# The &digikam; Handbook

Gilles
Caulier

    caulier_dot_gilles_at_free.fr

Renchi
Raju

    renchi_at_pooh.tam.uiuc.edu

Richard
Taylor

    rjt-digicam_at_thegrindstone_dot_me_dot_uk

Ralf
Hoelzer

    kde_at_ralfhoelzer.com

Joern
Ahrens

    kde_at_jokele.de

Oliver
Doerr

    oliver_at_doerr-privat.de

Gerhard
Kulzer

    gerhard at kulzer.net

2001
2005
The &digikam; developers team
&FDLNotice;
2005-07-10
0.7.4

&digikam; logo

&digikam; is a KDE Photo Management Application with support for Digital Cameras.

KDE
Digital Camera
digikam
gphoto
Graphics

## Introduction

### Background

#### About &digikam;

&digikam; is an advanced digital photo management application for the KDE desktop. It provides a simple interface which makes importing and organizing digital photographs a "snap". &digikam; enables you to manage large numbers of digital photographs in Albums and to organize these photographs for easy retrieval using Tags. It has many features for viewing, organizing, manipulating and sharing your pictures.

An easy to use Camera interface is provided, that will connect to your digital camera and download photographs directly into &digikam; Albums.

&digikam; incorporates a fast Image Editor with a few basic image editing tools. You can use the Image Editor to view your photographs, and make corrections and alterations.

#### Reporting Bugs

Like the rest of KDE, &digikam; is an Open Source project. This means that it relies on its users to play their part by, at least, reporting problems and suggesting possible improvements.

&digikam; makes it as easy as possible for you to report bugs or suggest improvements. Wherever you are in the application the Help menu will include a Report Bugs option. This will display a message box with a highlighted link. Click on the link and your web browser will open the page for the reporting system. All the information required will already be filled in, just follow the instructions for completing your report.

#### Support

&digikam; is a community supported project, which means that users and developers support one another. If you become a regular user of &digikam; you are encouraged to join the &digikam; Users Mailing List. You can start off by asking questions of other &digikam; users and hopefully soon you will be answering the support questions of others.

&digikam; Users Mailing List joining instructions.

You can also visit the &digikam; Home Page. for news of new releases and other &digikam; related information.

#### Getting Involved

There are many ways that you can get involved with the continued development of &digikam;. You do not need to be a software developer. You can help with documentation, translation and user interface design or just contribute really good ideas to the wish-list. You can also get involved by testing early development code as it is being developed and providing feedback to the developers. Of course, if you are a software developer then you can help to make &digikam; the best digital photograph application there is.

The best way to start getting involved with &digikam; is to join the Developers Mailing List. &digikam; Developer Mailing List joining instructions.

### Getting Started

#### The First Run Dialog

When you start &digikam; for the very first time it will ask you where you want to store your photographs. You can type in the path name of a folder or click on the Folder icon Folder Icon to select a folder from the dialog.

If you already have a collection of photographs on your hard disk, you can enter the top-level folder containing those photographs as the Albums Library folder. &digikam; will treat each sub-folder of the folder you've entered as an Album. None of the photographs will be altered.

When you use an existing folder of photographs, as the Album Library folder, you will notice that the Albums in the My Album list do not have photographs as their icons. The first time you view each Album &digikam; will create a thumbnail from the first photograph in the Album and use this as the Album icon. See the My Album section for details of how to change the Album icon.

If you have previously accessed your photograph collection with another application, that has created thumbnails in non-standard sub-folders, &digikam; will show these thumbnail folders as separate Albums. &digikam; follows the freedesktop.org standards for thumbnail folders. There is no way of hiding non-standard thumbnail folders from the "My Album" list. If you want to keep them you could create a Album Collection that just contains all the thumbnail Folders and then view your Albums in By Collection order. See the My Album section for more about Album Collections.

Once you have configured the Album Library Folder you can setup &digikam; to work with your digital camera. Then learn how to use My Albums and My Tags to arrange your photograph Albums.

### Supported Image File Formats

#### Still Photograph Formats

Almost all digital cameras store photographs in one of two formats: JPEG or TIFF. Many cameras enable you to select which of these formats to use. JPEG is a compressed format, that trades some of the image quality to keep file sizes small. TIFF is not a compressed format, it maintains higher image quality but at the expense of much larger file sizes. A full description of these formats can be found at the Wikipedia. &digikam; supports both of these formats.

PNG is an image format that was developed as a replacement for a number of older, in the 1990's widely used, image file formats. It is a lossless format like TIFF but it is much more compact and can save you disk space. Although your camera is unlikely to support PNG, some people like to convert their photographs to PNG as soon as they get them on their computer. Unlike JPEG, PNG images do not loose quality every time you re-encode them after alteration. &digikam; fully supports PNG images and the Batch Processing Images Plugin can convert a batch of images from any supported format to PNG in one step. See the Configuration section for information about using plugins with &digikam;. For more information about the PNG format see the PNG homepage.

Some, typically more expensive, cameras allow you to store images in RAW format. RAW format is not really an image standard at all. It is different for every make of camera. RAW format images contain all the data that is taken directly from the camera's image sensor before the software in the camera applies things like white balance, sharpening etc. Storing photographs in a camera's RAW format allows you to alter settings, such as white balance, after the photograph has been taken. Most professional photographers use RAW format, because it offers them maximum flexibility. The downside is that RAW image files can be very large indeed. If you want to learn more about RAW image format visit the very helpful guide The Luminous Landscape. You can convert RAW format images into JPEG or TIFF in &digikam; using the RAW Image Converter plugin. See the Configuration section for information about using plugins with &digikam;.

#### Moving Image Formats

Many digital cameras support taking of short movie clips. These clips are usually stored in AVI or MPEG format. &digikam; understands these formats and will generate thumbnails for the movie files. However, &digikam; is not a movie manipulation application and it does not have any built-in movie viewing or editing capabilities. If you double click on a movie file &digikam; will use your KDE settings to choose a viewing application to use.

#### How &digikam; Supports File Formats

&digikam; relies on a number of libraries and support packages to load and save image formats. Which image formats are available will depend on the availability of these libraries on your system and, in some cases, on the way that those libraries have been compiled. On most distributions you will find that a wide range of image formats are viewable within &digikam;.

This dependence on other libraries means that it is not possible to give a definitive list of all of the formats that will be available on your system. At the very least JPEG, PNG, and TIFF will be available.

&digikam; only displays files that are in formats that it understands. It does this by looking at the file extension on the files and checking this against a predefined list. If the file extension is in the list &digikam; will show the file in the Image View. You can change the list of file extensions that &digikam; will accept, see the Configuration section for more details.

### Supported Plugins

One of the nicest things about &digikam; is how easily its functionality can be extended, by using plugins. Two plugin architectures are available:

- Kipi Plugins: the Kde Image Plugins Interface project is an effort to develop a common plugin structure for &digikam;, KimDaBa, Showimg and Gwenview. Its aim is to share image plugins among graphical applications. Kipi Plugins setup is described in this section.

- Image Editor Plugins: these plugins add new image manipulation options in the &digikam; Image Editor. The DigikamImagePlugins project is dedicated to providing a collection of tools using this architecture. Image Editor Plugins setup is described in this section.

Plugins can manipulate images in almost any way that users can. Their advantage is, that it is much easier to add a capability to &digikam; by writing a small plugin than by modifying the &digikam; core.

## Using &digikam;

### The Main &digikam; Window

#### Introduction to the Main Window

##### The Main Window

&digikam;'s main window has three areas. The My Albums list in the top left, the My Tags list in the bottom left and the main Image Window on the right-hand side. You can use these three views to organize and find your photographs.

Across the top of the window is a Menu Bar and below it is the Tool Bar.

The Default Main Toolbar

- (1) : Move one step backwards in the Album History.

- (2) : Move one step forwards in the Album History.

- (3) : New Album.

- (4) : Add Images.

- (5) : Edit Album Properties.

- (6) : Open Image Editor.

- (7) : Edit Image Comments and Tags.

- (8) : Image Properties, Meta-Data, and Histogram.

- (9) : Rename Image.

- (10) : Increase Thumbnail Size.

- (11) : Decrease Thumbnail Size.

- (12) : Toggle Full Screen.

#### "My Albums" View

The "My Albums" list provides an organized view of your photograph albums. All photographs that are managed by &digikam; are stored in a single Album. These albums can be sorted by their Folder (directory) layout on the hard disk, by the Collection name that has been set in the Album Properties or by the Date that the Albums were first created (this date can also be changed in the Properties of each Album).

You can switch between these orderings using the drop-down list in the Tool Bar at the top of the window.

##### Creating a New Album

There are a number of ways to create a new Album. You can create a new Album when you upload new photographs from the Camera using the Camera Tool. You can also create a new empty Album by clicking the New Album button on the Tool Bar. As an additional option, you can create a new Album by importing an existing folder (directory) of photographs from your hard disk, just select Album Import Import Folders from the Menu Bar and select the folder that you want to import. An Album will be created with the same name as the hard disk folder. You can use drag and drop to import a folder. Drag a directory icon, for example from a Konqueror window. Than drop it on the album list on the left. A menu will appear that gives you the option to move or copy the folder into &digikam;.

