Huge fan of DarkTable. As someone who doesn't want to lock my whole photo-processing pipeline into a subscription-based model for the rest of my life (Lightroom) it's by far the most powerful tool at my disposal.
That said, pain points for me have included:
- Managing multiple databases across multiple machines. My use-case is I have a central database with all photos on one machine. Generally do initial edits on another and then move the files across. I have yet to find a workflow - with the "Local sync" feature, or simply moving files and their edit files across the network - that feels simple. Should be noted that dragging files + their XLF's from temporary machine to primary machine wont import into the "database" for you. And you have to make sure all your directory structure and naming schemes are the same on all your machines.
- The community around "styles" (presets) doesn't scratch the surface compared to Lightroom's. There's one main website [1], but it's not really curated. I'd like to see more blog posts and pros offer these.
The difficulty managing files across multiple machines is not unique to Darktable. It's anywhere the CAP theorem is relevant. Even Adobe's Cloud.
Darktable's database is not the single source of truth. Functionally, it's an index over the XMP sidecar files. When it's deleted, rebuilding is 'simply' a matter of reimporting all the files. The XMP sidecar files are the actual data records...well ok, so are the images but they're immutable.
Local-sync's is inherently mutable state semantics. That's probably never what I want in my workflow. Disk space is cheap enough that I don't find an append only workflow cost prohibitive. Particularly since duplicating a Darktable image only consists of a new XMP file there's little point in overwriting an existing one to save a few bytes. [1]
Practically speaking, local-sync doesn't work for me because it munges filenames. This breaks my tiered backup logic...or rather complicates reasoning about it beyond the number of brain cells I can commit to it.
What I think I want is more tooling for operating outside of Darktable (I already ingest images from my camera with Rapid-Photo-Downloader). Two tools in particular. One which takes a list of XMP files and generates new XMP files based on Darktable's duplicate semantics. The other an inverted index of all the XMP documents. The goal is to move file operations outside of Darktable where they can be automated in the shell.
[1]; XMP files could be versioned with Git if duplicate files are a problem. They aren't for me.
As for styles, I noticed it too, but this got a huge boost with the addition of 3D LUT support in darktable 2.7. Here’s a site with free LUT’s: https://freshluts.com
Regarding databases across machines, would not Syncthing [1] work for this? Storage is fairly cheap these days, so having an exact copy of everything on two machines would not be that bad.
On a personal note, I desperately want to get into using darktable as Lightroom is the last piece proprietary software that I rely on. However, it seems Leica M8 support is still “not there” [2]. They do link to how to help out by adding support at the top of the page, but as mine was stolen two years ago I am not much help and I do want to be able to support my range of cameras dating back to 2006.
The three things on the list are conveniences not necessities. They are features of individual modules that provide a UI over several pixel pipeline operations that can be done in other ways. White balance can be done without using the presets (that's mostly how I do it). Denoising can be done with tools besides "profiled denoise." I do use it. I often shoot slow lenses at high ISO's (1600-12800) and it was the easiest tool to learn without understanding what I was doing. I've never used custom matrix because my camera isn't supported. I don't miss it. You might I guess.
But none of these are core features. And none are the only way to accomplish the things they do.
As someone who doesn't want to lock my whole photo-processing pipeline into a subscription-based model for the rest of my life (Lightroom) it's by far the most powerful tool at my disposal.
Couldn't you just outright buy a Capture One license?
I used to pay for a photo editing software and used it for years. Then they got bought out by another company and the SW languished. And there was no easy way for me to migrate my photos away from it. Today I cannot even run the version I bought - incompatible libraries, etc.
Photos will last longer than the SW used to edit them. Don't lock them in.
Neither LR nor Capture one lock in your photos though. The edits will be locked in I suppose but I don't see a way to not lock them in. Are you saying that Dark Table somehow doesn't lock in your edits?
At least LR does not lock in your edits; I'm fairly certain Capture One doesn't either. You can export either XMP sidecar files or DNGs with the edit history bundled in along with the RAW data. LR's centralized catalog is just an SQLite database, I believe, but I don't think the schema is documented publicly.
Genuine question, are those edits usable in another app though? I.e. even if the XMP notes that I used a range mask with some color filter, if capture one or DT aren't capable of this or aren't capable of reading the sidecar files, isn't this a de-facto lock-in?
DT is open source, so even if it is abandoned, you have hope of still getting your edits. You have hope that if the original authors decide to abandon the project, someone else will take it on, etc.
I once bought a Lightroom license. Then they ditched all updates and moved to a subscription model and slowly made it unusable. Won't make that mistake again.
