My Darktable Workflow

Basic workflow

Copy a film roll (a directory of RAW images) into a directory on the machine running Darktable.
Import the film roll into Darktable.
Review the images using lighttable mode and remove any images that are beyond repair.
Take a snapshot of the image so we can do a before and after comparison.
Adjust the white balance.
Exposure compensation and recovery.
Noise reduction.
Lens corrections.
Capture sharpening.
Contrast with levels and curves.
Crop and rotate the image.
Colour and selective enhancements such as saturation, colour adjustments and spot removal.

Output workflow

Resize the image for the web or printing.
Output sharpening.

Black and white workflow

Monochrome plugin
Channel mixer with the combination of RGB values equalling one.
Colour zones plugin.
Improve contrast with tone curve plugin.

Darktable Modules

Basic Group

Crop and rotate (including keystone for architectural)
Shadows and Highlights
Base curve (turn this off if you don't like it and use your own tone curve - see Tone Group)
Exposure
Demosaic (PPG is faster)
White balance

Tone Group

Levels
Tone curve
Zone system
Local contrast

Colour Group

Velvia
Channel Mixer (check table of film values below)
Colour Correction for tinting and split toning
Monochrome
Color zones (modifies color in images)

Correction Group

Sharpen
Denoise - Non local means (see denoising starting point below)
Lens correction
Spot removal

Effect group

Watermark
Framing
Splittoning
Vignetting
Soften (Orton effect)
Grain
Graduated Density

Channel Mixer B&W film

Film Type (Red, Green, Blue)

AGFA 200X (0.18, 0.41, 0.41)
Agfapan 25 (0.25, 0.39, 0.36)
Agfapan 100 (0.21, 0.40, 0.39)
Agfapan 400 (0.20, 0.41, 0.39)
Ilford Delta 100 (0.21, 0.42, 0.37)
Ilford Delta 400 (0.22, 0.42, 0.36)
Ilford Delta 3200 (0.31, 0.36, 0.33)
Ilford FP4 (0.28, 0.41, 0.31)
Ilford HP5 (0.23, 0.37, 0.40)
Ilford Pan F (0.33, 0.36, 0.31)
Ilford SFX (0.36, 0.31, 0.33)
Ilford XP2 Super (0.21, 0.42, 0.37)
Kodak T-Max 100 (0.24, 0.37, 0.39)
Kodak T-Max 400 (0.27, 0.36, 0.37)
Kodak Tri-X 400 (0.25, 0.35, 0.40)
Normal Contrast (0.43, 0.33, 0.30)
High Contrast (0.40, 0.34, 0.60)
Generic B/W (0.24, 0.68, 0.08)

Denoise (non-local means) starting point

Take a tenth of the ISO value. So if ISO is 160...

luma 16% chroma 32% (double luma)

Common ND filters

Filter ([ev] or f-stop, absorbance, transmittance) ND2 (-1, 0.3, 50%) ND4 (-2, 0.6, 25%) ND8 (-3, 0.9, 12.5%) ND400 (-9, 2.7, 0.195%)

HDR Workflow

Import bracketed shots into Darktable.
Click on Create HDR.
Turn off all modules in the 'Active' group.
Adjust the exposure.

With a night shot with a few light sources correct the light source to bring back as much detail into the light source without lowering its intensity. With a daylight show expose the darker parts of the image.

Use the global tonemap module. Day shot you need to bring out highlights. Night shot bring out shadows.
Fine tune the exposure.
Use the equaliser module to increase contrast.

Resources:

bedros/darktable-workflow.md