I don’t think I ever surfaced the word nightmare, or anything close to it.
It is a combination of things (some smaller, some more macroscopic) that create an unnecessary barrier to entry.
1 Like
I’ve been reading too much reddit.
4 Likes
This forum should allow 
as a reaction other than 
5 Likes
You are right, Davinci Resolve has been a while… But I recall stuff from there in darktable! Thank!
1 Like
If users are expected to have “no intuition” about a module meant to be used to do relatively basic operations on their images, perhaps it would be better to add a layer of abstraction that could be intuited.
I do not agree with this. No matter what, users who dedicate themselves to using the module beyond just presets will build a mental model of what each control does. This mental model will be based on what effect each control has, not in understanding how the math works. Doing this proactively is not that hard.
Here is an example of some control renaming ideas of the top of my head:
Global
- Iterations (can stay, relatively understandable)
- Detail Protection (previously central radius)
- Effect Radius (previously radius span)
- Sharpening (moved from edge management)
Effect by Scale Level (Sharpen ↔ Diffuse)
- Large Forms (previously 1st order speed)
- Medium Forms (previously 2nd…)
- Small Details (previously…)
- Micro Details (…)
Edge Behavior by Scale Level (Accentuate ↔ Avoid)
- Large Forms (previously 1st order anisotrophy)
- Medium Forms (previously 2nd…)
- Small Details (previously…)
- Micro Details (…)
Effect Management
- Edge Protection (previously “edge sensitivity”)
- Surface Protection (previously “edge threshold”)
- Shadow Protection (previously “luminence masking threshold” under “diffusion spatiality”)
I don’t see how the above is not better than the current control names. I din’t remove a single control, and none of the underlying terms were necessary to keep.
What do we use to define “accurate”? Accurate as in what it does? Or how it does it? If we pick the latter, we would’nt call it “exposure”, we would call it “uniform pixel luminance adjustment” 
.
Diffuse or Sharpen leans heavily into “Accuracy in how it works”, instead of “Accuracy in what it does”, and the latter is really the only thing users need or want. Not all users are developers or scientists, and the module is obviously supposed to do something useful for users, so the controls should reflect the things users want to do, rather than obscure parameters used within the engine of the module.
I am not saying the module should be dumbed down. But we have the ability to abstract, and we should use it in situations like this.
3 Likes
Are they? In the world of video they are, but if I’d ask my working still photographer friends what toe and shoulder is I’m pretty they wouldn’t know. I should try. 
I think there could be a middle ground though. Like just because something is an improved/different approach to accomplishing a thing, doesn’t mean that the UI has to be very different. Again, with abstraction we can simplify this for users, while still using the awesome internals:
Here is an example of a better UI abstraction for the Color Calibration CAT tab:
White Balance (prev. the tab name was “CAT”)
- Method (prev. Adaptation)
- Color Temperature (prev. CCT)
- Light Source (prev. Illuminant)
- Temperature Adjustment (prev. temperature)
Right now the colors on this control are actually showing what color will be mapped to white… which is not intuitive at all. Just flip the colors around and it will work the same and everyone will understand it
. - Gamut Compression and the option to Clip Colors outside of the Gamut could be moved to a “Gamut Controls” collapsible panel.
No controls removed, all internals still working just as they do, but with better names and more intuitive control.
3 Likes
To be fair, if photographers don’t know, they should learn it 
I see no reason for the field to remain “dumbed down” when video editors have shown that everyone has the capability to learn these more technical terms and there really doesn’t exist a barrier.
Fair enough. Lightroom is 19 years old.
And that is good question. Not one that I recall, not one that I have used. And one that I have found.
But that is exactly why I question the choice of naming the labels.
If you compare darktable with other raw editors, then the terminology in darktable is rather different from other editors. That this is an effect of exposing the underlying math that is understandable. But it is a very valid question to ask how established these terms are - given that they are not used by other raw editors. That is not poor logic.
I actually LOVE that darktable gives me this much control.
But I question from time to time the time the used terminology. Also see the last remarks of @mikae1 and @thumper
Both of your examples are very good Thank you.
1 Like
Yesterday, I read something about Ansel Adams’ zone system:
Criticism has been raised on grounds that the Zone System obscures simple densitometry considerations by needlessly introducing its own terminology for otherwise trivial concepts. Noted photographer Andreas Feininger wrote in 1976,
I deliberately omitted discussing the so-called Zone System of film exposure determination in this book because in my opinion it makes mountains out of molehills, complicates matters out of all proportions, does not produce any results that cannot be accomplished more easily with methods discussed in this text, and is a ritual if not a form of cult rather than a practical technical procedure.[12]
Much of the difficulty may have resulted from Adams’s early books, which he wrote without the assistance of a professional editor; he later conceded (Adams 1985, p. 325) that this was a mistake. Fred Picker (The Zone VI Workshop 1974) provided a concise and simple treatment that helped demystify the process. Adams’s later Photography Series published in the early 1980s (and written with the assistance of Robert Baker) also proved more comprehensible to the average photographer.
1 Like
No they don’t… Neither does Capture One. My remark was more that Mica was referring to film of the 1990s. And that Lightroom is (much) younger than this.
I am not arguing against not using any abstraction whatsoever, since toe and shoulder in a way are already abstractions in themselves, but there already exists software which simplifies these things a lot more, why should darktable be one of them?
It’s not like we are discussing complicated things, as there is even a curve preview. Any user can figure out what it means in three seconds by moving the sliders and watching the curve preview change.
It’s not like the D&S sliders where without knowing the maths or reading the manual you will have a hard time understanding it intuitively. I don’t get why this is even a discussion.
1 Like
Because you just draw that curve on; it’s not generated with any maths like AgX’s. Same as tone/base/rgb curve in Darktable.
Small aside: The ‘shoulder’ in the AgX graph is reminiscent of a ‘knee’ in any audio compressor. But they don’t have ‘toes.’
3 Likes
I did some digging and the terms were published in 1920 and used to describe film now for over 100 years also they appear as standard terms of reference on the ACES web site so it’s not an abstraction in DT as you note also it’s pretty straightforward to understand or at least if you are going to use a curve something you should be comfortable with. I like the technical terms in DT but I realize I might be biased and I am an N of 1.
2 Likes
Sorry, I didn’t explain myself correctly. I meant that toe and shoulder are abstractions of elements of the curve, not that they are only an abstraction present in DT
1 Like
I wonder of relevant film terminology of the 90s is to most photographers today.
Some of these could be misleading and inaccurate for example the scales. If you don’t change the direction sliders then 50% first order and -50 second order will cancel each other or be additive if the are the same polarity. It’s the interaction with the second set of sliders that determines the adjustment. Also the initial section borrows from the contrast eq and so used common terminology. So for sure in some cases better names might be out there but there can be reasons also for a given layout and set of terminology.
Just look at the exercise of naming the new POC contrast module…extrapolate that to slider names…
What ever I said it was meant to agree with you not call out the wording in your post…
1 Like