Red Row Studio » Linux

Phatch: image workflow builder

admin — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 14:25:50 +0000

I recently needed to perform some batch operations (add a couple of borders and resize) on a bunch of photos, and I came across this interesting app. Essentially it lets you chain operations together to make a processing pipeline, then point it at a directory of images to process. You can then save your set of operations to use next time. A really nice and unique interface, I thought.

A linux raw digital photography workflow

admin — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:20:07 +0000

I’ve been using Linux to manage, edit and print my digital photographs for a few years now, but it’s only in the last few months that the available software has really come together. Here’s a quick guide to what I’m using, why I like it, and what the alternatives are

Photo management

A.k.a DAM (digital asset management). I use DigiKam 0.10 (the official 0.10 version has just been released) because

It has a very nice, logical user interface with multiple tabbed panes
It reads metadata nicely from raw files (and will soon be able to write)
Very quick tag searching
It’s easy to integrate with other apps (see my post here)
Manages both raw and jpg files

Alternatives: F-spot, Picassa

RAW conversion

The best software I’ve found for raw conversion is Bibble – currently version 4.10, but looking forward to version 5 which is in development. It’s not open source, but I use it for the following reasons

Very fast, takes advantage of multiprocessor machines
A great range of plugins that I couldn’t live without
Flexible output batches to allow you to customise a really quick workflow
Integrated noise-reduction software (a simplified version of Noise Ninja)

Alternatives: RawTherapee and RawStudio are both promising open source projects.

Printing

Another piece of non-free software – Turboprint. Printing has never been particularly easy on Linux, in my opinion, but this piece of software makes it much slicker.

Fully colour managed printing with custom colour profiles
Integrates with GIMP
Gives you ink and printer status updates

Alternatives: Most linux distributions ship with GutenPrint, which takes care of printing on most printers, but the experience isn’t so good, and you have to take care of colour management at the application level.

Any comments about your own workflow?

PS Selling a digital camera? Check out this article on my new blog – 10 tips for selling a digital SLR camera.

How to add applications to Digikam’s “open with” menu

admin — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 09:13:36 +0000

The photo management application for KDE, Digikam, can read most (all?) raw camera formats, making it a very useful tool for cataloguing collections of raw files. To make your workflow run smoothly, you need to be able to open files in your preferred raw conversion software from within Digikam, which might need a bit of setup. It took me ages to find this online, so I’m posting it here in the hope that others might find this useful. I’ll use the example of adding Bibble Pro, a raw converter that is available for linux. The executable name is bibblepro.

To make bibblepro show up in the open with menu, we have to tell KDE that we want to use this program to open raw photo files. To do this we need to use the KDE system settings tool. In (k)ubuntu 8.10, we run the command systemsettings. In other distributions I believe it’s called kcontrol.

Within the system settings tool go to File associations. You might need to click on the Advanced tab. Click to expand the Image section of the Known Types on the left and select the raw file type you need to open (e.g. x-pentax-pef for Pentax raw files). Check that the Filename Patterns box contains the correct extensions (.pef and .PEF for Pentax raw files). In the Application Preference Order box you can see the list of applications that KDE knows can open .pef files. Click the Add button and type the name of your application in the box (e.g. bibblepro) then click OK. You should now see the application listed in the Application Preference Order box. Close the system settings tool and restart Digikam. Right click on a raw file of the type you specified, and you should see the new application in the Open with menu.

If you need to work with raw files of several different types, you’ll need to add the application to the Preference Order box for several different entries in the Known types.