Creating a Natural-Looking HDR Image with RawTherapee and Luminance HDR When it comes to creating an HDR image that still feels natural, rather than screaming "overcooked", a careful workflow and thoughtful tone mapping choices are crucial.Let me walk you through how I recently processed a water lily to maintain realism while bringing out depth and... Continue Reading →
Every image has a story, and this one starts as a humble RAW file—just data, just potential. But like the forest floor quietly waking up in spring, it only needed the right touch to bloom. With a careful edit in RawTherapee, some luminance tone mapping (Reinhard 02), and a bit of patience, this wood anemone... Continue Reading →
Read this six-minute tweak for RawTherapee, and get a total workflow upgrade. A Fresh Start with RawTherapee: Setting Up Your Favorites for a Smarter Workflow, and Color Management with Adobe Camera Profiles. In a previous article, we talked about ART and other RawTherapee forks. One thing ART definitely has going for it is a simpler... Continue Reading →
6 minutes read. Well, I said I was pretty happy with this quick and simple edits – and I meant it. Honestly, in most cases I’d just throw this kind of result straight into my gallery without chasing perfection.But… can it be improved? Sure. In my first version, I used Shadows & Highlights to bring... Continue Reading →
Well no, it’s not some magical recovery job – this is just a plain RAW file, shown in Neutral. But yeah... it is very dark. So the question becomes: can you still make something out of it in RawTherapee? Absolutely! RawTherapee’s bag of tricks can handle way worse than this. And honestly, with just a... Continue Reading →
8 minutes reading time + video Welcome to a new Open Source Photography Deep Dive tutorial! In this guide, we'll focus on editing with RawTherapee, and I'll show you the simplest ways to get great results quickly. In RawTherapee version 5.11, the 'Toolbox' in the 'Editing' section has nine tabs. One of them is the... Continue Reading →
6 minutes read + video Once you've downloaded your latest photos to your computer and given them proper names, it's time to sort them and delete any unusable shots right away. Since we shoot in RAW, we’ll do this directly in RawTherapee. A quick note: if you shoot in both RAW and JPEG, you can... Continue Reading →
6 minutes reading time I can promote RawTherapee (RT) all I want, but if people are set in their ways with certain software, camera brands, and habits don’t allow themselves to take a peek over the fence… well, who knows? Maybe, just maybe, there’s a patch of grass out there that’s greener. Or even a... Continue Reading →
5 minutes read time Version Management in RawTherapee: A Flexible Approach When it comes to version management in photo editing, Adobe Lightroom offers a history panel and virtual copies, allowing users to revert to previous edits and compare different versions easily. However, this system is deeply tied to Lightroom’s catalog, which has some drawbacks: the... Continue Reading →
Less than 2 minutes to read. The graduated filter in RawTherapee or Lightroom is typically used to correct featureless skies, reduce overexposure in bright skies, or enhance cloud contrast to create a more dramatic atmosphere. In this case, however, I’m using it to recover details in the snow, which became overexposed and lost texture after... Continue Reading →
Only 5 minutes to read + the first 5 minutes of a video For a while, I’ve been encouraging others to explore RawTherapee—not to push them, but to share my experience. It’s a reliable, user-friendly program that’s often misunderstood as overly complex. In reality, it’s straightforward to use and can save you money by eliminating... Continue Reading →
4 minutes read time. The tool, initially called "Local Adjustment Tool" in RawTherapee 5.10, was renamed "Selective Editing" in version 5.11, likely reflecting expanded capabilities. It took me a while to realize the true potential of this tool. I first noticed it in RawTherapee 5.10 but didn’t grasp what a fantastic feature it is for... Continue Reading →
Less than 6 minutes read time - Latest update below I’m always looking for ways to improve, and recently, I focused on optimizing my website's limited storage while presenting larger, high-quality photos to my audience. During this search, I discovered an alternative image format: WebP. WebP and JPG (JPEG) are both widely used image formats,... Continue Reading →
Less than 1 minute read time. The article linked below discusses a color issue in RawTherapee, where images looked different on-screen compared to after being uploaded to WordPress. I resolved this by adjusting a setting in RawTherapee. However, this isn't exclusive to RawTherapee—it could also occur in your editor or be related to the output... Continue Reading →
When photographing general subjects like architecture, street scenes, and landscapes, I typically shoot in both JPEG and RAW formats. However, for the past year, when it comes to birds or wildlife, I’ve switched exclusively to RAW. All three of my OM System cameras—the OM-1 Mark II, E-M1X, and E-M1 MKIII—are set to shoot in RAW... Continue Reading →
The Year is Ending: Looking Back and Forward As the year draws to a close, we're just days away from the start of the final month. Before we know it, another year will have passed. What will the next photographic year bring? Hopefully, plenty of good weather! As the holiday season approaches, the pace of... Continue Reading →
In Today’s Photo Gallery: A Female Roe Deer Today's gallery features a small series of photos of a female roe deer. These images tie into topics from previous articles on Open Source Photography, such as which camera settings to use or what makes the ideal telephoto lens for birds and wildlife. While many YouTube professionals... Continue Reading →
On October 15, 2024, Amateur Photographer reviewed RawTherapee as the best free RAW editor. However, the well-known magazine didn’t shy away from pointing out some drawbacks alongside their praise. As a long-time RawTherapee user since its very first version, I was naturally curious to read their take on it. What immediately caught my attention—after skimming... Continue Reading →
Some time ago, I bought a Leica T camera, which was initially advertised as using the Leica T mount. However, it turned out that, for some strange reason, Leica had simply given the L mount a different name, likely to prioritize their own lenses. In any case, the fact that it’s actually an L mount... Continue Reading →
Before we move on to what was promised on Wednesday about gear for wildlife photography and rain protection, let's first cover the final part of my RawTherapee workflow. In the first part of my RawTherapee workflow, I covered the Exposure section using Adobe Camera Profiles. After that, I discussed Sharpening in RawTherapee, and today we’ve... Continue Reading →
After editing my pictures with an Adobe Camera Profile, LUT, Preset, or fully manual adjustments, it's time to sharpen and denoise. My initial plan was to cover both sharpening and denoising in a single article. However, after some thought, I realized it would probably be better and clearer to address them separately, especially since opinions... Continue Reading →
Intro Installing the Adobe DNG Converter and Profiles Using and Workflow Intro : In today's article and its follow-up, I aim to explore Adobe Processing Profiles, much like I did earlier this year in "The Raw Advantage – My new Streamlined Workflow". Yet, with changes in my workflow and the availability of a new version... Continue Reading →
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