Note: At the time of me writing this, I am at work and do not have access to actual images to upload, however will provide samples later on today.
So here’s my issue, and I wonder if any of you have encountered this, and whether you have a solution for it. I went on a trip back in May of this year and while there I edited some of the raw images. I am currently working on putting an album together and wanted to edit some more of them, as well as tweak some of the original edits. I find that the RawTherapee I am using now (the most recent appimage available on https://rawtherapee.com ) is leaving out curves settings and perhaps even white balance when opening the files. My reference point is the few files I edited and exported back in May. I am going to check the pp3 files and see what version I had going back then and see if I can get it installed in order to compare. Samples and pp3 files to follow; but I wanted to write this now in case any of you have any experience with this
Just a thought: Has there at some point since release of v 5.0 been any major change in the pp3 file syntax - which could cause a newer version of RT to not interpret an older pp3 correctly?
I don’t think they guarantee backward compatibility with pp3 files. The tools change and their functions change. V5.4 brought some great new tooling, like the auto match tone curve that might be overriding what you had before (though I don’t know that for sure).
One thing is for sure, back up those sidecar files!!
Forgive my ignorance, but your statement “One thing is for sure, back up those sidecar files!!” seems useless as per the OP’s remarks, unless you can run an older version of RT to make use of said older, maybe-not-forward-compatible sidecar file.
(Also forgive me for the long sentence…)
You can always run an older build. The source code is open. All OP would need to do is examine his sidecar file, find the version of RT (which is inside the sidecar file, as I understand it), then checkout the source and build the necessary version. OP won’t get support from the developers on an older version, but he is certainly free to use whatever version he’d like.
There have been several changes to existing parameters in PP3 files, but in most cases RawTherapee maintains backwards-compatibility. I doubt curves and white balance would experience any issue between any 5.* release. We will need to see those sample files.
So the mystery has been solved! I’ve played around with different versions and even found the original pp3 file for the raw file. Long story short, it’s not RawTherapee’s fault, I’m just an idiot. The edits were done on an older version of RT and in a hurry while on holiday so I could submit something to Facebook. In order to shorten the processing time, I’d just fix exposure levels and applied the Fujifilm 400H clut, which I love. For some reason, though, when I open the file it does not load the clut so therefore it looks plain. I also assumed that the “plain” (mostly lacking colour contrast) look was due to curves being missing, which they were not, it’s just that the clut provides a more vivid feel.
Further conclusions:
So RawTherapee did change a lot in the last few versions; especially love the changes to highlights/shadows and sharpening/tone-mapping, however developers were kind enough to not change much in terms of the order in which things are expressed in the pp3 syntax. Plainly, this means that newer versions of RawTherapee are able to quite well handle older pp3 files, even if doing the same thing in a newer version may look different (ie: better performance in demosaic or better colour handling). The only exception would be the tonemapping (I think), in which case the tool has been completely reworked, looks radically different when applied, and is found in a different spot. I haven’t tried it myself, but I believe that compatibility may be there even the other way around, as in using a new pp3 on an older version of RawTherapee. Obviously the features that didn’t exist back then would not have any effect, but I don’t think it would crash it.
I’d like to thank all of you for stepping up to help a fellow user, especially since I rudely asked a specific question without the decency of posting any actual samples Much appreciated!
@paperdigits you’re right about backing up the pp3s. It’s quite annoying how opening a raw file with the wrong version might accidentally overwrite the original pp3 and so on. RawTherapee could improve on the pp3 front, but I’m not saying that as criticism, I’m rather happy with the way things work
