> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://cotovan.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Riverside Screen Glow and Lighting Controls: How to Look Better Before You Record - URL: https://cotovan.com/post/riverside-screen-glow-and-lighting-controls/ - Published: 2026-09-03T14:02:35.000Z - Updated: 2026-09-03T15:02:43.000Z - Description: Riverside's Appearance controls let you smooth your skin, relight your face, and turn your own screen into a ring light — all before you press record. - Author: Cristi Cotovan - Tags: Riverside.FM Articles Riverside has had appearance effects inside the recording studio for a while, and I already walked through the first version of them in my guide on [how to touch up your appearance in Riverside Studio](https://cotovan.com/post/touch-up-your-appearance-in-riverside-studio/). The latest update turns that handful of toggles into a proper lighting kit — and adds the one control I was pleasantly surprised with: a software ring light that lives on your own screen. This matters more than it sounds. I've had clients tell me flat out that they'd rather record in Zoom because Riverside didn't smooth their skin. That objection is gone, and what replaced it goes further than Zoom does. One thing to be clear about up front: everything here happens *before or during* recording or live streaming, in the studio. It isn't a post-production effect. The payoff is that the file you record is already better, instead of you fixing it in the editor afterwards. ## Riverside now tells you when your lighting is bad Open a project and click **Record** to launch the studio. You land on the "Let's check your devices" screen — the lobby where you confirm your camera, microphone, and headphones before joining. It's a good moment to sanity-check the rest of your [Riverside studio settings](https://cotovan.com/post/optimize-riverside-studio-settings/) too. What's new is that Riverside now watches your camera feed here and speaks up when the light isn't good enough. A Tip panel appears over your preview: *"Your lighting could be better — Check that you have enough light and that you're facing it,"* with an **Adjust lighting** link right underneath it. I switched my key light off on purpose for this, and on a Logitech C925e webcam the image drops off a cliff — which is exactly the situation the tip is built to catch. ![Riverside studio lobby with a lighting tip panel over a dark webcam preview](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-studio-lobby-lighting-tip.jpg) With the room light off, Riverside flags the problem itself and offers an Adjust lighting shortcut. Notice the 1080p / 24fps readout in the same corner — that's what will actually be recorded. While you're looking at that corner, the "1080p / 24fps — This is how you'll be recorded" line is worth a glance every time. If it isn't showing the resolution you expect, sort that out before you fix anything cosmetic — here's [how to record in high resolution in Riverside](https://cotovan.com/post/how-to-record-in-high-resolution-in-riverside/). ## The framing guide you get for free Click **Adjust lighting** and two things happen. The effects panel opens on the right, and your preview picks up a framing overlay: a rule-of-thirds grid plus a green bracketed rectangle. Put your face inside those brackets and your framing is right. Not cropped at the forehead, not floating in the middle of the frame with a metre of empty headroom above you. I had been planning to make a whole video about camera framing, and this overlay does most of the teaching for me. ![Green bracket framing guide and rule-of-thirds grid over the Riverside camera preview](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-adjust-lighting-framing-guide.jpg) The green brackets show where your face should sit. Line yourself up with them and you've solved framing before you've touched a single slider. If framing slips during a real session, you can still recover it later with [AutoCrop and reframe in the Riverside editor](https://cotovan.com/post/how-to-use-autocrop-and-reframe-video-in-riverside/), which can centre your face automatically. But getting it right in the lobby costs you nothing and looks better. If you’re eager to learn more about Riverside and wish to have ****a one-on-one Riverside coaching session**, feel free to [book a call with me](https://cotovan.com/coaching). I’m here to help you with any questions you have and to guide you through the best workflows, tips, workarounds, or just answer any questions you may have! [Book a session ](https://cotovan.com/coaching) ## Where the controls live The panel that opens is called **Background and effects**, and it has two tabs. **Background** is the one you may already know — blur your background or swap it for an image. The new stuff is on the **Appearance** tab, and there are four controls on it: - **Touch up** — smooth your skin on camera - **Face lighting** — improve lighting on your face - **Studio lighting** — adjust the lighting in your scene - **Screen glow** — brighten your face when your lighting is low ![Riverside Background and effects panel open on the Appearance tab with four controls](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-background-and-effects-appearance-tab.jpg) All four appearance controls sit on one tab, each with a plain-language description of what it does. They stack, so you can run all four at once. In practice you won't want to — I'll come back to that. ## Touch up: skin smoothing Toggle **Touch up** on and a dropdown appears underneath it with two strengths: **Subtle** and **Smooth**. Subtle is the default and Smooth is the more pronounced of the two. This is AI processing running in real time on your camera