After I had posted the long read, the lingering question was - why do we have to put so much effort into revising one raw processor or the other or choosing between them?
Is it not possible to take the best bits of each, without having to, re-write the code and merge them into a single darktable module.
My other side is musical, and in that world, the digital and analog processing there does not think only in terms of this processor or that processor, when you can have a bit of this and a bit of that. You could plug any digital processor anywhere in the chain, In series, in parallel, like Shakespeare said - as you like it… For example, you can have several equalisers in the chain, each doing what its best known for. Top end (high frequency) enhancing, another processor for the bottom end. (bass). By the time we listen to most music, its been through several equalisers. And in that world, its normal.
In that world, plugins are the norm, taken for granted, and it all works together, from different developers, seamlessly without any committees to decide. I am not the first on this thread to publicly express a wish that darktable would be plugin enabled. Who knows, one day, one day…anything is possible…
We are familiar with HDR, Focus stacking, Panorama composites, combining images.
What’s stopping us, as end users, when we do not have the interest, responsibility or ability to code digital light benders(e.g. modules), from taking the output of one image processor and combining it with the output of another raw processor, in our own custom ways, in series, in parallel or both, not bound to whatever each processor design is capable of. And this can happen outside of darktable, or inside darktable.
So that’s how I have used sigmoid since my prior post, in combination with other raw processors, and each is chosen, by experience/testing, for their strengths on different areas of the same image. Colour rendition, highlight control, contrast definition, etc.
With this revised compositing approach, I’m 100% satisfied with sigmoid, just as it is, for my current use case, and appreciate the aspects in which it excels, moreso since I no longer have to choose one way or another, with only one image processor(or module), for all of the scene to display referred transform.
I’m now familiar with the sigmoid controls, so for me, no longer an issue.
Here is an image composited from s-t-d referred processing with sigmoid, and the s-t-d referred processing from another raw processor.
Some of my previous efforts on the same image here :
The raw file is in the other thread.