Are the any plans to include xcf support for future versions of Gimp?

Gimp has updated the .psd plugin, and it is much better than it used to be, so for now, I use .psd as the format to share with Krita.

What I hope for is full xcf support in Krita with Gimp's new layer modes and higher bit depth. The .psd plugin is much improved in Gimp 2.9, but the bit depth stays at 8 for now when I export a .psd.

By the way, Krita is an awesome painting program! Thanks so much!

Higher bit depth isn't appropriate for this program. Photoshop/Affinity Photo bit depth does not reach 64 bit and for good reasons. I can't really explain why other than it would take huge processing power, and it requires a taxing amount of memory that's not in reach of so many people out there unless you're working with 4x4 images or something. I don't think my 2K dollars PC would be able to process it well with my needs considered in mind and especially with Krita nondestructive workflow. I always work with nondestructive workflow unless in rare cases where I don't need it like repairing photographs without changing the looks entirely or when I actually have to open GIMP CCE just for its LCH support. I wish Krita had LCH support, and it is suitable for content creation too (I used it to alter my Ultimate Ride Disney Coaster theme textures after they been automatically filtered in Krita.

mikeholder wrote:Are the any plans to include xcf support for future versions of Gimp?

Gimp has updated the .psd plugin, and it is much better than it used to be, so for now, I use .psd as the format to share with Krita.

What I hope for is full xcf support in Krita with Gimp's new layer modes and higher bit depth. The .psd plugin is much improved in Gimp 2.9, but the bit depth stays at 8 for now when I export a .psd.

Krita does support higher bit depths in psd. As for xcf, Krita can only read, not save xcf files, and that's only possible because someone, more than a decade ago, wrote a small library for reading xcf files. The library is unmaintained, so updates to the 2.10 format are unlikely. And until 2.10 is released, 2.9 is only a development release with things like the file format likely to change still. Then again, the xcf file format is intentionally undocumented: the gimp developers don't want it to become a general interchange format, but the internal file format for gimp, just like the .kra format is internal to Krita.

I think he's referring to 64-bit depth in GIMP, and last time I checked, 32-bit processing can be a pain in Krita. Photoshop can handle it better, but at some point, you're reaching to the point where not even my computer can handle it. I don't think people who have a high-end computers using Krita are able to afford dealing with a small image of 320*240 with 64-bit. I don't even remember Photoshop supporting anything higher than 32-bit and will not support 64-bit any time soon. 64-bit is one of those depth that's really only going to be supported by the scientific imaging community unless technology advances to the point where 64-bit image processing is sensible. Other than that, I don't recall anyone else using 64-bit images.

Reptorian wrote:I think he's referring to 64-bit depth in GIMP, and last time I checked, 32-bit processing can be a pain in Krita. Photoshop can handle it better, but at some point, you're reaching to the point where not even my computer can handle it. I don't think people who have a high-end computers using Krita are able to afford dealing with a small image of 320*240 with 64-bit. I don't even remember Photoshop supporting anything higher than 32-bit and will not support 64-bit any time soon. 64-bit is one of those depth that's really only going to be supported by the scientific imaging community unless technology advances to the point where 64-bit image processing is sensible. Other than that, I don't recall anyone else using 64-bit images.

And I don't understand how you can interpret the original question in this way. Your earlier answer wasn't really relevant, and in any case, you cannot know whether we intend to support 64 bit floating point or not. All it takes is one extra class, because all the heavy lifting is supported by littlecms anyway. I might just do that for the heck of it. But, like I said, it's not relevant in the context of the original question, which was about compatibility with the xcf file format because gimp's psd file format plugin is limited to 8 bit/channel images.

boudewijn wrote:

Reptorian wrote:I think he's referring to 64-bit depth in GIMP, and last time I checked, 32-bit processing can be a pain in Krita. Photoshop can handle it better, but at some point, you're reaching to the point where not even my computer can handle it. I don't think people who have a high-end computers using Krita are able to afford dealing with a small image of 320*240 with 64-bit. I don't even remember Photoshop supporting anything higher than 32-bit and will not support 64-bit any time soon. 64-bit is one of those depth that's really only going to be supported by the scientific imaging community unless technology advances to the point where 64-bit image processing is sensible. Other than that, I don't recall anyone else using 64-bit images.

And I don't understand how you can interpret the original question in this way. Your earlier answer wasn't really relevant, and in any case, you cannot know whether we intend to support 64 bit floating point or not. All it takes is one extra class, because all the heavy lifting is supported by littlecms anyway. I might just do that for the heck of it. But, like I said, it's not relevant in the context of the original question, which was about compatibility with the xcf file format because gimp's psd file format plugin is limited to 8 bit/channel images.

"What I hope for is full xcf support in Krita with Gimp's new layer modes and higher bit depth. " From the OP.

That's where I think of 64-bit and blending modes in GIMP. In GIMP, there are layer LCH blending modes such as:
- LCH Luminance
- LCH Lightness
- LCH Chrominance
- LCH Hue

In any case, it's not too much trouble to copy and paste GIMP 2.9.6 results to Krita. I do it whenever I need the LCH support.

The problem is with Gimp, not Krita. Xcf files created by Gimp 2.9 can't be opened by Kita, or even Gimp 2.8. Psd files can be opened by Krita, but Gimp can only export psd as 8 bit. I don't use 64 bit depth for anything. Gimp 2.9 does 32 bit internally for adjustments, if I understand correctly. My desire for higher bit depth is not to lose info when making adjustments like level/curves etc. