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Export: full-size files

Export writes full-size image files: a JPEG or TIFF for every take, rendered from the original with your develop settings applied, for a client, a lab or a website. Reach for it when the developing is done.

Opening it​

On the cull page, open the ⋯ menu at the end of the views line and choose Export…, or choose File ▸ Export…. On the edit page, press Export N at the right of the top panel.

The dialog is titled Export takes at full resolution, with the count of takes under its opening sentence. The count and the export cover every frame marked Take in the library, whatever the pass is narrowed to; the N on the edit page's button counts only the takes in the pass.

The export dialog with the Full-size JPEG preset chosen and Fast selected

The controls​

Preset. A saved recipe that fills in everything below it. Three come with Vixlo: Full-size JPEG, Web 2048 and TIFF 16-bit. Change any control except Engine and the name reads Custom, unless the settings now match another preset, whose name then shows. Saving your own is on Export presets, renaming and watermarks.

Format and Quality. JPEG or TIFF. A JPEG has 8 bits per channel, and a slider from 50% to 100% sets its quality, 92% unless a preset says otherwise. A TIFF has 16 bits per channel for a RAW take and for a take you have developed; What an exported file contains says what the rest get.

Size. Full is the original's own pixels. 4096 and 2048 are ceilings on the long edge; a smaller frame is delivered at its own size, and nothing is ever enlarged.

Colour space. sRGB or Display P3, for the Fast engine only. sRGB suits the web and most labs. Display P3 converts the pixels, not just the label. With sRGB, Fast does not always convert; What an exported file contains says when.

Rename, Subfolder and Watermark. Name patterns built from tokens, with First file: under them showing the first take's name, and a line of text drawn into the exported file only. Left empty, each file keeps the original's name and lands in the folder itself. The presets page has all three.

Engine. Fast or Max quality. Fast renders through Core Image and carries every develop setting. Max quality hands every take to darktable, an external program; it is slower, helps only RAW frames and cannot apply develop settings (Max quality and darktable).

In Vixlo 0.1

The note under the row reads Core Image — fast, and exactly what you saw while culling. Not so for a RAW take you have not developed: its canvas shows the camera's own JPEG, but Fast renders from the raw data, so the in-camera look, a film simulation for example, is missing from the export. A take with any develop setting is decoded from the raw data on the canvas too, and the note holds. Check one exported file before delivering.

Choosing a folder and exporting​

  1. Press Export to folder….
  2. In the picker (Choose a folder for the exported files. Nothing is written to your originals.) choose any folder on this Mac, or make a new one, and press Export Here.
  3. The dialog changes to Exporting… with a bar and a count, 4 of 12 rendered.

The export dialog mid-run: 4 of 12 rendered, the bar part way across, Cancel

Cancel stops the run after the frame in hand. Done closes the report.

In Vixlo 0.1

Cancel does not interrupt the frame being rendered. Vixlo finishes, writes and counts it, so Cancel at 4 of 12 rendered leaves five images, and the report begins Wrote 5 of 12. and goes on 0 frames could not be rendered — see export-manifest.json for why. Nothing failed: — with gaps means you stopped the run, and the manifest lists the five and does not name the other seven. Until that frame is done, the dialog drops back to its first page with Export to folder… live. Wait for the report rather than pressing it.

caution

Never export into the folder your photographs are in, least of all the Originals folder inside your library: an exported DSCF1234.jpg replaces a DSCF1234.JPG there, which on a RAW+JPEG shoot is the camera's JPEG beside each RAW, and its .xmp replaces the one holding that frame's develop settings. See Where files go.

When an export is refused​

These stop an export before anything is written, with Couldn't export and the reason; Try again reopens the picker.

  • A folder on a removable card or drive, an external SSD included. The message ends An export never writes back to a source card.
  • A folder you cannot write to: isn't writable, so nothing was written there.
  • With Rename and Subfolder both empty, two takes that would get the same file name: the same IMG_0001.RAF from two cards, say, or IMG_0001.RAF and IMG_0001.JPG as two takes, because Vixlo did not pair them as one shot, both becoming IMG_0001.jpg. (A RAW+JPEG pair that Vixlo paired at import is a single take, and is not affected.) The message lists the names and ends Rename these frames, or export them separately. Typing a pattern into Rename or Subfolder is the quickest way round it: the second take then gets a name of its own (Image names never collide). Names that differ only in capital letters get past this check; see the caution under Running the same action twice into one folder.
  • Max quality without darktable, or with a developed take: see What it refuses. With no takes at all, Export to folder… stays off.

When it finishes​

The finished dialog reads Export complete: Wrote 12 files and a sidecar for each, for 12 takes. Your originals were not touched. If some frames could not be rendered the title ends — with gaps and the manifest says why. What is in the folder, and inside each file, is on What an exported file contains.

The Export complete dialog with 12 rendered, 0 failed and Reveal in Finder

Exporting again into the same folder​

With a rename or subfolder pattern an image already in the folder is never written over; without one, Fast replaces a file of the same name. Where files go has every case.