The photo editor can be used inside the catalog software, but also as stand alone software, we call it "fotoARRAYRAW". As individual program it can RAW and JPEG files from any folder, without a catalog, and it is the program the File Browser starts when you choose "Develop". It has the same engine and the same effects as the developer inside the catalog, plus a filmstrip for the selected file, variants and command line and scripted export.
The stand alone photo editor is part of the PRO package and uses the fotoARRAY PRO license.
The main window with the parameter panel - You also see the filmstrip. The button [+] opens the menu to add parameters.
The window has a toolbar, the picture, the parameter panel on the right and the filmstrip at the bottom. Every picture in the filmstrip keeps its own parameters and layers. The parameter panel is a tree: groups can be collapsed, switched off as a whole and expanded when you need them.
Use [+] to add a new group of controls, for example "Tone Control", "Color" or "White Balance"
Crop, straighten, liquify, perspective, mask brush and eraser, repair, clone stamp, white balance pipette, depth brush, focus point, colour picker.
A layer without a mask works on the whole picture, but after everything that lies below it in the stack. This is useful when a correction depends on the result of the steps before it.
Examples: a second contrast pass after a strong fog effect, which brings back the structure the fog has taken away. A black and white film look applied as the last step, so that all local light corrections below it are converted together. A colour grade that works on the finished tones instead of the raw data.
Because every layer has an opacity, the strength of such a step can be set afterwards with one slider, without touching the values inside the layer.
A layer with a mask applies its sliders only where the mask is white. All masks are vectors and stay editable on the picture.
Radial and linear gradient, frame, brush and eraser, polygon for straight edges, and the light source mask with position, direction, cone and range.
Also included is a ray mask, which creates light rays and diffraction stars. Place individual points on the picture as light sources, each with its own colour and ray width, to add a star to a street lamp or sun rays through the trees.
With positive exposure it adds light, with negative exposure it forms a shadow.
Every mask can be limited to a brightness range, to structured or smooth areas, and it can be inverted.
Several masks form one mask. Each member adds its area (ADD) or removes it (SUB), and one set of sliders on the group acts on the result.
Example: a gradient brightens the shaded facades, a polygon cuts the pavement out of it.
A layer can carry its own content instead of sliders.
Calculated from the picture: blur, radial blur, the extraction of one colour, a moved and scaled copy of the picture.
Generated: gradient, frame, film grain, noise and clouds, cells, drops and streaks. Grain and noise can follow the brightness of the picture.
Each of these can also be used as the mask of the layer. A cloud pattern becomes an irregular mask for fog, a colour extraction becomes a mask for exactly one colour - use a mask group to refine the mask further.
Every layer is blended with the stack below it: Normal, the darken and lighten modes, Overlay, Soft Light, Hard Light and the other contrast modes, Difference, Subtract, Divide, and Hue, Saturation, Color and Luminosity.
Example: a blurred copy in Screen mode, limited to the highlights, gives a soft glow.
A layer marked as pre-stage is calculated before the base development. Its changes pass through the tone curve like the original light of the scene. A darkening then looks like a real shadow, with the surface texture still visible inside it.
A layer can carry a chain of effects, for example the B&W Film effect with its looks and toning. The mask decides where the effect acts.
The Optics layer holds the effects that depend on the depth of the scene. Ambience adds fog, veil and light sources that grow with the distance. The virtual lens adds vignette, defocus, depth of field, aperture shape and the flaws of old lenses.
Perspective with sliders or with four points placed on a rectangle of the scene. Liquify with a grid that can be pushed, pulled and pinned. Crop with movable grid lines and fixed formats. Repair finds its own source area, the source can be moved, scaled and rotated. All geometry and repairs stay editable.
All of this works together in one stack. A light layer, a shadow as pre-stage and a black and white layer on top. A mask group that brightens a facade after the perspective correction. A contrast layer above fog and lens blur. Each step can be switched off, reordered or weakened with its opacity at any time.
A variant is a second recipe for the same file. It is stored next to the picture, appears in the filmstrip behind the original with a badge, and can be exported like any picture. Variants are the way to keep a colour version and a black and white version of the same shot without copying the RAW file.
Templates are saved developments with a rule for their application. fotoARRAYRAW ships with a set of them, among them film looks, lens simulations and scan corrections. Templates can be transferred between the catalog and fotoARRAYRAW.
Single layers can be saved to a file and loaded into other pictures. New layers get English names, so saved layers and templates work in every language of the program.
Retouching and corrections
All corrections are stored as vectors in the recipe, stay editable on the picture and never change the original file.
Remove and Clone
Paint over dust spots, sensor dirt or small distractions, and Remove replaces them with the surrounding structure. Clone copies an exact piece of the picture from a source point you choose – ideal for repeating patterns and hard edges.