feed, so the preview may hesitate for a moment when you switch it on or change the strength. That's normal — let it settle before you judge the result. ![Touch up toggled on in Riverside with the Subtle strength dropdown showing](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-touch-up-subtle-smooth.jpg) Touch up gives you two strengths. Subtle is where I'd leave it — Smooth is noticeably heavier. My advice: stay on Subtle. The point of a touch-up is that nobody can tell you used one. Smooth is there if you want it, but it starts to look like a filter rather than good lighting. ## Face lighting: brighten just your face **Face lighting** is a single toggle with no slider. It detects your face and relights it specifically, so your features come up while the rest of the frame stays where it was. In a dark room the difference is immediate — my face lifts noticeably while the acoustic panels behind me stay dark. ![Face lighting being switched on in the Riverside Appearance panel](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-face-lighting-toggle.jpg) Face lighting targets your face rather than the whole scene, which is why the background doesn't come up with it. This is so helpful when you're recording in bad conditions — a hotel room at night, a corner of the office with one overhead lamp. ## Studio lighting: brighten the whole scene **Studio lighting** is a toggle plus a slider, labelled **Reduce light** on the left and **Increase light** on the right. Unlike Face lighting, this one works on the entire image. Push it up and the whole scene lifts, including the room behind you; pull it down and everything dims. ![Studio lighting slider pushed toward Increase light in Riverside](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-studio-lighting-slider.jpg) The Studio lighting slider raises or lowers the whole scene. Pushed far enough, it starts revealing the parts of the room you'd rather stayed dark. Use it sparingly. Brightening a dark image in software also amplifies whatever noise your camera sensor produced in the shadows, so if you crank it you'll trade darkness for grain — and you'll reveal the background clutter the darkness was hiding. I sit just past the middle and leave it there. ## Screen glow: a ring light made of your own screen This is my favourite of the four, and it's the one I want to explain properly because it works differently from the others. **Screen glow** doesn't process your camera feed at all. It paints a bright border around the Riverside window on your display. Because you're looking at that screen while you record, the light bounces off it and onto your face. It's a real, physical light source — your monitor — being used as a fill light, and your camera captures the result exactly as it would capture a lamp. ![Screen glow switched on in Riverside, showing a bright white border around the studio window](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-screen-glow-ring-light.jpg) Screen glow turns the edges of the Riverside window into a soft white ring light. My face brightens because the screen is genuinely lighting it. Two sliders come with it. The first is brightness, from **Dim** to **Bright**, for when you only need a touch of fill. The second is colour temperature, from **Warmer** to **Cooler**, and I love it! My face always reads slightly too warm on camera, and being able to dial a cooler light onto it fixes that at the source instead of in a colour grade. Slide it toward Warmer and you get that orange, tungsten-lamp look; slide it toward Cooler and you get something closer to daylight. I keep mine slightly cool. ![Screen glow temperature slider dragged toward Warmer, tinting the on-screen ring light orange](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-screen-glow-temperature-warmer.jpg) Dragging the temperature slider toward Warmer turns the on-screen ring orange. Watch your face, not the border — that's where the change matters. The panel also notes that Screen glow *works best at full screen brightness*, and it means it. A software ring light can only put out as much light as your display can, so turn your monitor up before you judge whether it's doing anything. One more thing worth knowing: once Screen glow is doing the work, you often don't need Face lighting any more. I turned mine back off — the real light on my face had made the software version redundant. If you’re eager to learn more about Riverside and wish to have ****a one-on-one Riverside coaching session**, feel free to [book a call with me](https://cotovan.com/coaching). I’m here to help you with any questions you have and to guide you through the best workflows, tips, workarounds, or just answer any questions you may have! [Book a session ](https://cotovan.com/coaching) ## Your settings follow you into the studio Set all this up in the lobby, click **Join studio**, and everything carries over already applied. The glow stays on screen, the touch-up stays on your feed. ![Inside the Riverside recording studio with Screen glow still active around the window](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/09/riverside-screen-glow-inside-studio.jpg) Inside the studio the glow is still there, still lighting my face. It never appears in the recording — only its effect on me does. Two details to note in there. First, the glow is not recorded. It exists on your screen, not in your video track, so your viewers never see the border — they only see the better-lit version of you. Second, because the glow takes up the edges of the window, you see a little less of the studio interface while it's on. That's the trade, and for me it's an easy one. You can also reach these controls mid-session: hover your own video tile and open the effects button