Potential improvements to import and copy in Darktable.

I also use a file manager to manage files. Often a Norton Commander clone (aka Orthodox File Manager): Multi Commander on Windows (yikes! its website is currently gone! – update: it’s there, but is only accessible via plain http, not https), and Krusader or Midnight Commander on Linux.

Thanks for the suggestions. I actually do not rename the files, but I like to have them put in folders based upon date. DT is doing this very well and I have saved it as a preset.

I was surprised to see the developers improving the import functions of DT. I primarily see it as an editing program, and a very good one at that. I have no desire to see DT become a LR. LR is too simple, but it is easy and fast for those unable or unwilling to learn the far more sosphicated editing options in DT. I also like RawTherapee, but the ability to do masking so well in DT has won me over.

Why? That is how an active open source project works. Things get a little bit better each time until its great. We don’t need a budget or to satisfy a market, “because we want a better application” is enough.

RawTherapee and ART also support local adjustments. See

https://rawpedia.rawtherapee.com/Local_Adjustments

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Greetings Terry,

I also agree with you that DT is killing LR and I think your request is much needed but as an “until then work around” what I do is sort the import files by date and pick the day in question. I do rename the files based on Date and Time taken and I end with a sequence number in case my rapid shoot takes two a second. If I then accidently import a photo twice it will create a new rendition of the photo instead of realizing it has already been imported. So, I understand your request is very legitimate.

Thanks for your response Kofa. I haven’t explored ART. But when I last looked at Rawtherapee when it mentioned support for local adjustments I felt the local adjustments did not compare to the great masking system in DT. I feel Dt has the best masking system I have used. I often use a drawn mask with the path tool to roughly select the subject. No need to be too critical. I then apply the adjustment such as a new instance of exposure. The transition is terrible at this stage but clearly reveals what I have done with the adjustment. I then add feathering and blurring radius for the mask until I achieve an invisible transition. I just love the way DT lets me do this. Of course there are also occassions when I use the parametric masks. DT’s real strength to me is the masking and that is why it has won me over from both LR and Rawtherapee. This is based on my experience and I respect that different people will have different experiences. BTW, what impressed me with Rawtherapee was the ability to tackle noise by picking different demosaic algorithms. Now I see a similar option in DT and I am very impressed.

Hi Paperdigits,
As a humble user who is incapable of coding I never felt the right to demand something from the developers or to criticise the developers or DT. I certainly felt no right to ask for a replacement to LR. I have used DT since about 3.2 and the developers seemed focused and motivated at improving the editing side, which they have done very well with. I yes I was surprised a developer felt motivated to improve the DAM capabilities of DT, because that did not seem to be a primary focus for them. So my suggestion here is what I hope is a small task for a developer (since the feature exists for the add to library). However, it would have great benefits when I put my memory card in to copy just the new images. As ever, I am so appreciative of the hard work and dedication of the developers.

Not necessarily hopeless:
image

But as there are a lot of waiting PRs in the pipe, you may have to be a little patient…

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Does this screengrab indicate that someone is working on it?

Yes, I do.
The identification of the image is done with its original name and its timestamp. This should work for the memory card you mount on your computer.
EDIT: should work too for mounted cameras.

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Will it work if you rename the images after import? That was my main concern when I was thinking about how to implement this.

This is not perfect, but original name (DSC12234.NEF) plus timestamp should work in most of the cases.
EDIT: I main have answered to another question. If the rename process doesn’t make the image lose its metadata, this will be stable.

Thanks for your work on this. It would also be great if it saw an edited image which, would now be a tiff or Jpeg with a different name and/or different file extension as a new image. I am not sure how challenging that would be for a developer. Maybe in preferences new image on import could be selected based on original file name or current file name.

Sorry, I don’t get this. For me the reference IS the source …
Can you explain a bit more what you think about ?

Here is the corresponding PR. Volunteers for testing are welcome.

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ART has masking more like DT but only on a subset of the tools…probably enough …I don’t think the brush mask is a vector mask like the one you draw in DT…

Hi Todd,
there is one problem with ART, the name is so generic that for the life of me I can not find it by a google search. However, I still feel that the ability to use the masks in DT is such a strong point for the program. For instance, being able to use multiple instances of the color calibration module and drawn masks is a unique way of tackling mixed lighting. I want masks on every possible module.

https://www.google.com/search?q=art%20rawtherapee

Thanks Kofa, I thought it was a fork of GIMP becuase some people find the name offensive. Yet strangely enough there is a dance troup in New York called the GIMP project for dancers with disabilities.

I feel Rawtherapee has a more ‘typical’ GUI and is easy for people to pickup compared to DT, but the masks are so critical to my work practices that Rawtherapee was placed on the back burner for me. In my imaging universe I would love to see a program called Darktherapee which merged the greatness of both programs.

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Art does it a bit differently…it lets you keep adding masks within a set of pretty comprehensive modules…so the instances are introduced as a new mask…it hard to explain until you play with it