PhotoFlow

The aim of the project is to provide a fully non-destructive photo retouching program that includes a complete workflow from RAW image development to high-quality printing.

Here is the general feature (whish)list:

• Fully non-destructive, layer-based photo editing workflow with realtime preview of the final image
• Support for 8-bits and 16-bits integer as well as 32-bits and 64-bits floating point precision, selectable at runtime and on a per-image basis
• Plugin-based architecture: new tools can be implemented as separate modules that are loaded at runtime
• Allows to load and edit images of arbitrary size, thanks to the underlying rendering engine based on the VIPS library
• Fully color managed workflow: user-defined input, work and output profiles, soft-proofing, etc...
• Support for layer grouping and layer masks
• Support for common photo editing tools: levels, curves, brightness-contrast control, blurring, sharpening, cropping, resizing, colorspace conversions, etc..., all implemented in the form of image layers
• User-friendly interface to develop new tools and image filters as external plugins

Downloading and compiling

The pixel rendering engine of PhotoFlow is based on VIPS (http://www.vips.ecs.soton.ac.uk). You have to install a recent version of VIPS in order to compile PhotoFlow.

Currently only gtk 2.x is supported. Support for gtk 3.x will be soon available.

Once VIPS is set up and running, follow these steps to download and compile PhotoFlow:

1. get master branch from GitHub:

    $ git clone https://github.com/aferrero2707/PhotoFlow.git
   

2. The build system is based on CMake, so you have to have it installed in your system. PhotoFlow provides an helper script to simplify the building process; in order to use it you have to go into the "build" subdirectory and run the "build.sh" script:

    $ cd PhotoFlow/build
    $ bash ./build.sh
   

   If you have installed VIPS in an unusual place, you can edit the build script and set the PKG_CONFIG_PATH variable accordingly

   To compile the code in debug mode, use

    $ bash ./build.sh debug
   

   instead.

3. If all goes well, you can now open an image file with PhotoFlow:

    $ ./src/photoflow image_file_name
   

   There are some test images available:

    $ ./src/photoflow ../testimages/Lab_curves.pfi
   

   or

    $ ./src/photoflow ../testimages/orton.pfi
   

Current status

PhotoFlow is in a early development stage. The present version allows to open an image file and apply basic editing filters via non-destructive adjustment layers. The individual layers can be activated and de-activated using the radio buttons on the right of the image. Moreover, the layers structure can be saved to disk and re-opened again via the command line.

Roadmap and development plans

The following list shows what features are currently planned or being implemented, in a kind of priority order:

• Support for layer maps in the gui

• Implement colorpsace conversions based on ICC profiles (partly implemented already)

• Allow re-ordering of existing layers via drag&drop

• Complete the list of supported blending modes

• Image pyramids and image zooming

• Loading and processing of RAW images (demosaicing, white balance, exposure adjustment, etc.)

• Pencil tool for simple hand drawing