I find myself often going B&W for my PP, but sometimes feel that I'm not using Darktable's features to their best. How do you guys get the best B&W out of Darktable?

Also, what's with the 'experimental' passthrough demosaic option? It gives me some sort of interlaced pattern and alters the tones, but I can't find any information on what it's doing.

I posted this sometime ago

Shutter Nuts: Raw-file to Black and white photo in Darktable

Eh, GIMP isn't as strong for RAW files.

I believe the experimental passthrough option is for those who have removed the color filter (Bayer) array from their sensor, as detailed in this feature request:

Feature #10492: Better support for CFA cameras with removed CFA - darktable - darktable - photography workflow application

But I could be mistaken; I didn't spend a lot of time researching the issue, so if I'm wrong I hope someone will correct me.

--Steve

Huh, I'd not realised you could just scrape off the bayer filter. Might give that a shot some day when I've got money to blow.

I think darktable would need to disable bayer interpolation if it is going to tackle the pentax Pixel Shift images. Since each pixel of a PS image has full colour info, there is no need for bayer interpolation. Darktable devs have had little inclination for adding pixel shifted pentax file support from the K3-II but that may change if the K-1 becomes popular and they receive more support requests.

I'd be surprised if they aren't already looking at it, what with the splash Pentax has been making in the photography gear world of late.