##### Deleting an Album

When you delete an Album from &digikam; it will be moved into the KDE Trash Can. As an option you could change this behaviour, so that delete really did remove the Album and all of the photographs in it. This can be changed by selecting Settings Configure &digikam; and selecting the Miscellaneous page. At the top of this page are the settings that control what happens when a photograph is deleted. To delete an Album right-click the Album in the "My Album" tree and select Delete Album from Hard Disk from the context menu.

##### Adding a Photograph to an Album

Most of the time you will create new Albums and populate them with photographs directly from your camera using the Camera Tool. However, sometimes you may want to add a photograph that you already have on your computer to an existing Album. To add a photograph to an Album, make sure that the Album is selected. Then, either click the Add Images icon in the Tool Bar or select Album Import Add Images from the Menu Bar. Select the photographs that you want to add from the file dialog and click Open. The photographs will be copied into the Album. Additionally, you can use drag and drop to import photographs. Drag the photographs icons, for example from a Konqueror window. Than drop it on the image list on the right hand side.

If you have a scanner configured you can also scan a photograph straight into an Album. Select Album Import Scan Images. You can also take a screenshot and add this directly to an Album. Select Album Import Screenshot.

##### Moving or Copying Photographs Between Albums

Simply drag the photograph and drop it on the destination Album to move or copy it from on Album to another. A menu will appear that gives you the option to Move or Copy the photograph. You can move or copy multiple photographs the same way, just select all the photographs that you want to move and drag them on to the destination Album.

##### Managing Albums

An Album contains a set of photographs and the Album Properties allows you to set information about this set. To access the Album Properties right-click on an Album and select Edit Album Properties from the context menu.

The Album Properties dialog allows you to set:

###### The Album Properties Dialog

- The Album Title : this will be used in the "My Albums" list.

- The Album Collection : this is a way of grouping your Albums together by a common label. The Collection you set will be used to order your albums when you select By Collection from the drop-down list in the Tool Bar. If you want to add and delete Collection labels, use the Collection Settings dialog.

- The Comments for the Album : this will be shown in the banner at the top of the main Image Window.

- The Album Date : this will be used when you order your Albums by date.

- An Average button : this will set the Date to the average date of the images in that album. It will first try to calculate the average date of the images in the album based on the EXIF-headers. If that fails it will fall back to modification date of the files in that folder.

##### Setting the Album Icon

When you first view an Album, &digikam; selects the first photograph in the Album as the icon to display in the "My Album" list. This helps you remember what kind of photographs are contained in an Album. Sometimes the first photograph in the Album is not the most representative and you want to select a different one as the Album icon.

To select a different photograph as the Album icon, right-click on the photograph that you want to use as the Album icon and select "Set as Album Thumbnail" from the context menu. Additionally you can use drag and drop to set the Album icon. Drag the photographs icon and drop it on the currently selected Album in the Album list.

##### Notes About Album Collections

An Album can only be in one Album Collection and Album Collections can not be nested.

&digikam; also supports tagging individual photographs using the "My Tags" area at the bottom left of the main window. Album Collections are different to photograph tagging because the Album Collection applies to all the photographs in an Album rather than to individual photographs. You can use both Album Collections and tagging to organize your photographs.

#### Image View

##### Introduction

The Image Window provides the main view of your photographs. When you select an Album the photographs in that Album will be displayed in the Image Window. Each photograph is displayed as a thumbnail. You can alter the size of the thumbnails using the magnifier buttons in the Tool Bar. The Thumbnail size buttons

The first time you select an Album you may have to wait briefly while the thumbnails are generated.

Information about each photograph is displayed below each thumbnail. You can control what information is displayed from the Settings Configure &digikam; dialog. Select the Albums page and look for the Extra Information in Thumbnail View section.

The thumbnails have ToolTips which will pop up if you allow the mouse to dwell over a thumbnail for a moment. The ToolTip shows the most important properties of the photograph including any Tags that you have applied. The screenshot at the top of the Introduction to the Main Window section shows a ToolTip being displayed.

##### Image Management

Photographs are what &digikam; is all about. The Albums and Tags allow you to organize and find your photographs in a way that suits you. The Image Editor lets you view your photographs and make a number of adjustments to them. You can access all of the functions that &digikam; can perform on a photograph by right-clicking the thumbnail or selecting from the Image menu in the Menu Bar.

##### Viewing a Photograph

You can open the Image Editor on a photograph either by double-clicking the thumbnail or by right-clicking and selecting View/Edit from the context menu. See the &digikam; Image Editor section for instructions on how to edit your photographs.

##### Viewing or Editing a Photograph With Another Application

Sometimes &digikam; may not provide all of the capabilities that you need. You can open a photograph in another application by right-clicking on it and selecting from the Open With sub-menu. The list applications that appear in this menu is controlled by the standard KDE file associations for the image format type of this photograph. Look in the KDE manual for instructions on changing these file associations if the application that you need is not listed.

Note that there can be a problem with meta-data embedded in photographs when they are edited by some image manipulation applications. Some applications do not retain the photograph's meta-data when you save a modified image. This means that if you modify a photograph using one of these programs you will loose information such as orientation, aperture etc.

##### Rotating a Photograph

You will need to have the Kipi JPEG Lossless Plugin installed for these rotation features. If you do not have this plugin installed you can still rotate your photographs, but you have to do so from the Image Editor inside. The Image Editor uses a different method of rotating an image, you may not notice any difference but the Image Editor method can cause some loss of quality in the photograph. The rotation methods described here use the Kipi JPEG Lossless Plugin and do not loose any quality in the original photograph.

&digikam; provides two ways to get your photographs the right way up. The simplest method is to right-click the thumbnail and select Rotate and then pick the correct amount of rotation needed.

Many digital cameras now have an orientation sensor. This sensor can detect how you hold the camera while taking a picture. It stores this orientation information inside the image. This meta data is stored in an embedded meta-data section called EXIF. The cameras could rotate the image themselves right away, but they have limited processing power, so they leave this job to an application like digiKam. If the camera is storing the orientation, then &digikam; can use it to automatically rotate your photographs so that they are the correct way up when you display them. &digikam; will rotate the picture on disk according to this orientation information.

The photograph is rotated without loss of quality and the orientation information is set to normal, so that other EXIF-aware applications will handle it correctly. To use this feature, right-click on the thumbnail and select Auto Rotate/Flip Using EXIF Information. The Camera Tool can perform this operation automatically when it uploads the photographs from your camera which will ensure that your photographs are always the right way up. The rotate operation will do nothing, if your camera does not include this information in the photos.

##### Photograph Meta-Data, Properties and Histogram

###### Editing Tags and Comments

&digikam; lets you view quite a lot of meta-data about your photographs. Meta-data is any information about a photograph that is not part of the image itself, for example, the date the photograph was taken is meta-data about the photograph.

Some meta-data is attached to photographs by the camera that took the picture. This camera meta-data is stored inside the image file and is called EXIF data. To view this information right-click on a thumbnail and select Properties from the context menu.

Other meta-data is associated with a photograph by &digikam; itself. Comments and Tags are meta-data that &digikam; manages for your photographs. You can edit the Comments and Tags for a photograph by right-clicking a thumbnail and selecting Edit Comments and Tags.

Unless you have a good reason for placing comments in the JPEG COM field of your images it is probably best to use the main Comments/Tags dialog for adding comments to your photographs. Unfortunately there is no standard where to place a comment. Some applications use the JPEG COM section, but this only works for JPEG images. Other applications store comments in the EXIF field, which is limited to JPEG and TIFF images. &digikam; stores comments in its internal database, so that all image and video formats can be handled the same way.

###### The Item Comments and Tags Dialog

Editing comments can be a tedious activity. The Comments/Tags dialog makes it easier by allowing you to move between photographs without having to select each in turn. To use this feature, open the Commands/Tags dialog on the first photograph you want to comment on and then use the Forward and Back buttons to move between each photograph.

###### Displaying Properties, embedded Meta-Data, and Histogram

There is one more set of embedded meta-data that &digikam; can access from a photograph. This can be accessed by right-clicking on a photograph and selecting Properties from the context menu.

This dialog will tell you general informations about current image like how large the photograph is and were it is stored on the hard disk.

###### The Image Properties Dialog with General Tab

This dialog will show you the same EXIF information provided in the EXIF Viewer dialog described in the EXIF Viewer section.

###### The Image Properties Dialog with EXIF Viewer in Action

This dialog will show you the full image histograms. You can find more informations about histograms in the Histogram Viewer section.

###### The Image Properties Dialog with Histogram Viewer in Action

Quite like within the Edit Comments and Tags dialog, you can move between photographs without having to select each in turn. Use the Forward and Back buttons to move between each photograph.

##### Renaming a Photograph

You can change the filename for a photograph by right-clicking a thumbnail and selecting Rename. Remember to keep the file extension (.jpg, .tif, etc.).

