I am always blown away by how proactive the developers are at improving DT and adding new features. I don’t know of any other program free or paid for that has this level of development. And this is all done by volunteers…amazing.
Just yesterday I learned about a new module in DT4.7 called overlay (edit: name may be changing to composite). This module is something I never expected from the developers or to see in any RAW editor, but it will allow me to blend bracketed exposes based on my own masking (well that is my use for the module).
Despite me exclusively running the latest weekly builds put together for Windows and reading the release notes of what changes are incorporated each week this one flew under the radar and I never realized it existed. I wonder how many more new options I am oblivious to. So hence my question, "What is your favorite new feature in darktable? "
I will start the ball rolling and say the improvements to snapshots are one of my favorite new features. I am not sure if this is a V4.7 thing or if it is in V4.6, but snapshots now remember or are linked to history so if I create a snapshot and continue editing I can compare my current edit to the snapshot. If the snapshot is better I can click on the history icon to the side of the snapshot and restore my edit to that point of time. The reason this is so important to me is that I shoot a lot of high ISO images and juggling the best settings for noise reduction and sharpening can require a few attempts. This allows me to identify the best strategy and get back to those settings efficiently.
I like very much the work being done on the new Color Equalizer module. Between it and the not so old RGB Primaries module, I feel like all my color adjustment needs are covered. I am very grateful to this group of immensely talented developers.
(Well, we might be highjacking Terry’s thread here, but these new canvas enlargement and overlay features clearly have the potential to become my favorite new dt feature. Perhaps split to have one thread cover these new features?)
The new features obviously will alleviate one of my two needs for transferring images to Gimp: Retouch from something outside of an image.
But reading the PR and the discussion I am still somewhat uncertain whether my other Gimp-need is also met, that of creating diptychs:
Will we be able to expand the canvas somewhat in all directions with white color around the image, with a much larger expansion in one direction wide enough to place an image beside the first image (and with some white canvas in between) - and then export it?
If “yes”, we’re solidly within answering Terry’s question.
– but it also makes another question arise: Will we be able to create triptychs, also?
EDIT: And whatever the answers are: Thanks a lot to Pascal and the others who have contributed to the new functionality!
Thanks for the clarification - this is really good news. ¡Gracias!
Yeah, I can see that there is a side here that I haven’t thought about:
When I create dip-/triptychs with gimp, I usually first export from dt finally edited images in lower resolutions before I establish the composite in Gimp. But unless we do something in advance, dt will work with both/all images in full resolution.
Right, this might be going off topic for this thread, but:
Would the overlay feature be useful for dark frame subtraction/hot pixel removal?
Ssensors can have hot pixels in fixed positions, and the best way to remove those is subtraction of a black frame with the same exposure time. But, for best results, the subtraction should be done with the raw images (or at least before demosaicing).
“This new content can be scaled, rotated and shifted horizontally or vertically.”
Combined with a mask, this sounds like we will get an instrument for not only placing images straight besides each other, but also being able to compose a diptych e.g. by adjusting sizes and offset so as to have lines in the two images connect with each other. Very good!
I’ve really missed such functionality, so I suggest that “creating diptychs or triptychs” are included in the release note as examples on what can be achieved.
(Dream On: Using culling mode to identify two images that could possibly play well together for a diptych, and then activating a function in that view so as to open them up in darkroom for further treatment by new modules. Dream Off.)
Not hijacking, this is why I started the thread to get a conversation going about new features. It is interesting that I read the PR and the use described there was so different to the immediate use I saw of combining bracketed exposures. It worked so brilliantly for combining bracketed landscape images using a gradient mask.
I second that. I never would have thought of adding such a module to a RAW editor, but a brilliant idea and it opens so many possibilities for the future. However, one limitation compared to GIMP for me is that darktable seems unable to handle transparency. If I open an image where I have isolated a bird and have it saved with transparency instead of sky the image opens in DT with a black background so I can’t just superimpose it using the new overlay module (or have I missed something ?).
That’s such a brilliant feature! I’ve dabbled in many a raw developer, and none reach the simplicity and precision of Darktable’s right-click menu. Genius!
I too love this module, although it’s not new! My only wish is that it could be updated to be more robust with the scene-referred workflow. I submitted a feature enhancement request but it sounds like it would be very complex and no one wants to tackle it right now. I’m also wondering if the new Color EQ module will replace it in my workflow. But there’s something about the interface I really like - sample a colour, shift click to add it to your palette, make adjustments, repeat as necessary, done. No messing with masks or curve smoothing. Although there are trade-offs for that simplicity because you can’t push the sliders very far at all.
Although I could nominate some of the modules already mentioned, I’m going to go with the Color Assessment “lightbulb” toggle, which is not very new, but newish in the grand scheme of things. It’s such a simple little tool, but so effective. I always used to struggle with colour casts, specifically not spotting them, and I’d often come back to a photo I’d spent a long time on previously and say “What was I doing there, where did that ugly green cast come from?”.
Now, I just switch on the lightbulb and can immediately see if there’s colour cast and also how well exposed it is. Reducing the size of the image to thumbnail size with the Color Assessment conditions turned on is a great way to get a sense of how good your exposure and colours are.
