Are photo editors superfluous?

I have been down the rabbit hole, thanks to amazing creators such as Harry Durgin, and realize that using a Raw editor such as Darktable (which I started using because of its photo management ) is a whole new world.
But since I started out before hand with Affinity (which in itself is an great piece of software), I am completely confused- if Darktable is so amazing (it is!)- why the hell do I need a Jpeg editor afterwards?
Shouldn’t it be enough to tweak ones Raw images’ exposures, WB, light levels etc etc with Darktable etc? Isnt it a bit superfluous to export the Raw as a Jpeg and then to waste time going over it with the same type of controls with another photo editor- or am I missing something here?
Apologies if the question sounds a little silly, but I have trawled the 'net for about a year looking for advice and so far- nothing…

Are you referring to what might be termed pixel editors?

When I really want to carefully finish a photo, after I run it through a raw editor, I go to GIMP to perform pixel manipulations, such as cloning out sensor dust and dodging and burning to adjust tones.

These sorts of adjustments are more or less out of scope of a raw editor, though you don’t necessarily need to perform them that often.

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Every year, the RAW tools get better and more capable and what you need to do in a pixel editor becomes less and less. Especially if you are talking about editing photos. I can do 95% of what I need to in something like DT.

There are still things that need a pixel editor although I long for the day when everything is in one place and I don’t need to use photoshop/gimp at all.

As I just wrote in another thread, a raw file is like a kitchen full of raw ingredients, while a JPEG is like a ready-baked cake by a specific chef. A raw file allows you to make far more adjustments (and at far higher quality) than a JPEG file. For example try adjusting the white balance of a raw file vs the out-of-camera JPEG file.

Why would you use a raster image editor after having used darktable? Simply because darktable is designed to allow you to get the most out of the raw file (mixing the ingredients, rolling the dough and baking it), while a program like GIMP does not concern itself with raw things and instead focuses on the stuff the comes afterwards - healing, painting, other sorts of local editing, and putting the cherry on the cake.

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The only thing you seem to be missing (apart from @Morgan_Hardwood’s point) is that the answer to this question is extremely personal! It is obvious that you do not need JPG editors. Some others may. Not because they can’t do their manipulations in a raw editor but because they don’t PREFER to. Different strokes for different folks.

In my opinion, one should not talk about a JPG-editor. I would prefer pixel-editor. This is because the transition to JPG should occur only at the very end of all image processing steps. Especially several editing sessions on a JPG input will lead to quality losses. Also heavy image processing with only 8bit/channel can be problematic.

Hermann-Josef

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After learning to use LR - and now switching to dt - I find I only use a pixel editor when I need a quick crop to a specific pixel-size plus save-for web (I manage several websites). LR/dt can probably do that just as well, but I can do it faster in PSE.

I have seen the light! Thanks guys, for the revelations- It is a breath of fresh air for me.
Up to now, I havent heard from anyone the ‘heresy’ that maybe for some people, the raw editing (and final exporting as TIFF or JPEG) can be enough!
I bought Affinity a year ago and was blown away by the excellent vimeos showcasing the endless possibilities. but as you know, Affinity isnt a photo management program and I also needed that.
Enter DT , which offers management and raw editing.
I realise that some folks are used to skipping between 2 softwares; one for management and one for editing, but if the management program does editing too…
Has anyone compared the raw editing capabilities of DT to those of Affinity?

Exporting a processed raw file as a jpeg and then editing it in some other image editor is a very silly thing to do. Jpeg is an 8-bit file format, whereas raw processors these days typically work at 32-bit floating point precision. Even more than being an 8-bit file format, jpeg compression introduces all kinds of compression artifacts.

Jpegs can indeed be successfully edited if that’s all you have to work with. But as you are starting with a raw file, if you intend to do further editing after exporting the image from the raw processor, export at least at 16-bit integer, and preferably 32-bit floating point, as a png or tiff or exr file.

These days raw processors such as darktable, RawTherapee, PhotoFlow, Lightroom, etc do much much more than simply interpolate raw files. These days raw processors are also “pixel editors” to use @Jossie 's term. Most of what people spend their time doing in the various raw processors is not just interpolating the raw file, but also “pixel editing” after the raw file has been processed into an image file.

In PhotoFlow it’s obvious when you’ve moved past the raw processing stage and into the pixel editing stage, as you have to add a new node to continue “pixel editing” the image that results from processing the raw file.

In RawTherapee, all the strictly “raw processing” algorithms are located on one tab, currently the next to the last tab in the user interface.

In darktable, the strictly “raw processing” steps are not so clearly laid out separately from the other steps. But nonetheless, always, in any “raw processor that’s also a pixel editor” (which is to say just about all of them these days) first the raw file is interpolated to make an image file. Anything after that is pixel editing.

So please don’t think everything you are doing in darktable (or any other raw processor that’s also a pixel editor) is “raw processing”. Because it’s not. Only the raw processing steps are working directly with the raw file, to make the image file. After that, all the editing is “pixel editing”.

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It very much depends on the type of photo. Landscape, still life, wildlife, I can usually make do with what’s available in Darktable, which I prefer to do because it’s non-destructive and easy to version with git. But if I need to get into some more complex compositing, I’m gonna have to use a raster editor. And of course portraits go straight to Gimp for retouching

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@rafi266 I use DT for both RAW and JPG, no wastage there.

I don’t even bother going to GIMP 'cause it’s like the Lightroom-Photoshop situation again (why??) Though it has its uses, it’s super-rare for me.

I don’t think anything is superfluous as long as you have a use for it. When I do a PlayRaw, my workflow makes use of multiple apps. Certainly, there is a pattern to what I end up using but I do try everything before deciding what to do with the raw file; the forum just sees the final product.

A pattern of use is what you should be looking for and a desire for exploration in order to find it. This philosophy works with any part of photography and life in general. Don’t get caught up with what you should or shouldn’t use; which software is better; or whether sticking to one is better than using many.

This comment is worth discussing. I don’t use Adobe products anymore, but when I did, something was really bothering me. I think it was how the apps overlapped. It was a bloody mess where there would be an obvious feature that was missing in one app but available in another. It goes like this:

Why the heck would they leave x out in app a? Are they trying make me frustrated? Let me use app b then. Oh dear, it doesn’t have y. This is stupid. Now I have to go back to app a. Now what? Are you telling me I have to go to app c that has x but not y? Where was I again?

In my opinion, the distinctions among FLOSS apps are clearer. I know exactly what darktable, RawTherapee, etc., do and what GIMP, etc., are for.

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I am with @afre here. You would not use your smart watch to hit nails, you will look for a hammer for that :wink:

The same with software. It is just tools that support you. Use whatever does that better (or whatever you know better) and makes you happy with your result!

what is Playraw?

play_raw is a tag collecting the threads where users post a Raw camera image file, and others use free / open source software to interpret the image.

https://discuss.pixls.us/tags/play_raw

Some people are raw converters only, some do photo editing also, some like to mix things up.

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