##### Deleting a Photograph

When you delete a photograph from &digikam; it will be moved to the KDE Trash Can. If you prefer that Delete really removes the photograph completely, than you can set this option by selecting Settings Configure &digikam; and selecting the Miscellaneous page. At the top of that page are the settings that control what happens when a photograph is deleted.

To delete a photograph right-click the thumbnail and select Delete from the context menu.

#### "My Tags" View

Photograph tagging provides a flexible and powerful way to organize and catalog your photographs. Tags are labels that can be applied to individual photographs. Once a Tag has been set to a photograph, that photograph can be found again by selecting the Tag.

##### Selecting a Tag

When a Tag is selected, all of the photographs that are marked with that Tag are displayed.

Tags can be arranged into a hierarchical tree. This allows you to organize your Tags in a logical manner. It also allows you to collapse parts of the tree in the "My Tags" list so that you can easily find the Tags that you are looking for.

By default, when you select a Tag in the tree that contains other sub-Tags, &digikam; will not display photographs that are labeled with the sub-Tags. You can change this behaviour, if you prefer that all photographs marked with a sub-Tag of the current Tag should be displayed. To set this option open Settings Configure &digikam; from the main Menu Bar, select the Albums page and then select Show Items in sub-Tags.

##### Managing Tags

You can add new Tags by right-clicking on either the "My Tags" label or an existing Tag and selecting New Tag. If you add a new Tag by right-clicking on an existing Tag, your new Tag will be created as a sub-Tag.

You can delete a Tag by right-clicking on the Tag you want to delete and selecting Delete Tag. When you delete a Tag the photographs that are marked with that Tag are not deleted. Simply the Tag is removed from those photographs.

You can move the position of a Tag within the tree by dragging it into the position that you want and dropping it there. A menu will appear that gives you the option to Move the Tag. A Tag can only be in one place in the tree at a time.

You can set the Tag Properties by right-clicking on a Tab and selecting Edit Tag Properties. The Tag Properties allow you to change the name of the Tag and the icon used in the "My Tag" tree.

##### Tagging Photographs

Before you can get the most out of &digikam;'s Tagging capabilities you must first tag your photographs. There are two methods of tagging photographs. Once you have identified the photographs that you want to tag you can either drag and drop them onto the Tag in the "My Tags" tree or, by right-clicking on the selected photographs in the Image Window, you can use the Assign Tag menu to select the Tags you wish to set.

You can label a photograph with as many Tags as you like. The photograph will appear when you select any of the Tags that are set against it. This way you can set a Tag for each person in a photograph, as well as the place the photograph was taken, the event it was taken at etc.

###### Tagging Image with Main Pop-up Menu

Once you have tagged a photograph, the Tag name will appear under the thumbnail in the Image Window.

You can remove a Tag from a photograph by right-clicking on the photograph and using the Remove Tag menu. This menu will only show those Tags that have been set on this photograph.

### Using a Digital Camera With &digikam;

#### Introduction to Camera Interface

The Camera Tool allows you to download your photographs directly from your camera into a &digikam; Album. You can access the Camera Tool by clicking on the Camera menu and selecting from the list of configured Cameras. See the Setup Camera Section of the manual for instructions on how to setup &digikam; to work with your Camera.

The Camera Interface is not the only way to get your photographs into &digikam;. See the Adding a photograph to an Album section for a description of how to add photographs that are already in on your hard disk.

To be able to use your digital camera with &digikam;, connect the camera to your computer, switch the camera to the image display mode and turn it on.

When you start the Camera Interface, it will try to connect to the Camera. For some cameras this connection phase can take a little while. When connected a Ready indicator will appear and thumbnails of any photographs on the camera will be displayed. Some cameras cannot provide thumbnails of the photographs, if this is the case you will only see the filenames and an icon for each photograph.

##### The Camera Client Window

#### Getting Informations About Photographs from the Cameras

Before to download photographs on your computer, you can need to see camera item informations. Using the Properties from Camera Interface pop-up menu will launch camera item properties dialog.

##### The Camera Item Properties Dialog

This dialog display file properties informations used internally by camera to store item. A flag indicate too if the item have already donwloaded to you computer. Note all these information can be unavailable with some digital cameras.

#### Downloading Photographs

The simplest way to download the photographs is to click the Download button and then click Download All. This will download all of the photographs on the camera to a single Album in &digikam;. The download process will not remove the photographs from the camera. It is always advisable to check that the photographs have downloaded safely into the Album you were expecting before deleting them from the camera.

If you do not want to download all of the photographs you can select just those that you need using the standard KDE selection methods. Once you have the photographs selected click Download and then Download Selected. The Download Selected button will be grayed out until you have selected some photographs.

#### Selecting a Target Album

Using Download All or Download Selected buttons will bring up a dialog, that allows you to select a target Album into which the photographs will be downloaded. The list of existing Albums is displayed, ordered by the Folder method (see the My Albums View for details of Album ordering). You can select the target Album from this list and then click OK.

##### The Target Album Selection Dialog

If you want to create a new Album, into which you could download the photographs, click the New Album button. The new Album will be created as a sub-Folder of the Album that is currently selected in the existing Album list. This means that, if you do not want your new Album to be a sub-Folder of an existing Folder, you must first select the "My Albums" entry from the very top of the existing Albums list before creating a new Album.

When you have selected the target Album, click OK and &digikam; will download the photographs from the camera to that album.

##### The Downloading from Camera in Progress

#### Deleting Photographs from the Cameras

Once you are happy, with the downloaded photographs that you wanted, you are ready to delete photographs from the Camera. You can delete all of the photographs in one go by clicking the Delete Delete All button. If you just want to delete a selection of the photographs, you have to select those that you want to delete and click Delete Delete Selected

Please note that there is no way to restore a photo that you have deleted from the camera. The photographs are not moved to the KDE Trash Can, they are removed completely. It is best to double check that you have successfully downloaded a photograph into a &digikam; Album before you delete it from the camera.

#### Automatic Renaming

Cameras often do not use very meaningful filenames for photographs. The filenames are usually reused once the photographs have been deleted from the camera. This can lead to filename clashes if you download photographs from many shoots into the same Album. It can also be useful to include the date and time that a photograph was taken in the filename.

##### The Camera Interface Advanced Options

&digikam; can automatically rename your photographs using the date and time information included by the camera in the photograph. To use this feature, click the Advance button on the Camera Interface. The Camera Interface window will expand to reveal some extra features. Select Customize Names and then enter any filename prefix you would like. Then, optionally, add the date and time and an a sequence number. The sequence number may be needed if you have a camera with a very fast multi-shot mode. With this mode, it is possible to get two photographs with exactly the same data and time.

The new filename that &digikam; will use for the photographs, when they are downloaded, is shown underneath the name provided by the camera in the thumbnail view. The renaming settings will be remembered next time you use the Camera Interface.

#### Camera Information Based Operations

##### Automatic Rotation

&digikam; can use any information about the orientation of the camera in the moment the photograph was taken for automatically rotation of the photograph when it is downloaded. Not all cameras include this informations. See the Photograph Meta-Data, Properties and Histogram section for more detail about informations that your camera may have embedded in your photographs.

This automatic rotation is switched on by default, and if your camera does not include the information, &digikam; will leave the photograph in its original orientation. If you would like to switch the automatic rotation off, click the Advanced button and deselect the Auto Orient option at the bottom of the window.

##### Automatic Destination Albums Creation

If your camera provide information about the date when a photograph is taken &digikam; can use this to automatically create sub-albums in the destination Album when it is downloaded. Sub-albums names will be based on image dates. All images who have the same date will be downloaded on the same sub-album. Not all cameras include this information. See the Photograph Meta-Data, Properties and Histogram section for more detail about information your camera may have embedded in your photographs.

This option is switched off by default and in this case &digikam; will download the photographs in the root destination Albums. If you would like to switch on this option click the Advanced button and select the Download photo in automatically option at the bottom of the window.

### &digikam; Image Editor

#### Introduction to Image Editor

&digikam; incorporates a fast Image Editor with a few basic image editing tools. You can use the Image Editor to view your photographs and to make corrections and alterations. The Image Editor can be accessed either by double clicking on a thumbnail in the Image Window or by right-clicking on a thumbnail and selecting View/Edit from the context menu.

The Image Editor provides a number of tools that enable you to adjust a photograph. Some of these tools are provided by plugins to &digikam;. So they may not be available by default on your distribution. See the Setup Image Editor Section for more details about &digikam; Image Editor plugins.

##### The Image Editor Window

The image editor has just one main window with:

- A status at the bottom which shows the filename, the current file number, the current zoom level, and the current image size.

- A Menu Bar across the top and below that a Tool Bar that provides quick access to some commonly used functions.

The Image Editor Toolbar

- (1) : First Current Album Image.

- (2) : Previous Image.

- (3) : Next Image.

- (4) : Last Current Album Image.

- (5) : Save the modified image.

- (6) : Undoing last action.

- (7) : Redoing previous action.

- (8) : Restore the Current Image From Disk.

- (9) : Zoom Into the Image.

- (10) : Zoom Out of the Image.

- (11) : Toggle Auto Zooming (if selected image will fit in the window).

