December 6, 2025
For flawless images.
What is it about?
Even the best photo sometimes has small flaws: A dust speck on the sensor, a blemish in a portrait, or a distracting soda can in the grass of a landscape shot. The Retouch module is your digital eraser. It is significantly more powerful than the old “Spot Removal” tool, as it handles complex shapes and frequency separation.
The most important tools:
- Clone: Copies an image area exactly to another location.
- Heal: Copies structure and color from the surroundings and intelligently blends them with the target area. This is usually the best choice for skin blemishes.
- Fill: Fills an area with a color or blur.
How to apply it:
- Choose a shape (circle, ellipse, path, or brush).
- Click on the spot you want to correct (target).
- Darktable automatically selects a source to copy from. You can move this source until the result fits perfectly.
- Use the mouse wheel to adjust the size of the tool or the softness of the edge.
Pro Tip:
For advanced skin retouching, the module offers an integrated wavelet decomposition. This allows you to remove skin blemishes without destroying the pore structure of the skin (“frequency separation”).