there, and the Appearance tab is right where you left it. ## Why it's worth fixing at the source This is what I tell every client I coach. When you record in Riverside, try to get good light, good framing, and a decent camera. Every problem you solve before you press record is a problem nobody has to solve afterwards — no colour correction pass, no exporting to another tool, no rescuing a dark face in the grade. Riverside can help after the fact — its [colour adjustment tools will lift dark or off-colour footage](https://cotovan.com/post/quick-color-adjustments-fixes-riverside/) in the editor. But recovering a bad image is always more work and always a worse result than capturing a good one. If the recording is right up front, it's easier on everybody. These controls are in the browser studio now. The effects panel points you toward the Mac app for the best-quality visual effects, and I'd expect this full set of appearance controls to land in the Mac recording app before long, along with other improvements. ## The settings I'd start with - **Touch up:** on, set to Subtle - **Face lighting:** on only if Screen glow isn't giving you enough - **Studio lighting:** on, slider just past the middle — not maxed - **Screen glow:** on, brightness high, temperature slightly cool - **Your display:** turned up to full brightness - **Your face:** inside the green brackets Dial that in once and it takes about thirty seconds before every session. If you're setting up your workflow from scratch, you can [try Riverside here](https://cotovan.com/riverside). If you’re eager to learn more about Riverside and wish to have ****a one-on-one Riverside coaching session**, feel free to [book a call with me](https://cotovan.com/coaching). I’m here to help you with any questions you have and to guide you through the best workflows, tips, workarounds, or just answer any questions you may have! [Book a session ](https://cotovan.com/coaching) ## Related guides [How to Touch Up Your Appearance in Riverside StudioRiverside added a control inside the recording studio that helps you smooth your skin, improve your lighting, and generally look more polished before you ever press record. If you've ever missed the appearance and skin-smoothing options you had in Zoom, this closes that gap — a lot of that same polish now lives right inside Riverside, and it's one less reason to record anywhere else. One thing to know up front: these Appearance effects currently live only in the recording studio — on the setup![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/icon/Cristi-2-31.jpeg)Cristi CotovanCristi Cotovan![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/06/riverside-touch-up-appearance-feature.jpg)](https://cotovan.com/post/touch-up-your-appearance-in-riverside-studio/) [Best Settings for Your Riverside Studio: A Feature-by-Feature GuideThe best settings for your Riverside recording studio to ensure your podcasts, livestreams, and recordings are of the highest quality.![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/icon/Cristi-2-31.jpeg)Cristi CotovanCristi Cotovan![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2025/09/155_optimize-riverside-studio-settings-1.jpg)](https://cotovan.com/post/optimize-riverside-studio-settings/) [How to Use Color Adjustments in Riverside to Fix Dark or Off-Color FootageA new feature to adjust colors has been added in Riverside and it could save a lot of back and forth in color correcting.![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/icon/Cristi-2-31.jpeg)Cristi CotovanCristi Cotovan![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2025/12/c8a6c58e-597a-4aab-b5b7-12ab8ae4f34d.jpg)](https://cotovan.com/post/quick-color-adjustments-fixes-riverside/) [How to Use AutoCrop and Reframe Video in RiversideRiverside's new editor detects faces and centres them in one click. Here's how to use AutoCrop, control the zoom, and push the same crop across every matching scene with Similar scenes.![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/icon/Cristi-2-31.jpeg)Cristi CotovanCristi Cotovan![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/08/riverside-auto-crop-feature.jpg)](https://cotovan.com/post/how-to-use-autocrop-and-reframe-video-in-riverside/) [Blue Background Appears in Camera on Mac? Here's the FixIf you're using Riverside on a Mac (or any other recording app) and a blue background suddenly appears behind you in the camera preview, it's not a Riverside bug — it's a macOS feature that's been turned on without you realising. What's Happening macOS includes system-level camera effects that apply to every app using your webcam — Riverside, Zoom, Google Meet, FaceTime, browser-based video tools, all of them. One of these effects is Background, which replaces your real background with a soli![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/icon/Cristi-2-31.jpeg)Cristi CotovanCristi Cotovan![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/5b/aa/5baa4306-14e9-442c-8242-49463a36912f/content/images/2026/02/blue-background-camera-mac-thumbnail.png)](https://cotovan.com/post/blue-background-camera-mac-riverside-fix/) If you're eager to learn more about Riverside and wish to have a one-on-one Riverside coaching session, feel free to book a call with me. I'm here to help you with any questions you have and to guide you through the best workflows, tips, workarounds, or just answer any questions you may have! [Book a session ](https://cotovan.com/coaching) ## Free Riverside Tips, Tricks, and Training in Your Inbox I create regular training content on [Riverside.fm](https://cotovan.com/riverside) \- if you're trying to learn the platform, I intend to teach all the ins and outs. 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