- (12) : Rotate the Current Image.

- (13) : Crop Image to the Selected Region.

#### Restoring Your Original Photograph

The editing functions of the Image Editor will make changes to your photograph. None of the editing functions will change the original photograph unless you select File Save or click the Save button in the Tool Bar. Note that once you have saved the changed version you will not be able to recover the original photograph.

You might prefer to take a copy of your photograph before you make any changes. You can use File Save As to save a working copy.

At any time before you save your photograph you can restore the view to the original image by selecting File Revert or clicking the The Image Editor Revert Button Revert button on the Tool Bar. You will loose any changes that you have made to the photograph since it was last saved.

#### Undoing/Redoing Actions

Almost anything you do to an image in Image Editor can be undone/redone. You can undo the most recent action by choosing Edit Undo, and redo by Edit Redo

If these are done so frequently that you really should memorize the keyboard shortcuts, Ctrl-Z to undoing action, and Ctrl-Shift-Z to redoing action.

To get a popup menu with the available undo/redo actions, you have to press the left mouse button at the undo or redo icon in the toolbar and hold it down for a moment. If you choose one of the menu items, all undo/redo actions until the choosen one are done.

#### Moving Between Photographs

Once you have started the Image Editor you can move between photographs in the same Album or Tag view by using the navigator buttons on the Tool Bar or the entries in the File menu. If you have made any changes to the current photograph you will be asked if you want to save them.

#### Changing the View

You can zoom in and out of a photograph using the The Image Editor Zoom Buttons buttons on the Tool Bar or the entries in the View menu. To make a photograph fit into the window use the Zoom Autofit The Image Editor AutoFit Button button on the Tool Bar.

View Toggle Full Screen will display the photograph using the full screen mode. You can move back to the normal view by pressing the Esc key. By default the Tool Bar is still displayed even in Full Screen Mode. If you would prefer that the Tool Bar is not displayed you can turn it off in the Configure &digikam; dialog accessed from the main &digikam; window, see the Setup Image Editor Section.

#### Image Properties

##### Comments Editing Tool

You can view some of the properties of your photograph by selecting the options in the Image menu. You can edit the comments set for this photograph using Image Edit Comments and Tags. The new Comments and Tags will be remembered when you close the photograph, even if you do not save the photograph first. For more informations about Comments and Tags dialog, please see Editing Tags and Comments section.

##### EXIF Viewer Tool

###### What is EXIF?

EXIF stands for EXtended Interchange Format. It was designed specifically for digital cameras. It allows a large amount of information about the photograph to be stored. Those informations are describing the camera which took the image along with the settings (including date and time) in use when the picture was taken. Also it allows an inline thumbnail to be included. See the Photograph Meta-Data and Properties section for more detail about information embedded data in your photographs.

EXIF format contains different marker sections named Image File Directories (IFD). The sections likely to be found in a normal EXIF file are as follows:

- 0: contains general information about the photograph.

- 1: contains information about the embedded thumbnail image.

- EXIF: contains extended information about the photograph.

- GPS: contains Global Positioning System information provides by the camera during the capture.

- Interoperability: contains information to support interoperability between different EXIF implementations.

- Thumbnail: displays the embedded thumbnail image.

###### How to Use EXIF Viewer?

You can review embedded EXIF information for the image using Image Properties and EXIF page. The EXIF Viewer is purely informational: nothing you do with it will cause any change to the EXIF sections.

###### The EXIF Viewer in Action

You can use two different levels to display EXIF marker sections:

- Simple: display only EXIF marker.

- Full: display all markers excepted thumbnails.

Some vendors add additional EXIF sections, such as Canon, Fujifilm, Nikon, and Sigma. These sections contain vendor and model specific notes. These will be displayed with Full level.

For the EXIF data displayed, EXIF Viewer provides a contextual help. Select an item on the top and the corresponding help can be displayed with the "What's This?" option of the dialog.

##### File Properties Tool

You can view the file properties using Image Properties and General page. This page allow you to see a large image thumbnail, general image and file system informations, and the &digikam; Meta-Data.

##### Histogram Viewer

If you are interested in the detailed histogram of your photograph you can view it using Image Properties and Histogram page. The histogram for a image shows the amount of each colour that is present and their different amplitudes within the image. If your photograph has a colour cast you might be able to see what is wrong by looking at the histogram.

The Histogram Viewer shows you informations about the statistical distribution of color values in the current image. It is purely informational: nothing you do with it will cause any change to the image. If you want to perform a histogram-based color correction, use the Adjust Levels Image Editor plugin. This plugin is part of the DigikamImagePlugins project. For more information about using Plugins in &digikam; see the Configuration section.

###### The Histogram Viewer in Action

An image can be decomposed into Red, Green, Blue, Alpha color channels. Alpha channel is a Layer in the image that supports transparency (like PNG or GIF images). Each channel supports a range of intensity levels from 0 to 255 (integer valued). Thus, a black pixel is encoded by 0 on all color channels; a white pixel by 255 on all color channels. A transparent pixel is encoded by 0 on the alpha channel; an opaque pixel by 255.

The Histogram Viewer allows you to view each channel separately:

- Intensity: shows the distribution of brightness values.

- Red, Green, Blue: show the distribution of intensity levels for the Red, Green, or Blue channels respectively.

- Alpha: shows the distribution of opacity levels. If the layer is completely opaque or completely transparent, the histogram will consist of a single bar on the left or right edge.

- Colors: shows the Red, Green, and Blue histograms superimposed, so that you can see all of the color distribution information in a single view. In this mode, the histogram foreground color can be choose with Color option.

With the Rendering option, you can determine whether the histogram will be displayed using the Full Image data or only with the current Image Selection. This option can only be enabled, if you have previously selected an image region with Image Editor.

With Scale option, you can change whether the histogram will be displayed using a linear or logarithmic Y axis. For images taken with a digital camera, the Linear mode is usually the most useful. However, for images that contain substantial areas of constant color a Linear histogram will often be dominated by a single bar. In this case a Logarithmic histogram will be more useful.

You can restrict the analysis, for the Statistics shown at the bottom of the dialog, to a limited range of values if you wish. You can set the range in one of two ways:

- Click and drag the pointer across the histogram display area, from the lowest level to the highest level of the range you want.

- Use the spin button entries below the histogram area. Left entry is bottom of range and right entry is top of range.

At the bottom of the Histogram Viewer are shown statistics describing the distribution of channel values, restricted to the selected range. These are:

- The mean.

- The standard deviation.

- The median of the selected histogram portion.

- The number of pixels in the image.

- The number whose values fall within the selected range.

- The percentage whose values fall within the selected range.

With Colors channel mode, this informations are updated with the foreground color selected with Color option.

##### How To Use a Histogram

Histograms are a graphical means to assess the accuracy of an image shown on the screen. The graph represents the 3 regions of the photograph brightness:

- (1) : the shadows-tone on the left.

- (2) : the middle-tone on the middle.

- (3) : the highlights-tone on the right.

###### The Histogram Description

The distribution of the graph, where the spikes and bulges are clustered, indicates whether the image is too dark, too bright, or well-balanced.

With an under exposed photograph, the histogram will have a distribution of brightness that tends to be mostly on the left of the graph.

###### An Over Exposed Photograph

With a correctly exposed photograph, the histogram will have a distribution of brightness that will be most prominent near the centre part of the graph.

###### A Correctly Exposed Photograph

With an over exposed photograph, the histogram will have the bulge showing the brightness distributed mostly towards the right of the graph.

###### An Under Exposed Photograph

Important: not all photographs have to exhibit this bulge in the centre part of their histogram. Much depends on the subject of the photograph. In some cases, it might be appropriate for the histogram to show a peak at one end or the other, or both.

The histogram is a reliable way of deciding whether or not a photograph is correctly exposed. Should the histogram show an over or under exposure, an Exposure Correction Tool should be used to fix the photograph.

#### Adjusting a Photograph

##### Cropping a Photograph

###### Manual Crop

Cropping a photograph is a common operation and the Image Editor makes it very easy. To crop a photograph simple drag a rectangle over the image by holding down the left mouse button and moving the mouse. You will see a wire frame rectangle appear as you move the mouse.

###### The Current Image Selection in Image Editor

When you release the button the area of the photograph that will be removed by a crop operation is darkened. This allows you to get a good view of how your photograph will look once you have cropped it. You can change the size if the cropped area by dragging the corners of the rectangle and you can create a new crop area simply by dragging out another rectangle.

Once you are happy with the crop, click on the The Image Editor Crop Button button on the Tool Bar and the photograph will be cropped. Use the File Save or File Save As entries in the File menu to safe the newly cropped photograph.

###### Proportional Crop

Aspect Ratio Crop tool goes further. While you are editing digital images, it is often necessary to create a compatible format with, for example, your photo-album. If you print an image from your digital camera and then try to put it in your photo album, you may notice that the camera has a different width or height ratio than a normal photographic film format so you need to crop your digital images in a predefined ratio (for example 5:7 or 2:3 which is a standard photo ratio).

