Darktable, the open source alternative to Adobe Lightroom, is back with a new feature release — its first update of the year.

Building on the major changes intro’d in Darktable 3.0 last December is Darktable 3.0.1. The new stable uplift adds a further batch of new features, iterative improvements, and other compatibility fixes.

Big thanks to omg! reader Einar who gave me the heads up on this new release. I find it hard to stay on top of half of what’s happening out there in free software land, so all your news tips and article suggestions (even if I can’t get around to writing about them all) are deeply appreciated.

Back to Darktable 3.0.1 and I can relay word that it includes the following major new features:

  • New color assessment mode (designed to ensure proper color perception based on ICC recommended colour proofing conditions
  • Focus peaking mode (ctrl+shift+f available in the lighttable and darkroom
  • New Y0U0V0 profile to denoise chroma and luma noise

Furthermore, the app now makes it possible to resize the left and right panels in layout views using a mouse (and the positions is remembered). This may sound small, but given the multitude of views available (and their configurability) it’s a welcome touch.

Additionally, Darktable 3.0.1 picks up the following stuff:

  • New loading screen
  • Tool tips on module in history
  • Wide-gamut HLG/PQ based color space P3 and Rec2020
  • Custom borders support in framing module
  • Standard variables support in watermark module
  • Shortcut improvements
  • Log editing support for the L, R, G, B, C, g blending modes
  • New accels for sliders to improve keyboard control
  • Support for copying, replacing and merging metadata

If you’re big on LUTs — as someone who enjoys video editing, I am big on LUTs — then there are a number of LUT-vley (bad pun, let it go) related tweaks here, including support for compressed LUT .gmz files in the 3D LUT module, and proper handling of valid LUT files in the file selector.

Finally there’s a crop of new white balance presets:

  • Canon EOS 77D
  • Canon EOS 9000D
  • Nikon COOLPIX P1000
  • Panasonic DC-GH5

Plus new noise profiles for the following camera models:

  • Canon EOS-1Ds
  • Fujifilm X-H1
  • Fujifilm X-T30
  • Olympus E-510
  • Panasonic DC-GH5
  • Sony ILCE-6600
  • Sony ILCE-7RM4
  • Sony ILCE-9

As I’m not much of a “pro” photographer myself so can’t attest to this particular programmes probable proficiency.

But what I can tell you is that Darktable has built up a loyal, vocal following within the free software community at large — and that is unlikely to have happened without reason.

So, if you fancy finding out what the fuss is all about you can download Darktable 3.0.1 from Github for Windows and macOS (as well as source code to build by hand for Linux).

If you prefer pre-built packages go ahead and relieve the Darktable OBS server of the relevant installers for your distro of choice using the link below:

Darktable OBS (Stable Releases)

Alternatively grab the latest release from Flathub:

View Darktable on Flathub

Photography type? Go ahead share your experiences with this app below!
App Updates darktable photog