Darktable 3.6, simple working instructions needed

You don’t need to be afraid, filmic will play a very small role in the processing.

Interestingly, my experience has shown that a large part of the people I have dealt with who have difficulties with Filmic - I know that sounds a bit arrogant - have knowledge gaps in other areas and think Filmic is the problem.

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Then you have to tell me how to help you, because the modules are very well described in the documentation. I mean, I can’t explain them any better.

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I linked the relevant manual section very early on in the thread. You’ve complained that it is too abstract, but the section I linked is literally numbered steps. Again I implore you to read this section.

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This is a key point and filmic often gets treated as being equivalent or superior to a base curve or starting color profile in other software so people try to keep tweaking it to get something similar when this is not exactly what it provides . As you have shown many edits can even be done perfectly well without it…I even recently blended filmic in lightness blend mode just to see what it would do and in many cases I prefer the look although I may be introducing something else…I think experimentation is really the key but some basic understanding of the color science and the math is very useful…

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reverse multiply is still there…all reverse modes are invoked using the small icon to the right of the blend mode selected… this and other new features are documented here…I think a German translation is available?? darktable 3.6: Summer Release 2021 | darktable

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https://www.darktable.org/usermanual/3.6/en/guides-tutorials/other-resources/

In addition (pick your level and presenter) for a range of content and presenter style check out these…

Frank Walsh
https://www.youtube.com/c/FrankWalsh/videos
Stefano
https://www.youtube.com/user/MEL365com/videos
Hal
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8CZCvZL3ic2hg074Quh2oA/videos
Nicolas
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxHYygok15XQ6bqu9FK-oCw/videos

Hardcore explanations …well worth looking at once you master some basics…
https://www.youtube.com/c/AurélienPIERREPhoto/videos

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I am very pleased that you are so persistent and want to help, but I still understand too little to ask concrete questions.
Today I have again spent the whole day with 3.6, without it having brought me further. I have no more strength and it is very difficult for me to learn, understand and connect so much at once.

Hang in there you will win in the end… :slight_smile:

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Ok. Then take your time, and if you have need help/have questions, we are at your disposal. :+1:

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Thats a valid approach, but your issue would have been analyzed within a few posts if you just had provides a picture showing your issue and a xmp file of your usual edits.
Then it’s quite easy to reproduce and find a solution.
But it’s up to you to help the community helping you…

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I’m looking at how to simplify the workflow section, and bring it up-to-date with the darktable 3.6 modules. I propose to drop the display-referred vs scene-referred discussion, and move the module non-recommended modules to an appendix. The idea is to provide a basic framework here, and possibly provide some worked examples in the Guides and Tutorials section. I would be interested to hear any feedback.

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That is clear and excellent. I really like the way you explained it. I think if there was a way to work a pair of images in to your initial description of how lightable will show images initially by default as a jpg and then it goes to the relatively “unprocessed” version you describe…This often seems to generate a lot of question with thinking that DT has done something to their images… but I really like it and i think it would be a very useful inclusion

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Is this what you mean? (in the actual manual, the images would be rendered smaller and place next to next other in a single row).

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I like this step by step approach, it’s very clear and there is just enough description behind each point.

In the filmic RGB point you mention the white auto picker but not the black.

I know using the black auto picker isn’t as reliable as the white auto picker due to noise, so do you think new users will use the black auto picker, assume it works as well as the white auto picker, then be disappointed with the results ?

I’m unsure how to get the point across that the black auto picker may not work well, even if there is pure black in the image.

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This is nice Matt I had been thinking more about how the lightroom preview is by default the jpg preview and the change in the image on the shift to darkroom view concerns many and leads them to think some thing is wrong. I think your images are great as is this add on…if it could be worked in that DT will initially preview images to appear as shown in figure 1 but will open and present as the raw file as shown in Figure 2 when you first go to darkroom and there after it might then be a clear description of the initial presentation and handling of images in the basic DT workflow…not sure of the wording but that is what I was thinking…its a very nice little breakdown I like how it is presented…

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Thanks Todd. I added a remark to that effect, although I want to be careful not to get too bogged down in this overview section, and so I didn’t link this to the corresponding option in the preferences section.

Next step will be for @elstoc to review the PR and provide his view. If anyone has any further suggestions, feel free to write a comment on the PR.

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For sure you don’t want to make it too involved and lose or get side tracked from the clear and concise workflow message…

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Thank you very much for this, it is very helpful for me and exactly what I was looking for!
Please don’t think it’s ignorance, but I’m working less intensively on it now because it’s still quite difficult for me, especially with the English manual. I now occasionally practise with 3.6, but I will probably not change all the work until there is a German manual.
@all:
I’m trying to learn more, but it takes a lot of time, it’s very difficult for me and I’m learning very slowly. As I make progress, I’m sure more questions will come up.
Until then, thank you so much for all your help!

There is one article in c’t which explains - among other modules - filmicrgb. It appeared almost a year ago but I think it’s not outdated yet. The title is “Landschaftsfotos optimieren mit Darktable”.
One or two weeks ago another article appeared in the computer journal Linux User about darktable 3.6. It also explains color balance rgb from a practical viewpoint.
I don’t want to link them here because they are behind a paywall. But at least the newer artice is not expensive I think.

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Excellent work, Matt. Very clearly expressed, and concisely includes the motivation for each module.

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