls before you start cooking a gourmet meal—it makes the final process much smoother.

In conclusion, the Intersecting Masks tool in ON1 Photo RAW 2026 is a powerful addition for anyone looking to take their photo editing to the next level. Whether you are a pro photographer or just a hobbyist who wants their vacation shots to look like fine art, this tool saves you time and reduces frustration. It eliminates the struggle of "over-editing" the background and lets you focus on making your subject truly shine. If you haven't tried the 2026 update yet, this feature alone makes it worth the look!