Library

Immage has no catalog. You add folders, browse them in the filmstrip or the grid, and rate, label and keyword photos there. Everything you set is written to the photo’s XMP sidecar, so it travels with the photo and darktable sees it too.

If you’ve used another editor: think of it as a folders panel without the import step. Adding a folder never copies or moves anything. Collections and smart collections don’t exist; Immich can do that job.

Folders

Open the Folders card in the Library panel.

• + Add folder… adds a folder to the list and opens it in Grid view. Dragging a folder from Finder or Explorer onto Immage’s window does the same.
• Click a folder in the tree to open it. The arrow beside it shows its subfolders.
• Hover a folder and click × to take it off the list, whether it is one you added or a subfolder inside one. A subfolder taken off the list is left out of Include subfolders too. Its files stay where they are; adding or dragging the folder in again brings it back.
• Include subfolders shows the photos in a folder’s subfolders too. It is off unless you turn it on.
• The refresh button reads the folders, and the open folder’s photos, again: use it after adding files from outside Immage.
• The × beside a top-level folder takes it off the list. Nothing is deleted.
• When the open photo is in a folder you aren’t browsing, that folder is marked with a dot.
• When your folders are on more than one drive, each drive is a heading over its folders, so two folders with the same name (a 2026 on your computer and a 2026 on a NAS) are told apart. A network share shows a network icon and its server’s name, or its address when the share was connected by address; double-click the name or address to give it a name of your own, and clear it to go back. Click a heading to fold it. A folder on a share that isn’t connected stays under its share, dimmed.

Folders you import into join the list by themselves. The list, the open folder and the last photo are remembered when you quit.

The filmstrip and the grid

The filmstrip under the photo shows the open folder, in the order the photos were taken. Photos taken at the same moment, such as a raw and its virtual copies, follow by file name. A photo whose camera recorded no capture time, as one with a flat clock battery, is placed by the date its file was last changed; photos with neither come last. Each thumbnail shows the file name and type (ARW, JPG, …), and a small sliders mark beside the type once the photo is edited. Hover over it to see its rating, labels and reject button. Once a photo is rated or rejected, those show all the time.

Thumbnails load in the background and prioritize the photos currently visible in the grid or filmstrip. Scrolling changes that priority; renders already running finish before the newly visible photos use their slots.

A photo counts as edited once you change something yourself. What Immage gives a photo the first time it opens (the New Photos settings in Preferences) doesn’t count, and undoing every change makes it unedited again. darktable uses the same rule, and the sidecar carries it, so its lighttable shows the same photos as altered. Photos opened in Immage before version 0.23.2 count their New Photos settings as an edit until you reset them.

Press G, or Grid in the toolbar under the filmstrip, for Grid view: the whole folder at once. Double-click a photo to open it and go back to the filmstrip. G or Esc also goes back.

Drag the top edge of the filmstrip to make it taller or shorter.

Selecting photos

• Click a photo to open it.
• ⌘-click adds a photo to the selection, or takes it out, without opening it.
• ⇧-click selects the run from the open photo to the one you click.
• ⌘A selects every photo the filters leave showing.
• ← and → step through the photos.

Ratings, labels, rejecting, exporting, virtual copies and Edit In all act on the whole selection.

Rating, rejecting and labels

You can also click the stars and the ✕ on a thumbnail, or use the Metadata card. Rating a photo un-rejects it.

Filtering

The toolbar under the filmstrip filters the folder:

• Stars: show photos with that rating and up. Click it again to turn it off.

• Reject: click once to hide rejected photos, again to show only them, and again to show everything.

• Edited (the sliders button): click once to show only edited photos, again to show only unedited ones, and again to show everything.

• Color labels: show photos with any of the chosen labels; the gray swatch shows photos without a label.

• Filters: opens a list of what else the folder can be narrowed by, with a panel beside it showing the options of the one chosen. Choose as many as you like, then click Search to filter the folder and show it in the grid; Clear in the panel takes that one off, at the next Search.

