thats the lightroom way because there’s just this way to do crop and rotate - and so it’s quite common to lightroom users
The darktable way ist different. Rotation doesn’t relate to cropping. It’s just get the correct orientation of the image. Cropping is done later to allow e.g. cloning stuff from later cropped areas.
It’s a different workflow - that doesn’t imply that the lightroom way is not appropriate.
Maybe a developer finds a way to do both with one control - you should file a feature request using: https://github.com/darktable-org/darktable/issues/new?assignees=&labels=&template=feature_request.md&title=
If you want to do the same rotation or cropping on different images, you can do this by copy/paste the setting (current implementation) or both independent settings (upcoming release).
The grade of user friendlyness is based on one’s experience. I personally prefer the darktable way because i can assign the rotation to a midi interface (using upcoming release) so i don’t need dragging a mouse but just rotate a knob - and what’s more user friendly than to control rotation by rotating something
This would be very useful. Affinity has a similar function. Does not have to be a limit, simply show the estimated file size before you hit export would be good enough.
You’re right, user-friendliness is entirely based on one’s experience.
Rotating through a midi interface ? that arouses my curiosity. You mean you plug a peripheral which takes over some of the controls of the modules ? Or you use the midi knobs as a generic replacement for the mouse scrolling ?
@st.raw
In my opinion a limit would be better when dealing with many pictures, so that exporting a bunch of pictures under, say, 1 or 2mb each, would be easier using the best jpeg compression ratio available for each picture. But for a single export, an estimated file size can come in handy.
I think gimp does this by exporting a temporary jpeg based on the compression ratio chosen. This is why the preview option must be enabled to know the file size when exporting.
I don’t know if there’s a way to estimate the file size before encoding the actual file.
There could be a use case that is currently not really possible with the new or really to some extent the old tool…not sure how to best describe it but running through the new rotate and perspective and then crop…you can arrive at a point where it might be nice to tweak the rotation of the cropped view that you have created and not have to go back to perspective which is using the whole image or the auto crop at the time it was first invoked…you could still zoom in to a similar region that you have in the cropped view I suppose to tweak your rotation either for leveling or straitening something or creating an angle for a creative purpose…it would just be nice to be able to tweak rotation in the full screen cropped view rather than fiddling a bit…
For example lets say you have a scene and you pick a roof line or something to do your levelling but then after you crop there are elements in the crop that are not strait and are distracting…say a small post or whatever…now you have to go back to rotate you get a different view…zoom in find the post straiten it as you like and then go back to crop to see that it looks as you expect…
I think tinkering like this could be common and shouldn’t require this back and forth.
Perhaps this is me missing something… In this way I do prefer the RT method with a leveling tool just always being available as an icon and you just use it and the change gets passed to the module…
I’m not aware of how it’s done in RT since I didn’t try it yet, but adding a separate control for cropping and rotating [with changes passed to the more complete module(s)] might be a good idea.
Since there’s already a separate control for the exposure and black point in the histogram, it wouldn’t break Darktable’s design that much.
Small adjustments and tweaking do require an easy access to commonly (might be hard to define “commonly”) related modules. e.g. I find myself often re-adjusting the exposure in the histogram while working on the filmic module.
@MStraeten
This is really nice. I can see a lot of situations where this kind of control would be fantastic.
I might test it if I find myself a cheap compatible midi controller
you can change rotation whenever you want - and this affects the whole image independently from cropping. I really can’t imagine why a rotation on a cropped area could differ from the rotation of the whole image.
If you have a valid use case for that, you simply can reorder pixel pipeline to do rotation after cropping…
As i wrote: better think in use cases instead of controls.
