As somebody who spent a lot of time in the B&W darkroom 50+ years ago, I often find it helpful to temporarily enable the monochome module before adjusting exposure, and assess the picture from there.
I question whether this could be taken a step further by using the colour picker to assess where known midtones sit. For example, a grey card sat amongst correctly exposed mid-tones, would have a monochrome RGB value of 127 127 127. IIRC under the same lighting, untanned Caucasian skin would be approx 153 153 153. Given that our eyes deceive us but our pictures are likely to include a suitable person, could colour picking be a way to appease those looking for a scientific way forward?
Itâs not relevant where a grey card midtone is located - itâs just relevant what you think should be midtone in your image. Because this is kept constant in filmic.
Unless you are editing images of your greycard
I accept what you say, and I personally have a good grasp on filmic. I can however see why lots of folks are confounded, and in my view some of this can be attributed the evolution of filmic in its various guises and the fact there is lots of outdated advice out there.
Aurelliene has in the past mentioned including a grey card and sampling from it. Bruce Wiliiams posted a video describing a Caucasian human face as being middle grey (which well-tanned Australian skin could well be).
This makes me wonder whether references to mid-tones and middle grey should be replaced with âthe important bits that are to be preservedâ or somesuch .
Following this for some time now it seems to me because the module is quite technical many people feel the need for a technical approach and others offer the âedit with your eyesâ suggestions which does work better IMO but it becomes a circular argument as there are always going to be those types of users I think, ie those that seem compelled to edit by following numbers boundaries and thresholds and then there are those that understand them as guidelines and indicators of change however their edit is based more in response to the visual representation of the image. I think the point is not to convince people of one over the other but rather to suggest all possibilities and get people to use what worksâŚI donât know what it is about DT but so many people phrase questions about the right way to do things when in reality DT offers so many ways to solve most image problems yet it seems to impart this âcorrect wayâ mentality. I think this may stem from the fact that DT can be complicated with all the options and math centric sliders and parameters but more so that it is a tool that really requires understanding on a number of levels about color and digital images and other foundational aspects that many users are not well versed,
In my experience, this happens in all enthusiast forums and communities. But I think you nailed it with your first sentence, which can apply to DT in general. Darktable lays the underlying mathematics and science bare much more than many commercial programs, so I think many users feel it needs a much more mathematical and scientific approach to processing.
BTW @priort, do you post on mobile? I always like to read your posts but I fear your message sometimes gets lost in a wall of text. A few paragraph breaks and clear sentences would help a lot. Just a friendly suggestion because I feel you represent that group of users that sits somewhere in the middle between the programmer-level enthusiasts and the non-technical users who just want their photos to look good (often found on other forums). I know youâre active on FB, helping users out over there with your knowledge gleaned from this forum, and I think this ambassadorial role is useful and important. Apologies if Iâve assumed too much!
Thereâs another aspect to consider. The problem with editing only with your eyes is that the number of variables (sliders) is too large, and since they are interrelated, it quickly becomes very difficult to find a combination that works, especially for captures that are suboptimal to start with.
At least for me, I want to understand what is going on from a technical standpoint to reduce the amount of tweaking required to get a good image â not because I want my image to be technically correct. For example, if I can nail down the exposure, I may then forget about that slider and concentrate on the remaining ones.
I often use my phoneâŚthanks for the feedback. I should strive to be more clear. Thank you for taking the time and effort to articulate your commentsâŚ
EDITâŚplease note there is no sarcasm intended what so ever in my reply. I genuinely appreciated the feedback it was spot on. Nobody need to suffer a stream of comments in a run on sentenceâŚThanks again
Miguel, I could not agree more. I was trying to express that there is often a disconnect that begins outside of darktable. Not having a fundamental understanding of color and basic digital editing when trying to use a tool like darktable to edit pictures will always be less than what it could be. Given this common deficit at the start it seems like many people approach the edit as though DT is a replacement for this knowledge gap and there is a magic combination of sliders that works or will produce the correct path to the end result.
At the same time it might be great to edit with your eyes but if you donât understand how to give your eyes what they desire then having a bunch of sliders wont help even when you might roughly know what the slider does in the module
So I think both aspects ie the technical knowledge and having a keen eye and visualizing are important, I just think that the missing link in processing between start to finish is often color theory and basic image editing concepts rather than mastering DTâŚif that makes sense
Appreciate it. Itâs always a pitfall of online discussion and email that the tone is not always obvious. But your comment seemed completely genuine and Iâm glad my comment wasnât taken as criticism, because that was definitely not the intention.