###### The Aspect Ratio Crop Tool in Action

The preview area lets you draw the cropping rectangle around the part you wish to use. It will keep the ratio value set in the bottom of dialog. You can always resize and move it with the mouse, it will keep the same ratio.

In Aspect Ratio Crop tool settings, you specify the Orientation as Portrait or Landscape. Portrait will always have the larger number assigned to the Height and Landscape to the Width.

Aspect Ratio Crop tool uses a relative ratio. That means it is the same if you use centimeters or inches and it doesn't specify the physical size. For example, you can see below a correspondance list of traditional photographic paper sizes and aspect ratio crop.

Standard Photograph Paper Size | Aspect Ratio Crop
--- | ---
10x15cms 20x30cms 30x45cms 3.5x5" 4x6" 8x12" 12x18" 16x24" 20x30" | 2:3
6x8cms 15x20cms 18x24cms 30x40cms 3.75x5" 4.5x6" 6x8" 7.5x10" 9x12" | 3:4
20x25cms 40x50cms 8x10" 16x20" | 4:5
15x21cms 30x42cms 5x7" | 5:7
21x30cms 42x60cms | 7:10

Show Rule of Thirds Lines line option is a guiding element to better compose your images. This guide is a grid that divides the picture into thirds in every direction (that makes for 9 parts). These proportions are close to the golden rule and are derived from the field of view of the human eye. They are used, often with slight variations throughout a large number of commonly used objects. Within that frame there are precise areas where the important parts of the image should be placed. The same principle is used to determine the position of the horizon and the proportion of ground to sky.

###### Photograph Composition Example Using Rule Third Lines

When first looking at an image, the eye of the viewer rarely settles at the centre of the image, but instead from the top left to right, and then to the lower left and right again. This pattern is most unconscious but has been well-documented. It is probably associated with the western reading pattern. From the photographer's point of view, the goal then becomes to guide the gaze of the viewer to the subject, being aware of the way many people perceive an image.

On the bottom of the dialog, the Max. Ratio button lets you set the selection area size to the maximum, accordingly with the current aspect ratio settings an orientation.

##### Resizing a Photograph

If the photograph has the wrong size you can scale it to the size you would like by using Transform Resize tool. Select Transform Resize and adjust the target values. The Resize tool dialog is available below.

###### The Resize Tool Dialog

This image resizing tool use a standard linear interpolation method to approximate pixels. If you want to resizing up a small image with a better quality, try Blowup tool. It is a plug-in available from DigikamImagePlugins project, and you can access it by the Transform Blowup menu entry. See the dedicated Blowup manual for more information.

##### Rotating or Flipping a Photograph

If the photograph is the wrong orientate you can Flip or Rotate it to the correct orientation you would like by using Transform Flip/Rotate tools available in Transform Rotate and Transform Flip menus.

With flipping options, you can flip, turn over, the image horizontally or vertically like a card. With rotating options, you can rotate the image 90 degrees clockwise or counter-clockwise or by 180 degrees. Can be used to change mode to Portrait or Landscape. You can rotate more progressively by using the Free Rotation tool. It is a plug-in available from DigikamImagePlugins project, and you can access it by the Transform Free Rotation menu entry. See the dedicated Free Rotation manual for more information.

##### Fix Red Eye in a Photograph

Red Eye is caused when flash photography is used to take photographs of people. The red is the reflection from the back the eye which can be seen because the pupil can not react quickly enough to the flash. You can correct some of the worst effect of Red Eye by selecting the area of the eye on the photograph, in the same way as described for cropping above. Then select Fix Red Eye Reduction.

###### The Red Eyes Correction Tool in Action

#### Adjusting Sharpness

##### Unblurring a Photograph

If the camera focus is not set perfectly or if the camera is moving when the picture is taken the result is a blurred photograph. If there is a lot of blurring, you probably won't be able to do much about it with any technique. If there is only a moderate amount, you should be able to improve the picture.

In some situations, you may be able to get useful results by sharpening an photograph using the Sharpen tool by the Fix Sharpen menu entry.

###### The Sharpen Tool in Action

You should be careful with this though, or the results will not look very natural: sharpening increases the apparent sharpness of edges in the photograph, but also amplifies noise. The generally most useful technique for sharpening a fuzzy photograph is called the Unsharp Mask. It is a plug-in available from DigikamImagePlugins project, and you can access it by the Fix Unsharp Mask menu entry. See the dedicated Unsharp Mask manual for more information.

###### The Unsharp Mask Image Editor Plugin in Action

##### Reducing Graininess In a Photograph

When you take a photograph in low-light conditions or with a very fast exposure time, the camera does not get enough data to make good estimates of the true color at each pixel, and consequently the resulting photograph looks grainy. You can "smooth out" the graininess by blurring the image, but then you will also lose sharpness. Probably the best approaches, if the graininess is not too bad, is to use the Noise Reduction filter. It is a plug-in available from DigikamImagePlugins project, and you can access it by the Fix Noise Reduction menu entry. See the dedicated Noise Reduction manual for more information.

###### The Noise Reduction Image Editor Plugin in Action

##### Softening a Photograph

Sometimes you have the opposite problem: an image is too crisp. The solution is to blur it a bit: fortunately blurring an image is much easier than sharpening it. Select the Blur Tool, by the Fix Blur menu entry and experiment with the level. The preview windows on the right of the dialogs show the effect of the operation of your photograph.

###### The Blur Tool in Action

#### Correcting Colour

Digital cameras often have problems with lighting conditions and it is not unusual to want to correct the colour, contrast and brightness of a photograph. You can experiment with altering the levels of different aspects of your photographs using the tools under the Fix Colors menu. You can see any adjustments you make reflected in the preview. When you are happy with the results, press Ok and they will take effect.

##### The Color Balance Tool in Action

If your image is washed out (which can easily happen when you take pictures in bright light) try the Hue/Saturation/Lightness tool, which gives you three sliders to manipulate, for Hue, Saturation, and Lightness. Raising the saturation will probably make the image look better. In some cases, it is useful to adjust the lightness at the same time. ("Lightness" here is similar to "Brightness" in the Brightness/Contrast/Gamma tool, except that they are formed from different combinations of the red, green, and blue channels).

When you take pictures in low light conditions, you could get the opposite problem: too much saturation. In this case the Hue/Saturation tool is again a good one to use, only by reducing the saturation instead of increasing it. You can see any adjustments you make reflected in the preview image. When you are happy with the results, press Ok and they will take effect.

##### The Hue Saturation Lightness Tool in Action

The Normalize, Equalize, Auto Levels, and Stretch Contrast functions under the Fix menu will attempt to work out the best color levels automatically. You will need to experiment with the effects of these functions to see what works best with your photograph.

- Normalize: this method scales brightness values across the selected image so that the darkest point becomes black, and the brightest point becomes as bright as possible without altering its hue. This is often a "magic fix" for images that are dim or washed out.

- Equalize: this method adjusts the brightness of colors across the selected image so that the histogram for the Value channel is as flat as possible, that is, so that each possible brightness value appears at about the same number of pixels as each other value. Sometimes Equalize works wonderfully at enhancing the contrasts of an image. Other times it gives garbage. It is a very powerful operation, which can either work miracles on a picture or destroy it.

- Auto-levels: this method maximizes the tonal range in the Red, Green, and Blue channels. It determines the image shadow and highlight limit values and adjust the Red, Green, and Blue channels to a full histogram range.

- Stretch Contrast: this method enhances the contrast and brightness of the RGB values of an image by stretching the lowest and highest values to their fullest range, adjusting everything in between. This is noticeable only with washed-out images and can be a good fix-it tool for bad photographs.

The results of any adjustments you make will not be remembered until you save your photograph.

#### Correcting Exposure

The simplest tool to use is the Brightness/Contrast/Gamma tool. It is also the least powerful, but in many cases it does everything you need. This tool is often useful for images that are overexposed or underexposed; it is not useful for correcting color casts. The tool gives you three sliders to adjust, for "Brightness", "Contrast" and "Gamma". You can see any adjustments you make reflected in the preview image. When you are happy with the results, press Ok and they will take effect.

##### The Brightness Contrast Gamma Tool in Action

If you have the Adjust Levels plugin installed (see the Setup Image Editor Section) you will have additional entry in the Fix menu called Fix Colors Levels Adjust. This tools provides an integrated way of seeing the results of adjusting multiple levels and also enables you to save level settings for application to multiple photographs. This can be useful if your camera or scanner often makes the same mistakes and you want to apply the same corrections. See the dedicated Adjust Levels manual for more information.

##### The Adjust Levels Image Editor Plugin in Action

A very powerful way of correcting exposure problems is to use the Adjust Curves plugin available by Fix Colors Curves Adjust menu entry. This tool allows you to click and drag control points on a curve to create a free function mapping input brightness levels to output brightness levels. The Curves tool can replicate any effect you can achieve with Brightness/Contrast/Gamma or the Adjust Levels plugin, though it is more powerful than either one of them. Once again, we refer you to the Adjust Curves manual for more detailed instructions, but the easiest way to learn how to use it is by experimenting.

