darktable 2.4.0

[Austinian]

What are people's preference between DarkTable and RawTherapee?
I devoted quite some time to RawTherapee a while back, when I was all in with Linux Mint (KDE). Since then, am back with Windows 7 for the time being, but if recommended, after reading some of these comments here I am willing to give this DarkTable a serious shot.

It's been quite a while since I tried RT. I recall finding that it offered a large number of processing choices, but I thought it was complex to use. Others will have more recent knowledge than I, and I'm not motivated to do anything difficult since I have very good Windows raw processing already.

Darktable's controls seem fairly intuitive to me, and the default is a decent starting point which makes learning easier (though it doesn't affect the ultimate capability for a skilful user to get results).

 

[sankos]

What are people's preference between DarkTable and RawTherapee?

The major difference between them, as far as I'm concerned, is that the official version of RT doesn't do localized edits (yet), whereas dt is the most comprehensive raw converter I have used when it comes to localized edits (you can even liquefy on the basis of raw data).

For me, dt offers the following advantages over RT:

1. layers, blending modes, parametric masking (this is huge)
2. multiple instances of some specific modules/filters can be used to stack effects on top of one another
3. support of Adobe-generated xmp's (mainly things like star-rating, labelling, keywording, geotagging, but also there's some attempt to read some basic processing commands written into the xmp by Lr)
4. geotagging (map module), HDR-merge into DNG, slideshow and tethering
5. raw overexposed area indicator (vs. RT's raw histogram) -- both are useful, though;
6. more customisable GUI for an average user -- you can hide the less useful modules in dt to simplify your workspace
7. more output file formats
8. some specific modules, e.g. high and low pass filters, exposure fusion, liquify, more flexible perspective correction, spot removal, local laplacian filtering and bilateral blur in many modules -- they allow you to design your own, customized version of Clarity, moire-removal, red-eye removal, localized defringing etc. (you're not just stuck with one developer's idea of e.g. what is the best type of Clarity effect) -- power-users who know how blending modes interact with various filters can take advantage of this, IOW you've got some ingredients to design your own editing tools as alternatives to the ones which already exist in the program.

RT advantages over dt:

1. R-L deconvolution sharpening (a deconvolution module for dt is in the works)
2. support for both Adobe-based DNG/DCP and ICC camera profiles (dt supports only ICC profiles): the embedded Tone Curve and Look Table can be enabled/disabled at will, whereas with dt you have to design your ICC profile in a specific way, so the workflow is more complex than it could be
3. support for both Adobe-based LCP lens profiles and the LensFun database
4. flat-fielding
5. more demosaicing methods at your disposal (but dt supports AMaZE, which is usually enough for me)

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Why matters

 

[Austinian]

So many toys, so little time!

Very true!

I was wrong - I found a hazy photo from the X-T20 but did not find the haze removal tool in Darktable 2.4.0. Of course Google hasn't crawled the user manual yet, if a writeup for dehaze exists.

It took me a while to find it, but a haze removal module (and more) does exist; they're in the easy-to-miss little "more modules" module.
I did a quick compare between PhotoLab and DT's haze tools; they both seem to work pretty well. DT's has stronger settings, but maxed out it's well into "bad HDR" territory on my test image; I'd score them as about equal in practice.

There's a lot to DT I haven't even begun to investigate. Much of it I probably won't need anyway, but it's fun to play with.

 

[sankos]

It took me a while to find it, but a haze removal module (and more) does exist; they're in the easy-to-miss little "more modules" module.

Right, it's easy to miss this customization feature if you're a first-time user. See here for the description of how this works.

A gotcha that I faced when I was starting out was that when you click the second time on the symbol of one of the module groups (de-highlighting it), all the available modules show up (in the fixed pixel-pipe order). Click it once more, and it shows you only the modules relevant to the specific group. The module group symbols I'm talking about are right under the histogram.

