Best Free and Open Source Tools for RAW Image Processing in Linux

Brief: Looking for RAW image editing tools in Linux? In this article, we’ll show you the best free tools to edit RAW photos in Linux.

A RAW image file contains minimally processed data from the image sensor and needs processing before you can print or edit them. When you shoot in a JPEG format, the image is compressed and some of the information is lost and non-recoverable, while RAW images are non-compromised high-quality images preserving all the necessary data from the sensor.

That’s the reason most photographers prefer capturing RAW images and editing it later.

Best RAW image editors for Linux

There are many free and open source applications to manipulate RAW images in Linux. In this article, we have compiled 4 best Software to handle RAW images in Linux.

Note that while I have included the installation method for Ubuntu based distributions, you can easily install them from the software repository of your own Linux distribution.

4. Photivo

Photivo is a free and open source RAW file editor supporting almost all RAWs and Bitmaps. A plugin is available for GIMP integration, which allows sending your modified photos to GIMP for further retouching and color profiles. Best suited for distortion and geometry correction and adaptive saturation, Photivo is a powerful RAW editor.

Photivo features

16-bit internal processing, color managed with LCMS2.
CA correction, Green equilibration, line denoise, bad pixel reduction, wavelet denoise, median filters on RAW data.
Tone mapping and split toning.
Several local contrast filters and Sharpen.
Denoise, separately on Luminance and Color (Edge avoiding wavelets, GreyCStoration, Wavelet, Masked bilateral, Pyramid).
Film grain simulation.
Black and white conversion and cross processing.
Texture overlay (external texture)
Fake tilt/shift, toy effect.

Installing Photivo on Ubuntu based Linux distributions

To install it use the commands below:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:dhor/myway
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install photivo

You can run Photivo from the Dash search or by launching from the terminal.

3. RawTherapee

RawTherapee is another cross platform, free and open source RAW image processing application supporting different image editing operations and a large number of files handling. Along with the usual RAW image files, it supports some less common types such as X-Trans, Foveon and Pentax Pixel Shift.

Features

96-bit (floating point) processing engine.
Non-destructive editing.
Advanced color handling from white balance to HSV (Hue-Saturation-Value) curves, color toning and color management including wide-gamut and soft-proofing support.
Powerful CIE Color Appearance Model 2002 (CIECAM02) module.
Enhanced exposure and tonality tools: tone and Lab curves, highlights and shadows tools, tone mapping (HDR-like effect), etc.
Several tools to enhance details: unsharp mask, RL deconvolution, contrast by detail levels.

Installation on Ubuntu based Linux distributions

It is available in the official repository. You can install it by clicking on the link below:

Get RawTherapee

Alternatively, you can install it using the command below:

sudo apt-get install rawtherapee

2. digiKam

digiKam is another advanced open source photo management application for Linux which can handle raw files and provides a comprehensive set of editing tools. Prominent features include adjusting colors, cropping and sharpening, curve adjustments, panarama stitching and more.

Features

Importing and processing RAW files and photos
digiKam core, image editor and image filters support 16 bits color depth pictures. Image Editor has a full color management support using ICC color profiles.
Red eye, brightness, contrast and Gamma correction
Color balance, blur / sharpen feature.
Black and White and tonality converter using curves adjustments.
Noise reduction, Liquid Rescale, Unsharp mask, correcting lens spherical aberration.
Hot Pixels Correction, Vignetting, Channel mixer, white balance etc.
Pseudo HDR-tonemapping tool to recover highlights and shadows while keeping local contrast.
And much more.

Installation on Ubuntu based Linux distributions

It is available in the official repository. You can install it by clicking on the link below:

Get digiKam

Alternatively, you can install it using the command below:

sudo apt-get install digikam

1. Darktable

Darktable is another open source RAW developer application which allow you to develop RAW images and enhance them. With fully non-destructive editing, Darktable comes with powerful export system supporting Picasa webalbum and flickr uploads and supports exporting RAW images to low dynamic range (JPEG, PNG, TIFF), 16-bit PPM or TIFF, or linear high dynamic range images.

darktable

Features

Darktable currently serves 47 image operations modules some of which are:

Crop and rotate, base curve presets, exposure controls, highlight reconstruction, white balance, demosaic, inverting options.
Local modification of the exposure based on pixel lightness, level adjustments.
Tone curve, changing lightness of the image, tone mapping.
Saturation enhancement, overexposed correction, channel mixer, color correction, contrast adjustment, color transfer from one image to another, managing color profiles.
Sharpen, equalizer, denoise, lens correction, spot removal, chromatic aberrations, hot pixels.
Low light vision, split toning, framing, watermark support, soften, colorization options etc.

Installation on Ubuntu based Linux distributions

It is available in the official repository. You can install it by clicking on the link below:

Get Darktable

Alternatively, you can install it using the command below:

sudo apt-get install darktable

Wrapping up

There are a number of Open Source software for processing RAW images in Linux. These software are feature-rich and can accomplish all your needs. It depends on your technical skills and priorities while choosing the software from above list.

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