But this plugin can do more for you, it helps you to improve the tonal quality of your photographs to very finely stepped gray scales. And don't forget that the better the photographs are (good exposure, lossless format, 24 or 32 bit deep) the more you can improve them. Navigate to the "Achieving ultimate tonal quality" section of this instructive page: Tonal quality and dynamic range in digital cameras by Norman Koren. Use digiKam Adjust Curves to do just the same!

##### The Adjust Curves Image Editor Plugin in Action

#### Special Effects and Filters

By default &digikam; provides a couple of simple toning filters that you can use on your photographs. Under the Filters menu you will find classic Black and White chemical toning used in analog photography. Color toning changes the monochromatic tint of a basically black and white photograph. When applied it gives the picture a warm, antique feeling. Some examples of colors toning types available in &digikam; are listed below:

Preview | Type
--- | ---
| Original color image taken in New Zealand landscapes.
| Neutral Black and White: simulate black and white neutral film exposure.
| Black and White with Green Filter: simulate black and white film exposure using green filter. This provide an universal asset for all scenics, especially suited for portraits photographed against sky. Similar to 004 Cokin(tm) Green filter.
| Black and White with Orange Filter: simulate black and white film exposure using orange filter. This will enhances landscapes, marine scenes and aerial photography. Similar to 002 Cokin(tm) Orange filter.
| Black and White with Red Filter: simulate black and white film exposure using red filter. Using this one for creates dramatic sky effects and simulates moonlight scenes in daytime. Similar to 003 Cokin(tm) Red filter.
| Black and White with Yellow Filter: simulate black and white film exposure using yellow filter. Most natural tonal correction and improves contrast. Ideal for landscapes. Similar to 001 Cokin(tm) Yellow filter.
| Sepia Tone: gives a warm highlight and mid-tone while adding a bit of coolness to the shadows-very similar to the process of bleaching a print and re-developing in a sepia toner (typical for your grandmothers photographs). Similar to 005 Cokin(tm) Sepia filter.
| Brown Tone: more neutral than Sepia Tone filter.
| Cold Tone: start subtle and replicate printing on a cold tone black and white paper such as a bromide enlarging paper.
| Platinum Tone: effect that replicate traditional platinum chemical toning done in the darkroom.
| Selenium Tone: effect that replicate traditional selenium chemical toning done in the darkroom.

Many other filters and special effects are available if you have the additional Image Editor Plugins installed (see the Setup Image Editor Section), like Film Grain, Rain Drops, Solarize, Charcoal Drawing, etc.

##### The Rain Drops Image Editor Plugin in Action

#### Printing Image

When you want to print the current image, select File Print and you get the standard KDE Print dialog, where you can adjust the settings before printing your photograph.

For more informations about advanced printing settings, please consult KDEPrint manual.

### &digikam; Configuration

&digikam; tries to give you as much control on how it works as possible. There are many options that change the behaviour of &digikam;. To access these settings select Setting Configure &digikam; from the Menu Bar. The configuration dialog is separated into eight pages. You can change between these pages by clicking on the icons on the left-hand side of the dialog.

#### Album Settings

The Album settings control how the main application will behave.

##### The Album Settings

The Album Library Path is the location on your hard disk where &digikam; will store all of the Albums. If you change this location without manually moving all of the Albums on the hard disk, &digikam; will think that there are no existing Albums and will generate a new database at the new location. Your old Albums will not be altered but you will need to change the Album Library Path back to the old location to access them. If you are not sure of what you are doing it is best not to change this location.

The Tag Settings are explained in the My Tags section.

The Extra Information in Thumbnail View options are described in the Images section.

The other settings of this dialog are self explanatory.

#### Embedded Information Settings

Image files can have some meta-data embedded into the image file format. This meta-data can be stored in a number of standard formats. &digikam; can read meta-data in the EXIF format if it is present in the file. &digikam; can also write comments into the EXIF information. Writing comments to the EXIF section is limited to JPEG images.

##### The Embedded Information Settings

These settings allow you to control how &digikam; will deal with this embedded information.

Save Album Items' comments as EXIF Comments in JPEG images : this will synchronise the comments that you add to your photographs with those in embedded in the image. This is useful because the comments embedded in the image can be read by other image viewers. Care should be taken if you have images that already have comments embedded in them because these comments will be overwritten by the comments made within &digikam;.

Rotate Images and Thumbnails according to EXIF tag : this will use any orientation information that your camera has included in the EXIF information to automatically rotate your photographs so that they are the correct way up when displayed. It will not actually rotate the image file, only the display of the image on the screen. If you want to permanently rotate the image on file, you can right-click on the thumbnail and select Auto-rotate/flip according to EXIF orientation. The image will then be rotated on disk and the tag will be reset to "normal". If your camera routinely gets this orientation information wrong you might like to switch this feature off.

Set EXIF Orientation Tag to Normal after rotate/flip : the Auto Rotate option automatically corrects the orientation of images taken with digital cameras that have an orientation sensor. The camera adds an orientation tag to the image's EXIF meta-data. &digikam; can read this tag to adjust the image accordingly. If you manually rotate an image, this meta-data will be incorrect. This option will set the orientation taq to "Normal" after an adjustment, assuming that you rotated it to the correct orientation. Switch this off if you don't want &digikam; to make changes to the orientation tag, when you rotate or flip the image.

#### Collection Settings

This dialog manage your Collection types. Album Collections are described in detail in the My Albums section.

##### The Collection Settings

#### Mime Type Settings

&digikam; can understand lots of different image file types as well as some video and audio formats. To control which types of files &digikam; will try to display you can add or remove file extensions from these lists. Any files that are in the &digikam; Album directories that do not match these extensions will be ignored by &digikam;.

##### The Mime Type Settings

#### Image Editor Settings

In the early versions of &digikam; the Image Editor was just a viewer for photographs, but it is rapidly developing into a very useful photo manipulation tool. This dialog allows you to control how the Image Editor will behave.

##### The Image Editor Settings

When changes are made to JPEG files and they are saved back to the hard disk the JPEG file must be re-encoded. Each time a JPEG file is encoded a decision must be made on the level of quality that is to be applied. Unfortunately the level of quality applied is not recorded in the image file. This means that the Image Editor cannot use the same quality ratio when saving an altered image as was used for the original image. You can change the default level of quality that the Image Editor will apply when it saves altered images by moving the JPEG quality slider (1: low quality / 100: high quality and no compression).

With PNG compression option, you can reduce PNG image files size. This operation doesn't reduce image quality because PNG usees a lossless algorithm. The only effect is that image data needs more time to compress/decompress. If you have a fast computer you can change this value for to use a high compression factor (1: low compression / 9: high compression).

With Using TIFF compression option, you can toogle to use Adobe Deflate compression algorithm with TIFF image files. This will reduce the TIFF image files size. This has no image quality effect because Adobe Deflate is a lossless algorithm.

By default the Image Editor will use a black background behind photographs when they are displayed. If you prefer a different background colour you can select one here. You can also turn off the ToolBar when the Image Editor is in full screen mode.

The Image Editor only implements some very simple photo manipulation tools in the core application. For an easy development of more manipulation tools the Image Editor supports a plugin interface. If your distribution has installed the additional Image Editor plugins they will be listed in the Image Plugins list. You can enable or disable these plugins that you see here.

For more informations about advanced Image Editor plugins, you can consult the 'DigikamImagePlugins' project at http://extragear.kde.org/apps/digikamimageplugins.

#### Kipi Plugins Settings

Kipi is the KDE Image Plugin Interface. It is an interface that is supported by a number of KDE image viewer/editor applications. By providing this interface &digikam; can take advantage of many plugins that are written to work with any application that implements the Kipi interface.

##### The Kipi Plugins Settings

If your distribution has the Kipi plugins package installed you will see a list of available plugins. Select those that you want to use and they will be loaded into &digikam;. The plugins will appear as new menu entries in the main Menu Bar and in the context menu for thumbnails.

Keyboard shortcuts to actions that plugins perform can be set up in the Setting Configure Shortcuts menu.

For more informations about Kipi plugins, you can consult the Kipi project at http://extragear.kde.org/apps/kipi.

#### Camera Settings

The camera settings shows on the left the list of the currently supported cameras. On the right at the top there is an auto-detect button, which tries to identify the camera connected to your computer (make sure that the camera is connected properly to the computer and turned on in the image display mode). Below this are the port settings; the currently supported are Serial, USB, and USB/FireWire MassStorage.

##### The Camera Settings

Clicking on a camera in the list on the left will display the supported ports which you can then select. If there is only one supported port it will be automatically selected. At the bottom on the right there is a box for setting the exact path in case of a serial port. Please note that USB interface does not need any paths to be set. At the very bottom is where you set the path for a USB MassStorage Camera. This box becomes active once you select USB MassStorage Camera in the camera list. You need to enter here the path where you mount the camera, usually "/mnt/camera" or "/mnt/removable".

##### The Add Camera Dialog

To be able to use your digital camera with &digikam;, connect the camera to your computer, switch the camera to the image display mode and turn it on.

