Starting to feel stupid

I read the RGB vs Lab article here as well as the filmic sticky. I understand about 1/3 of those posts.

I’ve just installed darktable for the first time. I’m willing to put in some time to learn things but I’d rather learn things right (correctly) from the beginning.

It seems like darktable is in the middle of a fairly major transition?

Are there new tutorials I should focus on to get in the habit of doing RGB modules first?

I’m using a 4k tv as a monitor (TCL 55R617) fwiw.

This is a good place to look:
https://darktable-org.github.io/dtdocs/overview/workflow/edit-overview/

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mek42
You are not the only one who found this challenging so don’t worry about it. For me it took some time for it all to sink in and it’s a continuous learning process but it’s all worth it.

Bruce Williams has an excellent set videos https://www.youtube.com/user/audio2u/videos

Including darktable ep 071 - 10 modules to get a new user up and running

I find scene-referred easier to use. The main difference is:

  • with display-referred, you have your input’s ‘levels’ (not a technical term; I could also say brightness) influenced by exposure and base curve. If either of those introduces clipping (at either end), you lose information. It can be very hard (e.g. with backlit scenes) to keep the highlights and raise exposure in the shadows. You can try to do it by modifying the base curve (which takes you from the ‘physical’ (linear) domain to your display-centric ‘editing’ domain), and/or by adding curves (e.g. tone curve) after the base curve. Some operations, which are related to physics (haze removal, lens correction etc.) are best done in the ‘physical’ domain.
  • with the scene referred workflow, it does not matter if you blow highlights before you hit filmic. So, using the backlit scene as an example, you can use the exposure module to lift the shadows. If you increase contrast in the ‘colour balance’ module, and you blow some highlights there, again, that’s not a problem. In filmic, you can select where your picture’s white point should be. Filmic de-saturates highlights and shadows, but you can use the ‘latitude’ control to make the range where colours are kept intact wider (you may need to lower contrast in filmic). Also, you can use the highlights-shadow balance control to slide the range of colours to be kept intact up and down around the mid-grey point. After filmic, you can still add more modules (curves etc.) to shape your picture further, but there you’ll have to be careful with clipping.
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Good little summary The Darktable Scene-Referred Workflow | Avid Andrew

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Mark much of this is referring to video but you can apply the same logic to your camera, sensor dynamic range etc…its a 5 part blog that additionally works through creating a custom LUT for your camera again using video from a Nikon D5200 as an example but you can translate much of the information to stills. Its a nice read and should make understanding the application of a "linear or scene referred: workflow more relatable. Adventures in Scene Referred Space - Part One — Paul Chambers 3D

Mark, @Bruce_Williams has an extensive set of Darktable videos. This one is directed at newbies and you might find this to be helpful: https://youtu.be/06V0XwmM0l4

You don’t need any of the technical jargon.

Don’t be overwhelmed by all the modules, you can hide most of them away.

With just Exposure module and Filmic RGB module, try the following:

  1. Using the Exposure module, adjust the image until the midtones look good. Ignore highlights and shadows, don’t worry about clipping here.
  2. Using the Filmic RGB module’s highlight adjustment slider, move it until your highlights look good.
  3. Using the Filmic RGB module’s shadows adjustment slider, move it until your shadows look good.

You should now have an image has good global contrast, and should be ready for local adjustments, if necessary.

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I’d also recommend you submit some images to our PlayRaw and then you can see how everyone else is using the tools.