Demonic_Duck
Man your hard Л sounds like O and soft Л -- like И. But you're absolutely right about lowering and rising of the tongue to make them hard or soft. And a thing to remember about Л is that its main sound is being made when the tip of the tongue is bouncing off the roof of the mouth or just getting in touch against it. In other words pronounce it in somewhat plosive way to make it sounding perfect.

Explanations here:
Getting started with russian phonetics - Russian Language Forums

Here's the link:
http://webfile.ru/5027843

It's my own post there so feel free to ask here if something is not quite understandeable. And I'm going to attach some pictures maybe here and there in a short while so it'll get easier to understand the positions.