Try and see if &digikam; can auto-detect the camera; if not, you can set the camera model and port manually. Once you have the camera setup, goto the "Cameras" menu in the main interface and you will see the camera listed in the menu.

You can choose any title you like for the camera in the setup and this title will be used in the main window Cameras menu. If you have more than one cameras, you can add them through this setup interface.

Yet another possibility - and a very convenient one - is provided by the script in usbcam.tar.gz. When this is installed, digiKam will open all by itself whenever a camera is plugged into the USB connector for download.

#### Miscellaneous Settings

Here you can control how digiKam will behave when you delete a photograph or an Album. See Deleting a Photograph and Deleting an Album sections for more details.

You can also switch off the display of the splash screen when digiKam loads. This may speed up the start time of digiKam very slightly.

##### The Miscellaneous Settings

## Menu Descriptions

### The main &digikam; window

#### The Album Menu

Alt Left Album Back

  Go back to the previously visited Album using history.

Alt Right Album Forward

  Go forward to the previously visted Album using history. You can only go forward if you've just gone back.

Ctrl N Album New Album

  Create a new album folder.

Ctrl F3 Album Edit Album Properties

  Edit the currently selected album title, comments and collection.

Album Open in Konqueror

  Open Konqueror with the current Album path.

Ctrl I Album Import Add Images

  Select images to be added to the currently selected Album.

Album Import Import Folders

  Select folders to be imported like Albums to the currently selected Album

Album Import Scan Images

  Kipi plugin for image acquisition with a scanner.

  See the dedicated Acquire Images manual for more information.

Album Import Screenshot

  Kipi plugin to take a screenshot.

  See the dedicated Acquire Images manual for more information.

Album Export Archive to CD/DVD

  Kipi plugin to archive Albums to CD or DVD using K3b.

  See the dedicated CD Archiving manual for more information.

Album Export HTML export

  Kipi plugin to create a HTML gallery with Albums.

  See the dedicated Images Gallery manual for more information.

Album Export Export to Remote Gallery

  Kipi plugin to export current Album to remote Gallery server.

  See the dedicated Gallery Export manual for more information.

Album Export Print Wizard

  Kipi plugin to print Album images.

  See the dedicated Print Wizard manual for more information.

Album Delete Album/Move Album to trash

  Delete/Move to trash selected Album and all items in it.

Ctrl Q Album Quit

  Quit &digikam;

#### The Tag Menu

Tag New Tag

  Create a new Tag entry in the Albums Database.

Tag Edit Tag Properties

  Edit the properties of the currently selected Tag.

Tag Delete Tag

  Remove the currently selected Tag from the Album's Database.

#### The Image Menu

F4 Image View/Edit

  Open the currently selected image in the &digikam; image editor.

F3 Image Edit Image Comments and Tags

  Edit the comments and tags of the currently selected image.

Image Correct EXIF Orientation Tag

  Manual EXIF Orientation Tag adjustment options of the currently selected image.

Alt Return Image Properties

  View General Properties, Permissions, embedded Meta-Data, EXIF information, and Histogram of the currently selected image.

Image Auto Rotate/Flip using EXIF information

  Kipi plugin menu entry to manually activate the auto rotate/flip feature for the currently selected images using the EXIF orientation tag.

  See the dedicated JPEG Loss Less manual for more information.

Image Rotate

  Kipi plugin menu entry for rotating the currently selected images by 90/180/270 degrees.

  See the dedicated JPEG Loss Less manual for more information.

Image Flip

  Kipi plugin menu entry for flipping the currently selected images horizontally or vertically.

  See the dedicated JPEG Loss Less manual for more information.

Image Convert to Black and White

  Kipi plugin menu entry for converting the currently selected images to black and white.

  See the dedicated JPEG Loss Less manual for more information.

Image Email images

  Kipi plugin for emailing images with your prefered mail agent.

  See the dedicated Send Images manual for more information.

Image Adjust Time and Date

  Kipi plugin for adjusting time and date of the currently selected images.

  See the dedicated Time Adjust manual for more information.

Image Set as Background

  Kipi plugin for setting the currently selected image as the desktop background.

  See the dedicated Wall Paper manual for more information.

F2 Image Rename

  Rename the currently selected image.

Shift Delete Image Delete/Move to trash

  Delete/Move the currently selected images to Trash.

#### The Select Menu

Ctrl A Select Select All

  Select all images currently shown

Ctrl U Select Select None

  Unselect all items in the current view

Ctrl* Select Invert Selection

  Invert the current selection

#### The View Menu

Ctrl+ View Increase Thumbnail Size

  Increase the thumbnail size of the currently selected Album.

Ctrl- View Decrease Thumbnail Size

  Decrease the thumbnail size of the currently selected Album.

Albums Sort Albums

  Sort all &digikam; Albums by Folder, by Collection, or by Date.

View Sort Images

  Sort all images in current Album by Name, by Path, by Date, or by File Size.

#### The Tools Menu

Album Find Duplicate Images

  Kipi plugin to find duplicate images in Albums Database.

  See the dedicated Find Duplicate Images manual for more information.

Tools Gamma adjustment

  Launch the screen Gamma Adjustment module from KDE Control Panel.

  See the dedicated KGamma manual for more information.

  Another even better reference can be found here: Monitor Calibration

Tools Create Calendar

  Kipi plugin for creating a calendar with Album items.

  See the dedicated Calendar manual for more information.

Tools Create MPEG Slideshow

  Kipi plugin for creating an MPEG Slideshow with Album items.

  See the dedicated MPEG Encoder manual for more information.

Tools Slideshow

  Kipi plugin for displaying a Slideshow with Album items.

  See the dedicated Slide Show manual for more information.

Tools Raw Image Converter (single)

  Kipi plugin for converting a single RAW image.

  See the dedicated Raw Converter manual for more information.

Tools Batch Processes

  Kipi plugin menu entries for performing batch Processes on currently selected images.

  See the dedicated manuals for more informations:

  - Border Images manual

  - Color Images manual

  - Convert Images manual

  - Effect Images manual

  - Filter Images manual

  - Recompress Images manual

  - Rename Images manual

  - Resize Images manual

  - Raw Converter manual

#### The Camera Menu

Any configured digital camera will be listed here. You can use the "Add Camera" menu entry to add a new camera to the list. Please, read the Setup Camera Section for more information.

#### The Settings Menu

Settings Show Toolbar

  Enable or disable the main &digikam; tool bar.

Ctrl Shift F Settings Full Screen Mode

  Toggles the graphic interface into full screen mode.

Settings Themes

  Any available gui themes for the main interface will be listed here. Select one for changing the theme used by &digikam;.

Settings Configure Shortcuts

  Configure the &digikam; shortcuts.

Settings Configure Toolbars

  Configure the &digikam; toolbars.

Settings Configure &digikam;

  Launch &digikam; configure dialog.

#### The Help Menu

&help.menu.documentation;

Additionally &digikam; offers these items:

Help Tip of the Day

  This displays a dialog with useful hints for using &digikam;.

Help Kipi' Plugins Handbooks

  Launch the KDE help interface with the Kipi's plugins handbooks.

### The Image Editor

#### The File Menu

PgUp File Previous

  Display the previous image of the current Album.

PgDown File Next

  Display the next image of the current Album.

Ctrl Home File First

  Display the first image of current Album.

Ctrl End File Last

  Display the last image of current Album.

Ctrl S File Save

  Save the current image if it has been modified.

File Save As

  Save the current image in a new file.

File Revert

  Restore the current image from the original file if it has been modified.

Shift Del File Delete File/Move to trash

  Delete/Move to trash the current image from the current Album.

Ctrl P File Print Image

  Print the current image.

Ctrl Q File Quit

  Quit &digikam; Image Editor.

#### The Edit Menu

Ctrl C Edit Copy

  Copy the current image selection in the clipboard.

Ctrl Z Edit Cancel

  Cancel the last action applied to the current image using history.

Ctrl Shift Z Edit Redo

  Redo the last action applied to the current image using history.

#### The Image Menu

F3 Image Edit Comments and Tags

  Edit the comments and tags of the currently selected image.

Alt Return Image Properties

  View General Properties, Permissions, embedded Meta-Data, EXIF information, and Histogram of the currently selected image.

Image Apply Texture

  Image Editor plugin to apply decorative texture to the current image.

  See the dedicated Apply Texture manual for more information.

Image Add Border

  Image Editor plugin to add a decorative border around the current image.

  See the dedicated Add Border manual for more information.

Image Insert Text

  Image Editor plugin to insert text in the current image.

  See the dedicated Insert Text manual for more information.

Image Template Superimpose

  Image Editor plugin for apply a template to the current image.

  See the dedicated Template Superimpose manual for more information.

#### The Fix Menu

Fix Colors Brightness/Contrast/Gamma

  Exposure correction of the current image by Brightness, Contrast, or Gamma adjustments.

Fix Colors Hue/Saturation/Lightness

  Color correction of the current image by Hue, Saturation, or Lightness adjustments.

Fix Colors Color Balance

  Color correction of the current image by Red, Green, or Blue adjustments.

Fix Colors Normalize

  Automatic color correction of the current image by an histogram normalization.