Area Remove
For larger objects: draw a polygon around the area to be removed. A source area is placed next to it and can be moved, scaled, rotated, stretched, skewed, tilted and mirrored until it fits. Snap aligns the source to the edges, and pattern fill builds the area from blocks of the source, so lawn, sand or water continue naturally. A slightly roughened edge and the original grain make the repair invisible.
Brushes
Dodge and burn with the brush to lighten or darken, paint with colour, blend softly with water, and take back with the eraser. Shape, size, hardness and strength are adjustable. Every stroke is a vector and can be applied as a freehand stroke or as a polygon area.
Liquify
Liquify reshapes the picture with a fine mesh. Usable for subtle corrections of shapes and proportions, or for deliberate creative distortion. As usual it is stored as vectors in the recipe and can be changed or reset at any time.
Brushes
Bloat enlarges, pucker shrinks, push moves the picture in the direction of the stroke, and restore brings back the original shape, stroke by stroke. Size, strength and soft edge are adjustable.
Block
Select a part of the mesh and move, scale, rotate or distort it as a whole using its corners and edges – for example to straighten a leaning object or to shift an element without redrawing it.
Fixed areas
Set anchors on nodes, or on the picture border, to pin parts of the picture in place. Anchored areas stay exactly where they are, while the surroundings follow the change – so a face keeps its shape while the background moves, or the edges of the picture stay straight.
Elastic mode
In elastic mode the change fades out smoothly towards the anchors and the picture border instead of ending at a hard edge. The border can slide along, and the elasticity is adjustable.
The mesh density can be changed at any time without losing what you have already done.
The export dialog writes JPEG, TIFF and 16 bit linear DNG, with a target folder, a size, a quality, a sharpening step, a colour space and a watermark from text or an image. A recipe can be attached to the result as a file or embedded in the JPEG, so the receiver can see how the picture was made. Up to two outputs are written in one run, for example a full size TIFF for the archive and a 1600 pixel JPEG for the web.
Each output has its own folder, format, size, quality, sharpening, colour space, watermark and border. One run can therefore deliver a clean file and a marked one.
The target can be a fixed folder or a subfolder next to the original. A postfix is added to the file name, and an existing file is never overwritten unless you allow it.
The size is given as the long edge in pixels, as a percentage, as a width (1200w), as a height (800h) or as a box the picture is fitted into (1200:800). A picture is never scaled up.
A border in pixels or in percent of the target size, set separately for the sides and for top and bottom, in any colour. The ratio between the top and the bottom border can be set, for example 1:1.5 for a classic mount with a wider lower edge. Recent borders are kept in a list.
The watermark is a template with a text or an image, placed with alignment, margin and scale. It can be softened or given a coloured glow. The watermark is applied after the resize and before the border, so it never sits in the border.
The DNG contains the finished development as linear 16 bit data. It keeps the full tonal range for further work in other RAW programs, without the tone curve of a JPEG or TIFF.
The recipe is written as a separate file (.fadev.ref). The reference file is not applied automatically when the exported picture is opened again, so the picture is never developed twice. The metadata of the original is written to the result.
The export runs in its own process. The editor stays free while the pictures are written, and several exports started one after another are collected into one run. The progress window shows the protocol under [Details].
The button Input ... selects other files and exports them with the parameters of the current picture. The automatic curve is measured again for each picture, and each picture keeps its own crop and geometry. This is the fastest way to develop a series that was taken under the same light.
Every export can be written as a script: a JSON file with the outputs and the list of pictures, each with its own recipe or the recipe stored next to it. fotoARRAYRAW runs such a script from the command line without opening a window, for example from a batch file or another program.
The catalog uses the same export rules for developed pictures. A picture exported from the catalog gets the same size, border and watermark as the same picture exported from fotoARRAYRAW.
fotoARRAYRAW can be run without its window. Start it with options and a list of files or a wildcard, and it develops the pictures with their recipes, a preset or single slider values, and writes the result in the format and size you ask for. A JSON job file describes a whole export with several outputs, name templates and target folders, and can be written by hand or by another program. This is how fotoARRAY itself hands large exports to fotoARRAYRAW, and how you can build your own batch processes.
Options include the format, the target folder, a name postfix, the long edge in pixels or percent, the JPEG quality, a crop in percent, the sharpening step, the demosaicing method, a preset file, auto tone, the recipe attachment and the watermark. The help text is printed with the option -h.
fotoARRAYRAW is unlocked by the fotoARRAY PRO license. It uses the same license store, so a license entered in fotoARRAY is known to fotoARRAYRAW and to the File Browser. Without a license the program offers a 14 day test that does not ask for a name or an address. When the test is over, your developments, variants and depth files are kept. One extension by e-mail is possible. The program is installed with the PRO package over an existing fotoARRAY installation and needs 64 bit Windows.
PRO fotoARRAYRAW is part of the PRO package. All functions on this page require the PRO license or the 14 day test.