Lightroom and Darkroom¶
Darkroom is designed so that you can switch from Adobe Lightroom without losing any of your work and while keeping your bearings.
What is carried over¶
When you open a photo that has never been edited in Darkroom, its Lightroom settings are read
from the .xmp file next to the RAW file:
- the settings of the Develop panel: light, color, mixer, curves, color grading, effects, detail, optics, geometry, calibration;
- the profile (Adobe Color, Landscape, creative profiles… with their amount);
- the crop and rotation;
- masks, including AI masks (subject, sky, people…) as Lightroom computed them;
- retouches made with the Remove tool;
- the star rating, color label, keywords, title, caption, creator and copyright.
Your Lightroom presets can be imported too (see Presets).
From a Lightroom Classic catalog¶
Adobe Lightroom Classic keeps settings in its catalog (.lrcat). Darkroom can read it:
menu File › Read Lightroom Classic Catalog…, then choose the catalog
(often Pictures\Lightroom\Lightroom Catalog.lrcat). From then on, any photo in that catalog
that has neither a .darkroom nor an .xmp file gets its settings, rating, pick /
reject flag, color label and keywords from the catalog — even if you have changed drives since: the photo
is recognized by its folder and name. My Style does not learn from these settings:
only from photos edited in Darkroom.
The catalog is only read, never modified. Not yet carried over from the catalog:
masks and retouches (save them to .xmp files with Ctrl+S in Lightroom to
get them back).
A very close rendering¶
Darkroom's sliders were calibrated against hundreds of Lightroom exports: the same value produces a very close effect, with the same Adobe profiles. A photo edited in Lightroom looks very faithful in Darkroom, without being identical down to the pixel.
Your files are never modified¶
Darkroom never modifies your RAW or .xmp files. Its settings are saved in a
<name>.darkroom file next to the photo. Once a photo has been edited in Darkroom, that
file takes precedence.
Differences¶
| Lightroom | Darkroom |
|---|---|
| catalog | no catalog: you open a folder |
| catalog flags | Lightroom Classic's pick / reject flags are not in the .xmp files: they are carried over by reading the catalog |
| removal with Adobe's generative AI, computed online | AI Erase computed on the computer, no connection needed |
| Select Subject, Sky, Background | available (Masking › Subject, Sky, Background), computed on your computer |
| mask settings | the same ones, plus vibrance, which Lightroom masks lack |
| Enhance › Super Resolution | not available |
| HDR merge | available (right-click the shots › Merge to HDR) |
| panoramas | available (right-click the shots › Merge to Panorama); no Boundary Warp and no full turn |