We're proud to announce the new feature release of darktable, 5.0.0!
The github release is here: https://github.com/darktable-org/darktable/releases/tag/release-5.0.0.
To build from source, do not ...
While this release doesn’t seem to add a huge amount of new stuff on the surface, the devs focused more on usability, performance and smaller improvements, which were all much needed.
Please correct me if I’m wrong and I oversaw something huge.
I’m really excited to see how the performance will improve on my shitty laptop.
While the program itself shouldn’t take too many resources to run, it always felt barely usable on that device, and on my gaming PC, it never used the GPU.
I’ve often heard many complaints about how Lightroom or Rawtherapee for example run way smoother than Darktable.
In my experience, that is usually a problem with the GPU OpenCL drivers. Sadly, the Mesa OpenCL implementation didn’t include image support when I last checked (you can check with clinfo | grep"Image support"). For AMD cards you need to have either the “pro” driver or ROCM installed, both aren’t packaged by all distros. Similar with Intel, don’t know about Nvidia, but I’m sure if it works, it’s only with the proprietary driver.
I ended up installing darktable in an arch distrobox container, as arch has ROCM packages (in AUR) and ever since GPU acceleration is working fine.
Darktable is WAY better than RawTherapee. Like, lightyears ahead.
I don’t want to talk badly about RT, but it’s just trash imo.
Development of RT has pretty much stopped, while DT has a huge community and many developers. It has become the only FOSS alternative to stuff like Lightroom.
The only issue I have with DT is that:
There’s way too much stuff going on for a beginner, and even with some experience, most features are too hidden due to clutter.
Some defaults are just badly set imo. For example, why do you not want lens correction and some other (neutral) stuff applied automatically?
Many modules are just redundant and should never be touched. There is soo much niche and legacy stuff nobody wants or needs, like 3 different white balance modules for example.
Great news, this preset fixes both of these issues!
It “removes” many of those unnecessary modules from your UI and applies some stuff already for you, which you would anyways, like said lens correction, so you can focus on the important stuff, like adjusting colors, contrasts, and more.
This preset should be the default imo, and it makes DT simple enough to use.
This is mostly what I use too. Additionally, on images with high ISO I usually add the profiled denoise module, often without changing the default values. If the image has a lot of noise, I sometimes use the preset that only reduces chroma noise (so the image stays grainy, but without the color mismatches)
Legacy reasons I suppose, it would suck to go back to a photo you took a while back, only to find out all your edits are gone because the modules you used are removed.
Some modules get a “deprecated” warning, which imo more modules could use, but there are probably still edge cases where someone might prefer the old modules
Darktable developers pride themselves for their non-destructive processing pipeline and use it as an excuse for how quirky and inflexible their UX is. I believe they are highly competent on the highly technical bits that ultimately very few people see or understand. Personally I can use it to an extent if I unlearn what other software have taught me over decades of UX conventions.
I’ve compared the two a while ago, seems to me like slightly different takes around the same core ideas. It’s true that a couple of things in Ansel feel more natural, but it’s not much, and it’s probably not worth the risk (AFAICT the bus factor is one, compat with DT isn’t a goal).
Awesome!
While this release doesn’t seem to add a huge amount of new stuff on the surface, the devs focused more on usability, performance and smaller improvements, which were all much needed.
Please correct me if I’m wrong and I oversaw something huge.
I’m really excited to see how the performance will improve on my shitty laptop. While the program itself shouldn’t take too many resources to run, it always felt barely usable on that device, and on my gaming PC, it never used the GPU. I’ve often heard many complaints about how Lightroom or Rawtherapee for example run way smoother than Darktable.
What change are you the most exited about?
In my experience, that is usually a problem with the GPU OpenCL drivers. Sadly, the Mesa OpenCL implementation didn’t include image support when I last checked (you can check with
clinfo | grep "Image support"). For AMD cards you need to have either the “pro” driver or ROCM installed, both aren’t packaged by all distros. Similar with Intel, don’t know about Nvidia, but I’m sure if it works, it’s only with the proprietary driver.I ended up installing darktable in an arch distrobox container, as arch has ROCM packages (in AUR) and ever since GPU acceleration is working fine.
When I tried darktable as a complete begginer I was completely lost and ended up learning rawtherapee instead. Would you say it changed now?
Darktable seems more popular than rawtherapee, but is there a big difference feature-wise?
Darktable is WAY better than RawTherapee. Like, lightyears ahead.
I don’t want to talk badly about RT, but it’s just trash imo. Development of RT has pretty much stopped, while DT has a huge community and many developers. It has become the only FOSS alternative to stuff like Lightroom.
The only issue I have with DT is that:
Great news, this preset fixes both of these issues!
It “removes” many of those unnecessary modules from your UI and applies some stuff already for you, which you would anyways, like said lens correction, so you can focus on the important stuff, like adjusting colors, contrasts, and more.
This preset should be the default imo, and it makes DT simple enough to use.
Thanks a lot for the presets, I’ll give this another try.
But yeah you could have stopped at darktable being better with the “shit” part 😅
You do need to figure out which modules to use and how to use some of them, its not too difficult when you have all the right modules.
A lot of the modules are old/redundant/deprecated, but still there for legacy reasons. They really clutter up the ui
I went down a rabbit hole of YouTube videos and ultimately ended up on like… One set of settings I pretty much do for most images.
Lens Correction. Exposure; click eyedropper
Basic Adjustments. Color Balance RGB Global Saturation 30% Global Chrome 15% Local Contrast Detail 130%
Filmic RGB. Click black relative exposure Click white relative exposure
Crop image
I would love to hear/read some more stuff. I’m an extremely basic photographer who didn’t want to pay for Adobe.
This is mostly what I use too. Additionally, on images with high ISO I usually add the profiled denoise module, often without changing the default values. If the image has a lot of noise, I sometimes use the preset that only reduces chroma noise (so the image stays grainy, but without the color mismatches)
Why don’t they remove all the old modules? I feel like they’re frustrating all their new users.
Legacy reasons I suppose, it would suck to go back to a photo you took a while back, only to find out all your edits are gone because the modules you used are removed.
Some modules get a “deprecated” warning, which imo more modules could use, but there are probably still edge cases where someone might prefer the old modules
Oh yeah I guess it could just only show them on old edits.
I think they are hidden by default with the scene-referred layout, but they will show up when searching. It’s a tough situation UX wise
Darktable developers pride themselves for their non-destructive processing pipeline and use it as an excuse for how quirky and inflexible their UX is. I believe they are highly competent on the highly technical bits that ultimately very few people see or understand. Personally I can use it to an extent if I unlearn what other software have taught me over decades of UX conventions.
One of the developers got sick of the UX issues and forked DT.
https://ansel.photos/
I only use this stuff occasionally. Is there really a big improvement in ansel over darktable? Or is the ansel dev just super angry for no reason?
Unfortunately its not much better.
I’ve compared the two a while ago, seems to me like slightly different takes around the same core ideas. It’s true that a couple of things in Ansel feel more natural, but it’s not much, and it’s probably not worth the risk (AFAICT the bus factor is one, compat with DT isn’t a goal).