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Why matters

 

[Austinian]

It took me a while to find it, but a haze removal module (and more) does exist; they're in the easy-to-miss little "more modules" module.

Right, it's easy to miss this customization feature if you're a first-time user. See here for the description of how this works.

A gotcha that I faced when I was starting out was that when you click the second time on the symbol of one of the module groups (de-highlighting it), all the available modules show up (in the fixed pixel-pipe order). Click it once more, and it shows you only the modules relevant to the specific group. The module group symbols I'm talking about are right under the histogram.

Thank you, I wondered how to turn on all the modules without clicking through the list.

When you say, "in the fixed pixel-pipe order" what do you mean?

Also, is the histogram a true raw histogram, like FastRawViewer?

 

[sankos]

When you say, "in the fixed pixel-pipe order" what do you mean?

Most raw converters have a fixed order of the processing commands which are performed after you hit the Export button (usually it's not important for the user to know this, but dt users are a curious lot, and this information can be useful when you want to obtain a specific effect and the fixed pixelpipe doesn't let you). Dt always shows you that the modules at the bottom come before the ones above, kind of like the stack of layers in Photoshop (the Background layer is always at the bottom). See here for a better description.

Also, is the histogram a true raw histogram, like FastRawViewer?

No, darktable can only show you raw overexposed warning, which you could argue is more useful, because you see where in the photo the overexposure takes place (and which channels were clipped) -- a raw histogram only tells you that overexposure takes place somewhere in the photo and how serious the channel clipping is.

More on darktable histograms can be found here.

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Why matters

 

[Bobthearch]

Just gave it a quick spin...

I hate the whole idea of "importing" and "collections." And it created unwanted files in my photo archive folders. But at least, unlike Corel Aftershot, I was able to turn off sidecar files in Options.

It was obvious the DT developing tools are incredibly strong. In fact they had to be applied with restraint in order to prevent halos and exaggerated effects.

I will leave it installed for a while in order to explore it more and address my curious questions as they arise. Overall I continue to prefer LightZone. LZ never leaves unwanted additional files in the photo archive folders, and I find it's layout and organization more intuitive.

 

[Austinian]

When you say, "in the fixed pixel-pipe order" what do you mean?

Most raw converters have a fixed order of the processing commands which are performed after you hit the Export button (usually it's not important for the user to know this, but dt users are a curious lot, and this information can be useful when you want to obtain a specific effect and the fixed pixelpipe doesn't let you). Dt always shows you that the modules at the bottom come before the ones above, kind of like the stack of layers in Photoshop (the Background layer is always at the bottom). See here for a better description.

Also, is the histogram a true raw histogram, like FastRawViewer?

No, darktable can only show you raw overexposed warning, which you could argue is more useful, because you see where in the photo the overexposure takes place (and which channels were clipped) -- a raw histogram only tells you that overexposure takes place somewhere in the photo and how serious the channel clipping is.

More on darktable histograms can be found here.

Thank you, good to know.

 

[sankos]

Just gave it a quick spin...

I hate the whole idea of "importing" and "collections." And it created unwanted files in my photo archive folders. But at least, unlike Corel Aftershot, I was able to turn off sidecar files in Options.

Well, it's an almost aesthetic thing, so it's pretty subjective and can be argued both ways. I used to hate sidecar files because they make a folder look messy (unless you use Sort by file type) but once I understood that they may be a safety net in case my database catalog file gets corrupted, and that it allows various programs to share (some) information with one another (star-rating, keywording, geotagging), I find that xmp-compliant applications are an asset rather than otherwise. I think it's important in order to fight the suspicion of being entrapped once you commit to one kind of DAM application.

I use dt alongside Lr and like it how the former picks up certain things from the xmp files (it doesn't have to reverse-engineer the Lr catalog). If dt didn't do that, or if Lr didn't let me create those xmp's, I might complain about being walled-in by Adobe with respect to tagging, rating and keywording.

It was obvious the DT developing tools are incredibly strong. In fact they had to be applied with restraint in order to prevent halos and exaggerated effects.