  • Rejected: All photos, Hide rejected or Only rejected. This counts as an active filter and resets with Clear all.
  • File type, Camera and Lens: tick any to show photos of those, for example RAW and JPEG. Each lists what the folder holds, with how many photos of each.
  • Camera body: distinguish physical bodies of the same model by their full serial numbers, even when you swap lenses. Entries show the camera model, serial and photo count. Tick multiple bodies to include any of them; combine with Camera, Lens or other filters to narrow the results. Long lists can be searched by model or serial. Serial not recorded selects photos without a usable body serial; those cannot be assigned reliably to a particular body. Serials come from the original file’s supported metadata, including recognized camera maker notes; lens serials are never used. Changes apply with Search, and reset with Clear or Clear all. This filter is available for folders, not Immich server searches.
  • Keywords: tick one or more to show photos with all of them. A keyword includes those under it, so Places shows photos tagged Places › Norway too.
  • Captured: photos taken between two dates. Type them, or pick a recent span (Last 30 days, This month, Last year and others), a year, or a month of the year picked. A photo with no capture time goes by its file’s date here too.
  • Exposure: ISO, aperture, focal length and shutter speed. Choose one to list the values the folder holds, and tick any, for example ISO 100 and 200.

  Each list counts only the photos your other choices leave: tick a camera, and Lens lists just the lenses used on it. The list shows what each is set to, and the button how many are on. Clear all, at the bottom of the panel, takes them all off when you click Search.

• Clear: show every photo again.

Opening another folder clears the filters.

RAW+JPEG pairs

Turn on Stack RAW+JPEG pairs as one photo in Preferences › General to show a raw and the JPEG, HEIF or OM System .ORI of the same name as a single photo. Its thumbnail reads, for example, ARW+JPG. A rating, reject or delete takes them all.

Virtual copies

A virtual copy is a second edit of the same photo. Press ⌘’, or right-click and choose Create Virtual Copy. The copy starts from the photo’s edit as it is, is listed after the original with a folded corner, and opens. Each copy has its own sidecar.

To remove one, right-click it and choose Remove Virtual Copy. Its sidecar goes to the Trash; the photo file stays.

Generated photos

Generated photos open for editing automatically, including HDR and panorama merges. Turn off Open generated photos in Preferences › General › Workspace to stay on your current photo and use the completion notification’s Open. Successful notifications close after 30 seconds, or when Open or OK is selected.

HDR Merge

HDR Merge combines bracketed raws, the same scene at different exposures, into one photo with the range of them all, using darktable’s HDR merge. Select the brackets in the filmstrip or grid, then press ⌃H or right-click and choose HDR Merge…. Turn on Auto Align for brackets shot handheld, so that they line up before they merge; brackets from a tripod don’t need it. Click Merge.

Immage writes a new DNG beside the first bracket, named <name>-hdr.dng (then <name>-hdr_01.dng and so on). It is merged in the background while you go on editing, and Open at the bottom left of the photo opens it. The DNG holds the raw data, not a finished picture: it opens with the new-photo defaults and is edited like any raw, with Exposure, Highlights and Shadows bringing the range in. The brackets themselves aren’t changed.

HDR DNGs preserve their format identification, color calibration and sensor pattern when copying the brackets’ EXIF, and can also open in darktable. Regenerate an older merge if it shows a ? thumbnail and cannot open.

The brackets must be raws from the same camera, of the same size and orientation. Anything that moves between them, such as people or leaves, shows as a ghost: Auto Align lines up the camera’s movement, not the subject’s.

Panorama Merge

Panorama Merge and its projection preview are supported on Windows, macOS and Linux. Official Windows builds include the OpenCV stitching support needed for both preview and merge. If the dialog says this build cannot stitch panoramas, its engine lacks stitching support; install a build that includes it.

Panorama Merge stitches overlapping RAW or non-RAW photos, including mixed selections, into one wide photo. Select the photos in the filmstrip or grid, then press ⌃M or right-click and choose Panorama Merge…. A preview of your selected photos appears above the projection choices. Choose a projection to compare its effect:

• Auto picks one from how wide the panorama is
• Spherical suits very wide panoramas, and those of several rows
• Cylindrical suits wide panoramas, and keeps vertical lines straight
• Perspective keeps straight lines straight, for architecture, up to about 100° across

With Auto, the label below the preview shows the projection chosen. Auto Crop cuts away the empty edges the photos leave; toggle it to compare the crop immediately. With it off, empty edges appear as a checkerboard.

