Currently I am scanning many hundreds, soon to be thousands of images and films. DT can do a great with most of the processing but auto levels in GIMP tends to work better at correcting the final colors than the RGB levels module in DT. Also with GIMP once the auto level is applied you have the option to fine tune the result as a curve before applying the destructive change. The levels feature in GIMP leaves Photoshop for dead because of this ability.
I should also point out that in the previous version of DT when I used Filmic V3 I was nearly always disappointed with the saturation of colors because of how the tool was designed to subdue saturation at extreme values. Now with V4 I have better control over the saturation across the whole range of values and get really pleasing results very quickly most of the time. I would suggest to anyone who was disappointed with earlier versions of Filmic that they try V4 with fresh eyes. Filmic takes me back to the days of film when I used different film stock for different subjects and lighting scenarios. Sometimes I want soft film for portraits and other times vibrant film to bring out the colors and contrast. On Sat, 20 Feb 2021 at 02:46, Kneops <kne...@gmail.com> wrote: > True Terry, I think I can agree with everything you wrote :), including > the sometimes necessary combo DT + Gimp. Sometimes I was so involved > with an image in DT, editing much too long, that when I saw the exported > image I was not satisfied at all. Opening it in Gimp and applying auto > levels and the image was finished ;). Working too long on an image and > you can get detached from it and they don't feel 'real' anymore. That > can also be the danger of too many tools. A picture a lot of times > should not be 'perfect' to keep it alive and real. > > > > Op 19-02-2021 om 15:28 schreef Terry Pinfold: > > For me the ability to do localised adjustments with the drawn masks > > using the paths tool and the ability to then feather this mask to get > > invisible transitions is what wins me over to Darktable. I am really > > impressed with Rawttherapee but the lack of localised adjustments is a > > huge negative for me. I also never bag out Lightroom. Lightroom provides > > a very fast and very good photo editing tool that is well suited to a > > studio, wedding, portrait photographer who needs excellent results > > quickly because time is money. On the other hand I find darktable is > > more of an artist's tool giving so much control over the image > > processing, but it takes effort to master and learn. The beauty of > > Lightroom is a few simple sliders to apply effects such as brighten > > shadows, clarity etc. I would never want Darktable to become this simple > > a program, but Lightroom is what suits so many people well. For me it is > > not a competition for which is the best program, but recognising what > > each program excels at. I even find that I often have to finish off > > images using GIMP after Darktable. I really like the way levels work in > > GIMP and the healing tool in GIMP is excellent when restoring scanned > > images with lots of spots. The retouch module in Darktable wins out when > > you have huge damaged areas that need repairing, but can be slow when > > you have numerous small spots. In my ideal universe I would love to see > > the talent of the Rawtherapee developers combined with the talents of > > Darktable developers. So many good ideas in both of those programs, but > > as I said the localised adjustments is the big one for me and I am also > > really impressed with how Filmic allows me to create the 'picture' or > > 'color' style of image that I want. I don't want to replicate the camera > > JPG look or the Lightroom look. I want the look that I want. > > > > On Fri, 19 Feb 2021 at 18:46, Kneops <kne...@gmail.com > > <mailto:kne...@gmail.com>> wrote: > > > > Funny, because when I used DT as my main raw editor I used drawn > > masks a > > lot (!), but since I have a LR license and noticed how well and fast > > sharpness, detail, highlight and shadow recovery work, I have never > > missed it. ;) > > > > > > Op 18-02-2021 om 22:50 schreef Terry Pinfold: > > > I own licences for Lightroom and the whole suite of Adobe > > products. I > > > choose Darktable as my preferred editing program because it is so > > good. > > > I especially love the drawn masks option using the path tool and > > then > > > the ability to feather the result after the fact to get invisible > > > transitions. > > > > > > > > -- > > > > > > > > > -- ____________________________________________________________________________ darktable user mailing list to unsubscribe send a mail to darktable-user+unsubscr...@lists.darktable.org