They can be as subtle as you want. Haloing can usually be prevented by using things like the Darken blending mode, changing the Gaussian blur to Bilateral (if that's what the offending module uses) or using layer opacity and/or parametric/manual masks. Once you set it to your liking, save it as a processing style (preset) for future fast-tracking.

I will leave it installed for a while in order to explore it more and address my curious questions as they arise. Overall I continue to prefer LightZone. LZ never leaves unwanted additional files in the photo archive folders, and I find it's layout and organization more intuitive.

Yes, I liked how streamlined the program felt. However, I found LZ too limiting for me, e.g. I couldn't use camera profiles (I usually don't like the embedded dcraw/generic Adobe-sourced matrix ICC profiles as my starting point). I couldn't remove things like CA, PF or moire locally, etc. What I liked, though, was layers, parametric masking and blending modes. In my usage Lightzone would always have to be used with a pixel editor, whereas darktable lets me accomplish more without having to generate a secondary full-sized RGB file for most of my raw files.

 

[Photographic Memory]

Just gave it a quick spin...

I hate the whole idea of "importing" and "collections." And it created unwanted files in my photo archive folders. But at least, unlike Corel Aftershot, I was able to turn off sidecar files in Options.

It was obvious the DT developing tools are incredibly strong. In fact they had to be applied with restraint in order to prevent halos and exaggerated effects.

I will leave it installed for a while in order to explore it more and address my curious questions as they arise. Overall I continue to prefer LightZone. LZ never leaves unwanted additional files in the photo archive folders, and I find it's layout and organization more intuitive.

 

[maltmoose]

Thought i'd chip in my experiences with Darktable from a fuji perspective.

ITS FAST, really fast to load fuji xt20 files. It makes it harder for me to want to use my full paid applications as they are glacially slow to load fuji files affinity/luminar to name a few.. oh acdsee cant do compressed raf and dxo just cant be bothered with fuji at all.

Be careful though as some settings can make darktable very slow to export files. (at least on my average system) I think the equalizer is the offending module, which is a fantastic tool for clarity type settings.

Some of the noise settings were way too aggressive but can be toned down. Increasing the patch size seems to help.

The one thing that is currently bugging me a little is the color rendering, its nice for some colors but quite off for others. I'm hoping theres some way of adding some kind of color profile to get closer to original colors or more natural colors. I think RT was better in this respect.

 

[Bobthearch]

A very thorough reply, worthy of a response for sure.

Just gave it a quick spin...

I hate the whole idea of "importing" and "collections." And it created unwanted files in my photo archive folders. But at least, unlike Corel Aftershot, I was able to turn off sidecar files in Options.

Well, it's an almost aesthetic thing, so it's pretty subjective and can be argued both ways. I used to hate sidecar files because they make a folder look messy (unless you use Sort by file type) but once I understood that they may be a safety net in case my database catalog file gets corrupted, and that it allows various programs to share (some) information with one another (star-rating, keywording, geotagging), I find that xmp-compliant applications are an asset rather than otherwise. I think it's important in order to fight the suspicion of being entrapped once you commit to one kind of DAM application.

I use dt alongside Lr and like it how the former picks up certain things from the xmp files (it doesn't have to reverse-engineer the Lr catalog). If dt didn't do that, or if Lr didn't let me create those xmp's, I might complain about being walled-in by Adobe with respect to tagging, rating and keywording.

That's my thing. I don't want any cataloging or databases, DAM, or inter-program compatibility or sharing. I don't mind these things being included as long as they are non-intrusive and/or optional and/or can be turned off. Orphaned filed left dumped in the photo archive folders will especially not be tolerated.

At the end of my developing and editing sessions I want only two things, the RAW file in original condition and my finished product exported as a jpeg.

It was obvious the DT developing tools are incredibly strong. In fact they had to be applied with restraint in order to prevent halos and exaggerated effects.