I’ll do a walk through as likely I wasn’t clear you will see what I mean I will do a short video….I know that I can change rotation whenever but not while cropped and displayed full screen as I said imagine you have two elements hypothetical but you level as I said based on the roof line…so nice and level for that view of the image…But now you do a substantial crop…maybe the roofline is not even in the image after you crop …Now maybe you have a sign post or mailbox or something in the crop that is crooked and a distraction…it would be nice to just draw a line on it in that cropped view at full screen display and just have it rotate and adjust the crop using the crop setting For this scenario at least as I worked it you have to go back to the rotation module……then the view jumps out of the full screen cropped display…you would need to zoom in to simulate the crop find the sign post and level it……so it is not an issue to complete the task but it seems like it could be smoother…I will have time later to make a short video and you can critique my steps in case I am missing something obvious….basically you can simulate it by leveling an image, do a substantial crop …now look at the image and decide you want to rotate it based on some element in the image….where do you go from there…. Back to rotate correct?? Then you lose your full screen cropped preview etc etc….
Long text for a quite simple scenario:
activate rotation module, zoom in on the small object you want to realign after cropping, set rotation, zoom out.
Of course this scenario can also be done with a crop frame allowing rotation as it’s done in lightroom. But the darktable way is far from being too complex…
You also have to make sure that the object you align on will actually orient the image as you want it:
while a rooftop may very well be horizontal in reality (if the building isn’t too old), that doesn’t mean its projection in the image should be horizontal. And there is no reason to believe a signpost is vertical in all cases.
i don’t see an issue there, you can rotate as you want, you aren’t limited to horizontal or vertical structures.
I don’t get your intention: there aren’t limits on how to rotate stuff in darktable or something that’s completely impractical to be done without the lightroom way.
You also don’t need to convince me, that the lightroom is a valid solution too, thats obvious …
Its not complex but its extra steps that should not be necessary. As a result of your cropping if you notice the need for a small adjustment to the rotation you shouldn’t have to go to another module and lose the current version of the displayed image likely fire up the pipeline a couple of extra times etc etc….I’m not saying it can be done…but something like this in ART….you crop….if you notice something need in alignment you select the level tool icon and make the adjustment and it gets transferred to the rotation module. No need fiddle around and zoom….
wait for next generation input, then define r+scroll (or whatever you want) to control rotation and you don’t need to switch between modules or drag some edges
There’re more solutions possible than the lightroom one…
To be able to rotate and crop at the same time, you can also setup a shortcut for the “angle” setting for the Crop and Rotate module (darktable 3.6).
Go in the darktable settings => shortcuts => “processing modules” => crop and rotate => angle and set there a shortcut for the dynamic field.
Here I’ve set it to Shift+R. That means that, whenever I press Shift+R and I rotate my mouse wheel, the value of the angle will change and immediately be applied. This will allow you to crop and rotate with your mouse without having to move to the slider.
I always keep saying I will define some dynamic short cuts and configure a quick access panel to my liking but I never get around to it….crappy fall weather may help me find the time….
EDIT:
Thanks for the reminder…set it up in rotate and perspective with R scroll works great…Just had to create an auto preset as well for the rotate module as ti only has ± 10 degrees…I set it to ± 90 which should suffice for most of what I would ask of it…
The shortcut workaround is ok, but very slow. Might be related to how Darktable refreshes the image.
Yet it’s better than having to get back to the slider, thanks.
@MStraeten
I don’t mean to bother you, please don’t take it badly, but is there a problem suggesting a feature that is present in lightroom ? I might have gotten it wrong but you seem to be annoyed by this. Would it be different if that feature came from an other software ? (I think that’s quite a common way of scaling and rotating things)
fully agree with priort… Separating rotation and cropping would be a bad idea and makes more tedious the processing of images in real life (like wedding). I strongly encourage not to do it. Thanks
P_L is right I suggest, we all don’t care if LR or other software work that way : if Darktable community finds it useful, why not implementing it ? No reason to be different just for the sake of being different.
Its already done…new crop module only module and rotate and perspective redesigned and combined but the quick access panel and dynamic shortcuts can really work around most any issue…assigning scroll_r allows you to rotate from anywhere…just like using it for exposure with E to tweak that any time…
Lots of history of DT bashing and not being up to Lightroom standards or doing things the Lightroom way etc etc …will often yield this sentiment intended or otherwise in responses…