Comments
Huge fan of DarkTable. As someone who doesn't want to lock my whole photo-processing pipeline into a subscription-based model for the rest of my life (Lightroom) it's by far the most powerful tool at my disposal.
That said, pain points for me have included:
- Managing multiple databases across multiple machines. My use-case is I have a central database with all photos on one machine. Generally do initial edits on another and then move the files across. I have yet to find a workflow - with the "Local sync" feature, or simply moving files and their edit files across the network - that feels simple. Should be noted that dragging files + their XLF's from temporary machine to primary machine wont import into the "database" for you. And you have to make sure all your directory structure and naming schemes are the same on all your machines.
- The community around "styles" (presets) doesn't scratch the surface compared to Lightroom's. There's one main website [1], but it's not really curated. I'd like to see more blog posts and pros offer these.
[1] https://dtstyle.net/
The difficulty managing files across multiple machines is not unique to Darktable. It's anywhere the CAP theorem is relevant. Even Adobe's Cloud.
Darktable's database is not the single source of truth. Functionally, it's an index over the XMP sidecar files. When it's deleted, rebuilding is 'simply' a matter of reimporting all the files. The XMP sidecar files are the actual data records...well ok, so are the images but they're immutable.
Local-sync's is inherently mutable state semantics. That's probably never what I want in my workflow. Disk space is cheap enough that I don't find an append only workflow cost prohibitive. Particularly since duplicating a Darktable image only consists of a new XMP file there's little point in overwriting an existing one to save a few bytes. [1]
Practically speaking, local-sync doesn't work for me because it munges filenames. This breaks my tiered backup logic...or rather complicates reasoning about it beyond the number of brain cells I can commit to it.
What I think I want is more tooling for operating outside of Darktable (I already ingest images from my camera with Rapid-Photo-Downloader). Two tools in particular. One which takes a list of XMP files and generates new XMP files based on Darktable's duplicate semantics. The other an inverted index of all the XMP documents. The goal is to move file operations outside of Darktable where they can be automated in the shell.
[1]; XMP files could be versioned with Git if duplicate files are a problem. They aren't for me.
As for styles, I noticed it too, but this got a huge boost with the addition of 3D LUT support in darktable 2.7. Here’s a site with free LUT’s: https://freshluts.com
Regarding databases across machines, would not Syncthing [1] work for this? Storage is fairly cheap these days, so having an exact copy of everything on two machines would not be that bad.
[1]: https://syncthing.net
On a personal note, I desperately want to get into using darktable as Lightroom is the last piece proprietary software that I rely on. However, it seems Leica M8 support is still “not there” [2]. They do link to how to help out by adding support at the top of the page, but as mine was stolen two years ago I am not much help and I do want to be able to support my range of cameras dating back to 2006.
[2]: https://www.darktable.org/resources/camera-support
The three things on the list are conveniences not necessities. They are features of individual modules that provide a UI over several pixel pipeline operations that can be done in other ways. White balance can be done without using the presets (that's mostly how I do it). Denoising can be done with tools besides "profiled denoise." I do use it. I often shoot slow lenses at high ISO's (1600-12800) and it was the easiest tool to learn without understanding what I was doing. I've never used custom matrix because my camera isn't supported. I don't miss it. You might I guess.
But none of these are core features. And none are the only way to accomplish the things they do.
Couldn't you just outright buy a Capture One license?
I used to pay for a photo editing software and used it for years. Then they got bought out by another company and the SW languished. And there was no easy way for me to migrate my photos away from it. Today I cannot even run the version I bought - incompatible libraries, etc.
Photos will last longer than the SW used to edit them. Don't lock them in.
Neither LR nor Capture one lock in your photos though. The edits will be locked in I suppose but I don't see a way to not lock them in. Are you saying that Dark Table somehow doesn't lock in your edits?
At least LR does not lock in your edits; I'm fairly certain Capture One doesn't either. You can export either XMP sidecar files or DNGs with the edit history bundled in along with the RAW data. LR's centralized catalog is just an SQLite database, I believe, but I don't think the schema is documented publicly.
Genuine question, are those edits usable in another app though? I.e. even if the XMP notes that I used a range mask with some color filter, if capture one or DT aren't capable of this or aren't capable of reading the sidecar files, isn't this a de-facto lock-in?
DT is open source, so even if it is abandoned, you have hope of still getting your edits. You have hope that if the original authors decide to abandon the project, someone else will take it on, etc.
I once bought a Lightroom license. Then they ditched all updates and moved to a subscription model and slowly made it unusable. Won't make that mistake again.