They can be as subtle as you want. Haloing can usually be prevented by using things like the Darken blending mode, changing the Gaussian blur to Bilateral (if that's what the offending module uses) or using layer opacity and/or parametric/manual masks. Once you set it to your liking, save it as a processing style (preset) for future fast-tracking.

Yes it was actually impressive, the amount of adjustment allowed by the software. Like every other program, it would take an investment of time to learn the nuances of DarkTable. It is unquestionably quite powerful.

I will leave it installed for a while in order to explore it more and address my curious questions as they arise. Overall I continue to prefer LightZone. LZ never leaves unwanted additional files in the photo archive folders, and I find it's layout and organization more intuitive.

Yes, I liked how streamlined the program felt. However, I found LZ too limiting for me, e.g. I couldn't use camera profiles (I usually don't like the embedded dcraw/generic Adobe-sourced matrix ICC profiles as my starting point). I couldn't remove things like CA, PF or moire locally, etc. What I liked, though, was layers, parametric masking and blending modes. In my usage Lightzone would always have to be used with a pixel editor, whereas darktable lets me accomplish more without having to generate a secondary full-sized RGB file for most of my raw files.

Perfectly reasonable, and quite insightful.

 

[Bobthearch]

Ah yes, Lightzone, I do hope there will be an update one of these days. Another gem in the "best things in life are free" offerings. Has been a while, but I always remember having fun with Lightzone!

To be honest, I use my Nikon Capture NX2 software for most RAW developing. But software happens to be a hobby of mine, and I'm always installing and trying new titles.

To a new Nikon RAW shooter looking for a low-cost developer with basic editing capabilities, I would recommend using the free Nikon software due to the cost and inter-compatibility. But often people are specifically looking for OpenSource options, particularly Linux users. And those people have three basic options, LightZone, DarkTable, and RAWTherapee. Of those three, Lightzone is the most intuitive and easiest to learn.

 

[sankos]

At the end of my developing and editing sessions I want only two things, the RAW file in original condition and my finished product exported as a jpeg.

Fair enough. As you said, the program should give you a choice in this respect, and thankfully, a lot of contemporary raw converters are like that.

 

[yanisha]

That's my thing. I don't want any cataloging or databases, DAM, or inter-program compatibility or sharing.

What you want is just a raw converter that does not have any cataloging, etc. If you want free then what you want is Rawtherapee.

 

[sankos]

Thought i'd chip in my experiences with Darktable from a fuji perspective.

ITS FAST, really fast to load fuji xt20 files. It makes it harder for me to want to use my full paid applications as they are glacially slow to load fuji files affinity/luminar to name a few.. oh acdsee cant do compressed raf and dxo just cant be bothered with fuji at all.

Darktable and RawTherapee developers are actually quite proactive in the way they support various flavours of raw files, reaching out to users to submit samples for an analysis. I've had quite the opposite experience with a(n expensive) commercial package, where I was told by the support on a couple of occasions over the years that they'd add a support for a given camera if an unspecified number of people submitted a request for it -- simply put, some of their clients get the support without begging for it, whereas others have to stand in line as if they paid less for their product and were asking for a favour. I'm not inclined to support such practice if I can help it.

Be careful though as some settings can make darktable very slow to export files. (at least on my average system) I think the equalizer is the offending module, which is a fantastic tool for clarity type settings.

Also a lot of localized edits can bog any system down, but that's just a fact of life for commercial software as well. A solution for that is baking the raw file into a working tiff file the moment the program gets slow. It breaks the non-destructive workflow but for some types of work it's unavoidable, e.g. portrait retouching. Another option is making sure you use the computing power of your graphics card.

Some of the noise settings were way too aggressive but can be toned down. Increasing the patch size seems to help.

The one thing that is currently bugging me a little is the color rendering, its nice for some colors but quite off for others. I'm hoping theres some way of adding some kind of color profile to get closer to original colors or more natural colors. I think RT was better in this respect.