The preview takes a moment to build and updates when you change projection. Previously viewed projections are kept while the panel is open. It shows geometry at reduced resolution; final detail, alignment and color may differ. If some photos do not overlap, the panel shows how many the preview uses. If the preview fails, try Retry or another projection. You can still click Merge to attempt the full-resolution stitch. Closing the panel cancels preview work. Previewing does not create a file or change your source photos.

Click Merge when you are happy with the projection and crop.

Immage writes a new DNG beside the first photo, named <name>-pano.dng (then <name>-pano_01.dng and so on), and lists it after that photo. It is stitched in the background while you go on editing, and Open at the bottom left of the photo opens it. Like Lightroom’s, the DNG holds linear image data with lens corrections already made. An all-RAW selection opens with the new-photo defaults, white balance as shot and Lens Corrections off. A selection containing non-RAW photos uses a common linear color space and a neutral starting edit. The DNG is edited as one photo. The other edits of the photos you merged aren’t used, and the photos themselves aren’t changed.

Panorama DNGs can also be opened in darktable. RAW merges preserve the DNG’s format identification, camera color matrix and white balance when copying the source photo’s EXIF. If an older RAW merge shows a ? thumbnail and cannot open, merge the original photos again with the updated version.

The photos should overlap by a third or so. A photo that overlaps none of the others is left out, and the activity line says so. Stitching runs on OpenCV rather than darktable, which has no panorama tool. It takes from half a minute to a few minutes, and a lot of memory for many photos.

Deleting rejected photos

Immage only deletes photos you have rejected. Reject them with X, select them (or show only rejected photos and press ⌘A), then right-click and choose Delete Rejected Photo… (with several, Delete 3 Rejected Photos…). They move to the Trash with their sidecars, after you confirm. Thumbnails disappear immediately while the files move in the background. If deletion fails, an error appears and the folder refreshes to show any files still present.

The right-click menu

Right-click a photo, or a selection, for:

• Edit In ›: send it to another application. See Edit In.
• Create Virtual Copy / Remove Virtual Copy
• HDR Merge…, for two raws or more
• Panorama Merge…, for two photos or more
• Adjust Capture Time… / Undo Capture Time Adjustment…
• Show in Finder
• Import Parent Folder, for an Immich result when Immich is configured in Preferences: add its locally mapped parent to Folders and browse its photos. Disabled when no local file is available. See Immich.
• Show in Immich, for a photo from an Immich search
• Delete Rejected Photo…

Metadata

The Metadata card shows the open photo’s:

• File Name and Folder
• Title, Caption, Copyright and Creator, which you can edit: type, then press Enter or click away. Esc puts back what was there.
• the rating and color label
• what the camera recorded: capture date, dimensions, focal length, aperture, shutter speed, ISO, exposure bias, flash, lens, camera and more

Adjust capture time

Select photos, then choose Adjust Capture Time… in the context menu or Metadata panel. Enter the correct time for the reference photo. The dialog previews the offset and number of photos; confirm to shift them all by the same amount, preserving relative timing. Photos without a valid recorded time are skipped. Changes go to XMP sidecars; original files stay unchanged. The context menu can undo the last batch after confirmation.

Location

In Metadata’s Location, enter latitude and longitude or open the optional OpenStreetMap map. Click to drop a pin, or drag it, then Apply to save GPS coordinates to the XMP sidecar. Remove location clears coordinates and altitude. The map offers dark and standard styles and needs an internet connection, with no API key.

Keywords

The Keywording card lists the open photo’s keywords; click × on one to remove it. To add some, type them separated by commas and press Enter. Type a hierarchy as Places > Paris. Suggestions come from the keywords you have used before, and Recent keywords holds the last few: click one to add it or take it off.

Opening a photo from another program

Another application, or Terminal, can hand Immage a photo:

open -a Immage /path/to/photo.arw

Immage shows the photo’s folder and opens the photo. Dragging a photo from Finder or Explorer onto Immage’s window does the same, and so should dropping it on Immage’s Dock icon.

This page is part of immage's own docs, at v0.41.1. View the source on GitHub.