The photo in question was shot under very, very bad conditions and requires a lot of work. To keep it simple no attempt has been made to reduce noise.
First version is base curve + shadows and highlights. Second version is base curve + Gaito styles relying on tone mapping and blend modes. Third version is filmic rgb + tone equalizer.
prepare a filmic curve with grey = 18%, and adjust black and white to input (donât spend too much time tweaking)
build a sinus in tone equalizer, centered in -4EV, then use the mask exposure compensation to drive the brightening/darkening pivot. I got too lazy to adjust the amplitude of the sinus (set to 1.5 EV), so I just used a 50% opacity to soften, instead of re-adjusting every slider.
raise the local contrast quite a lot (150%). Note that, on this pic, because the grey point wis adjusted before filmic, local contrast seemed to behave better before filmic in the pipe (default order is after).
Youâve said this several times, yes, but youâve failed to tell us what youâve tried, what is lacking, and where you feel youâre failing. There have been several suggestions here about paths to take. Have you tried them?
âI want a good starting point, quicklyâ is way too vague and means too many different things.
Maybe you need to make a few Play Raw threads and see what people come up with.
While trying the different proposed ways of working I have a new question which came up. If I want to use a LUT for a specific look, when is the best time to apply? Right at the beginning of the processing or later after I finished fixing the basics like contrast, exposure and so on?
Of course you are right, my apologies. Itâs fairly safe to assume that I have tried a lot of things and ways to do this, including some of the methods suggested in this, and other threads (Iâve been lurking for quite some time ), and have watched Bruce Williamsâ videos a few times too.
Iâve been trying to use some of the workflows mentioned in recent threads, such as removing Base Curve, and using the RGB modules (mainly Filmic RGB). Iâve been working up the module order (as I would work top to bottom in Lightroom), applying the âBasicâ module for exposure and black point (and maybe Saturation/Vibrance as needed), then moving onto the Filmic RGB module, and finshing with shadows and Highlights if needed, I also use the Contrast Equaliser (rather than the Sharpen module).
Whatever I do with those though, I still end up with a rather flat image that has no âpopâ at all.
I do seem to get slightly better results using a non-Filmic method, using Base Curve, Basic Adjustments and Sharpen. This is pretty much the same workflow I use in Lightroom.
But, whatever I try, I cannot get to a point that the image is something Iâd want to share.
Iâll perhaps, as you suggest, try posting a new thread with some of my Raw images.
I understand but for a JPEG file often the WB is offâŚnot talking RAW here. I have a large number of old vacation shots etc that are not works of art but were shot quickly to capture a moment and the spot white balance does an excellent job almost every time to correct that so why would we perhaps not want the ability to have a module applied in a static or fixed manner but where necessary have it recalculate I am sure there are other applications for this âŚI am also talking about when they are added to a style and not necessarily in the normal work flowâŚonce applied there would be not need to reinitialize âŚI just used it as an exampleâŚAurlien replied to me by message that color balance could be used to achieve this by setting the values out of bounds essentially and they will reset themselves as they are not staticâŚI will have to try that âŚ
+1 to that. Iâve learned a lot about how the respective tools work doing PlayRaws. Make sure you also post an objective JPEG, one that âpopsâ, and folk will attempt their approximations and post their XMP files for you to consider.
Thank you for the response. I like your version. The resulting image is rather dark just like the original scene. I notice that you have been true to the methods described in your paper and Iâm looking forward to do some experiments and satisfy myself that this approach is superior to the other methods.
I tried to edit this photo a long time ago with the old version of filmic but gave up. The new filmic is much better and easier!
I never anticipated that editing such a problematic photo could or should be easy or automatic.
No, you think you recognize the car! Experts have informed me that this is not a Chevrolet Bel Air as it should be. Itâs a similar styled car shown in the exhibition while the Bel Air is being restored.,
This is indeed what I meant by my original question.
Just between you and me: When I arrive home with a collection of new photos I develop the photos in RawTherapee batch and browse the resulting jpgs to select the ones I like to edit in dt. This is the fastest way in my opinion. I can start the process with only one click on a BAT-file and the pc will do the rest.
I disagree with people stating that if you donât want to spend a long time editing your photos in dt you should just settle with the out-of-camera-jpgs. No, not true! You can do so much better with relatively few adjustments in dt including the automatic perspective correction which I use a lot. A wonderful tool!
If filmic rgb is the new (best) way of editing then dt should use filmic as the default and guide you to use the tools compatible with filmic rgb.
Donât use base curve before filmic, this isnât a scene referred workflow, use instead the color balance module.
One simple workflow is just exposure, color balance and filmic, in this order.
1)First activate the filmic module with minimal contrast and gray at 18% because itâs needed to view the scene referred image trough the display.
2)Every tone manipulation has to be done with exposure and color balance(before the filmic module)
3)recover the highlights using the filmic module
Iâve tested this workflow in photoflow and darktable and iâve to address a big issue with the darktableâs filmic.
In the third point darktable modify too much the overall brightness and contrast of the image
Thank you! You are absolutely right and it was not my intension to use base curve in this example. I must have forgotten to turn it off working with multiple versions of the same image.
Itâs more or less full edit (with noise reduction, etc)
However, Iâd like to lighten the rear wing a bit, but as usual, struggling with the Tone Curve module gave me no success.
Because that module use the lab trc, not very suited for curves adjustment.
I suggest to use the base curve as a replacement to tone curves ( enable cubic spine and no color preservation)
Simple old workflow (exposure,gamma,s-curve) DSC_0667.NEF.xmp (10.1 KB)
I actually did mean the Tone Equalizer
Iâm fine with using curves since DT 0.6, but the TE is beyond my abilities to comprehend and to do something useful with it.
darktable-chart:
why not ship those user created styles for every camera with darktable? every manufacturer has different Picture Mode/Control (Neutral, Standard, Portrait, Landscape, Vivid, MutedâŚ)
So Beginners get different good looking results with just a few clicks.
I have created them for my Olympus OM-D EM 5 Mark II
There are some others on https://dtstyle.net/
), and have watched Bruce Williamsâ videos a few times too.