I make my own camera profiles with a free command-line utility DCamProf. There's a commercial version of it called Lumariver Profile Designer. There are also other possibilities, like CoCa (free) or RawDigger + MakeInputICC, not to mention some more expensive solutions.

Another way is using darktable's own tools and/or ColorMatch.

You could also try using Capture One ICC profiles by Scottie Wang or others. Those profiles made specifically for the use in C1 have to be processed in a special way in darktable -- you need to use the "unbreak input profile" module and probably change the first value (linear) to 0.0500 from the defaults. Additionally, you'd have to use a custom "base curve" that is less contrasty than the default Fuji one.

So, as you can see, there are some options

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Why matters

 

[sankos]

Oh, apparently a new version of LZ is here. Add to that PhotoFlow, and we've got an interesting series of raw developments (couldn't resist the pun).

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Why matters

 

[maltmoose]

Thought i'd chip in my experiences with Darktable from a fuji perspective.

ITS FAST, really fast to load fuji xt20 files. It makes it harder for me to want to use my full paid applications as they are glacially slow to load fuji files affinity/luminar to name a few.. oh acdsee cant do compressed raf and dxo just cant be bothered with fuji at all.

Darktable and RawTherapee developers are actually quite proactive in the way they support various flavours of raw files, reaching out to users to submit samples for an analysis. I've had quite the opposite experience with a(n expensive) commercial package, where I was told by the support on a couple of occasions over the years that they'd add a support for a given camera if an unspecified number of people submitted a request for it -- simply put, some of their clients get the support without begging for it, whereas others have to stand in line as if they paid less for their product and were asking for a favour. I'm not inclined to support such practice if I can help it.

Be careful though as some settings can make darktable very slow to export files. (at least on my average system) I think the equalizer is the offending module, which is a fantastic tool for clarity type settings.

Also a lot of localized edits can bog any system down, but that's just a fact of life for commercial software as well. A solution for that is baking the raw file into a working tiff file the moment the program gets slow. It breaks the non-destructive workflow but for some types of work it's unavoidable, e.g. portrait retouching. Another option is making sure you use the computing power of your graphics card.

Some of the noise settings were way too aggressive but can be toned down. Increasing the patch size seems to help.

The one thing that is currently bugging me a little is the color rendering, its nice for some colors but quite off for others. I'm hoping theres some way of adding some kind of color profile to get closer to original colors or more natural colors. I think RT was better in this respect.

I make my own camera profiles with a free command-line utility DCamProf. There's a commercial version of it called Lumariver Profile Designer. There are also other possibilities, like CoCa (free) or RawDigger + MakeInputICC, not to mention some more expensive solutions.

Another way is using darktable's own tools and/or ColorMatch.

You could also try using Capture One ICC profiles by Scottie Wang or others. Those profiles made specifically for the use in C1 have to be processed in a special way in darktable -- you need to use the "unbreak input profile" module and probably change the first value (linear) to 0.0500 from the defaults. Additionally, you'd have to use a custom "base curve" that is less contrasty than the default Fuji one.

So, as you can see, there are some options

 

[CAcreeks]

The one thing that is currently bugging me a little is the color rendering, its nice for some colors but quite off for others. I'm hoping theres some way of adding some kind of color profile to get closer to original colors or more natural colors. I think RT was better in this respect.

Do you have any examples?

With Fuji X-Trans Raw files, color rendition seems very similar to out-of-camera JPEG.

But I see from your equipment list that you don't have Fuji cameras.

 

[Iliah Borg]

Also, is the histogram a true raw histogram, like FastRawViewer?

No, darktable can only show you raw overexposed warning,

So does FRV, and using data supplied by the camera manufacturer in Makernotes. Plus it can show underexposure warning, set in EV, according to photographically useful dynamic range, graded by ISO setting

a raw histogram only tells you that overexposure takes place somewhere in the photo and how serious the channel clipping is.

That's not all what a raw histogram tells

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http://www.libraw.org/