Fix Colors Equalize

  Automatic color correction of the current image by an histogram equalization.

Fix Colors Auto Levels

  Automatic color correction of the current image by an histogram auto-levels adjustment.

Fix Colors Stretch Contrast

  Automatic contrast enhance of the current image.

Fix Colors Invert

  Invert image colors.

Fix Colors Levels Adjust

  Image Editor plugin to adjust levels manually on the current image.

  See the dedicated Adjust Levels manual for more information.

Fix Colors Curves Adjust

  Image Editor plugin to adjust curves manually on the current image.

  See the dedicated Adjust Curves manual for more information.

Fix Colors Channel Mixer

  Image Editor plugin to mix color channels on the current image.

  See the dedicated Channel Mixer manual for more information.

Fix Colors White Balance

  Image Editor plugin to adjust white color balance on the current image.

  See the dedicated White Balance manual for more information.

Fix Blur

  Focus error correction of the current image by a blurring operation.

Fix Sharpen

  Focus error correction of the current image by a sharping operation.

Fix Red Eye Reduction

  Red Eye correction using the current selection of the current image.

Fix Unsharp Mask

  Image Editor plugin to operate an Unsharp mask on the current image.

  See the dedicated Unsharp Mask manual for more information.

Fix Lens Distortion Correction

  Image Editor plugin to correct lens distortion of the current image.

  See the dedicated Lens Distortion Correction manual for more information.

Fix Restoration

  Image Editor plugin to reduce artefacts on the current image.

  See the dedicated Photograph Restoration manual for more information.

Fix Inpainting

  Image Editor plugin to remove unwanted area on the current image.

  See the dedicated Photograph Inpainting manual for more information.

Fix Noise Reduction

  Image Editor plugin to reduce the noise on the current image with using a Despeckle filter.

  See the dedicated Noise Reduction manual for more information.

Fix Anti Vignetting

  Image Editor plugin to correct vignetting of the current image.

  See the dedicated Anti Vignetting manual for more information.

#### The Transform Menu

Shift 1 Transform Rotate 90 degrees

  90 degrees rotation of the current image.

Shift 2 Transform Rotate 180 degrees

  180 degrees rotation of the current image.

Shift 3 Transform Rotate 270 degrees

  270 degrees rotation of the current image.

Transform Flip Horizontally

  Horizontal flip of the current image.

Transform Flip Vertically

  Vertical flip of the current image.

Transform Crop

  Crop the current image to the current selection.

Transform Resize

  Resize the current image to the appropriate factor or dimensions.

Transform Aspect Ratio Crop

  Crop the current image using an constrained aspect ratio.

Transform Blowup

  Image Editor plugin to blow up a photograph without less image quality.

  See the dedicated Blowup manual for more information.

Transform Shear

  Image Editor plugin to shear the current image.horizontally or vertically.

  See the dedicated Shear Tool manual for more information.

Transform Free Rotation

  Image Editor plugin to rotate the current image by any angle in degrees.

  See the dedicated Free Rotation manual for more information.

Transform Perspective Adjustment

  Image Editor plugin to adjust perspective of the current image.

  See the dedicated Perspective Adjustment manual for more information.

#### The View Menu

Ctrl+ View Zoom In

  Increase the zoom factor on the current image.

Ctrl- View Zoom Out

  Decrease the zoom factor on the current image.

A View Zoom AutoFit

  Set the zoom factor for adapting the current image size to the Image Editors window size.

View Histogram

  Display superimposed histogram under current image.

#### The Filters Menu

Filters Black and White

  Apply Black and White filter to the current image.

Filters Raindrops

  Image Editor plugin to add Rain Drops on the current image.

  See the dedicated Rain Drops manual for more information.

Filters Infrared Film

  Image Editor plugin to simulate infrared film on the current image.

  See the dedicated Infrared Film manual for more information.

Filters Oil paint

  Image Editor plugin to simulate Oil Painting on the current image.

  See the dedicated Oil Paint manual for more information.

Filters Emboss

  Image Editor plugin to Emboss the current image.

  See the dedicated Emboss Image manual for more information.

Filters Solarize Image

  Image Editor plugin to Solarize the current image.

  See the dedicated Solarize Image manual for more information.

Filters Distortion Effects

  Image Editor plugin to apply distortion special effects on the current image.

  See the dedicated Distortion Effects manual for more information.

Filters Add Film Grain

  Image Editor plugin for to adding Film Grain on the current image.

  See the dedicated Film Grain manual for more information.

Filters Blur Effects

  Image Editor plugin to apply blurring special effects on the current image.

  See the dedicated Blur Effects manual for more information.

Filters Charcoal Drawing

  Image Editor plugin to simulate Charcoal Drawing on the current image.

  See the dedicated Charcoal Drawing manual for more information.

#### The Settings Menu

Ctrl Shift F Settings Full Screen Mode

  Toggles the graphic interface to full screen mode.

Settings Configure Shorcuts

  Configure the &digikam; image editor shortcuts.

Settings Configure Toolbars

  Configure the &digikam; image editor toolbars.

#### The Help Menu

&help.menu.documentation;

Additionally &digikam; Image Editor offers this item:

Help ImagePlugins' Handbooks

  Launch the KDE help interface with the &digikam; Image Editor plugins handbooks.

## Credits and License

&digikam; logo

Program copyright 2001-2005, &digikam; developers team

- Renchi Raju renchi_at_pooh.tam.uiuc.edu: Coordinator, Main Developer.

- Caulier Gilles caulier_dot_gilles_at free.fr: Co-coordinator, Developer, French Translations.

- Joern Ahrens kde_at_jokele.de: Developer.

- Ralf Hoelzer kde_at_ralfhoelzer.com: Developer.

Documentation copyrighted by:

- 2001-2002 Renchi Raju renchi_at_pooh.tam.uiuc.edu.

- 2002-2003

  - Gilles Caulier caulier_dot_gilles_at_free.fr

  - Renchi Raju renchi_at_pooh.tam.uiuc.edu

- 2003-2005

  - Gilles Caulier caulier_dot_gilles_at_free.fr

  - Renchi Raju renchi_at_pooh.tam.uiuc.edu

  - Richard Taylor rjt-digicam_at_thegrindstone_dot_me_dot_uk

  - Ralf Hoelzer kde_at_ralfhoelzer.com

  - Joern Ahrens kde_at_jokele.de

  - Oliver Doerr oliver_at_doerr-privat.de

  - Gerhard Kulzer gerhard at kulzer.net

All Pictures copyrighted 2003-2005 by Gilles Caulier caulier_dot_gilles_at_free.fr.

&underFDL;

&underGPL;

## Installation

### How to Obtain &digikam;

The website for &digikam; is at http://digikam.sourceforge.net. Please check it regularly to get the latest news about &digikam;. &digikam; can be obtained in binary and source format from http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=42641.

Also you can checkout the digikam and kipi source code modules from KDE Extragear CVS repository like this:

        % cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@anoncvs.kde.org:/home/kde login
        % cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@anoncvs.kde.org:/home/kde co
        kdeextragear-libs-1
        % cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@anoncvs.kde.org:/home/kde co
        kdeextragear-3

The last CVS snapshoots can be downloaded at this URL ftp://ftp.kde.org/pub/kde/unstable/snapshots/.

### Requirements

In order to successfully use &digikam;, you need the following:

- AutoConf >= 2.5

- AutoMake >= 1.7.0

- KDE 3.x

- gphoto2 2.x

- imlib2 >= 1.2.0

- libgdbm >= 1.8.0

- libkipi >= 0.1

- libkexif >= 0.1

- libtiff >= 3.5.x

- DigikamImagePlugins >= 0.7.4 (optional)

KDE can be obtained from KDE Home Page.

Gphoto2 can be obtained from Gphoto Home Page.

libkipi can be obtained from http://extragear.kde.org/apps/kipi.

libkexif can be obtained from http://digikam.sourceforge.net.

DigikamImagePlugins can be obtained from http://extragear.kde.org/apps/digikamimageplugins.

Most likely your distribution vendor might already have packaged and provided these packages.

### Compilation and Installation

In order to compile and install &digikam; on your system, type the following in the basedirectorys of the libkipi and digikam module distributions:

        % export WANT_AUTOCONF_2_5=1
        % export KDEDIR=KDE_installation_dir_on_your_system
        % export
        PKG_CONFIG_PATH=$PKG_CONFIG_PATH:/path/to/installation/lib/pkgconfig
        % make -f Makefile.cvs
        % ./configure
        % make
        % su
        % make install

#### Important Notices

Stage 3 is required if you are installing libkipi/libkexif in a non-standard location, and you must let pkg-config know about their paths.

More specific compilation and installation options can be passed to the configure script. Use `./configure --help` on the command line to view these options.

Use --enable-debug=full option with configure script for to provide a full informations bug report.

Because &digikam; depends on libkipi and libkexif, you must build these libraries before you build &digikam;.

Since &digikam; uses autoconf and automake you should not have trouble compiling it. If you run into problems please report them to digikam-users@kde.org.

&documentation.index;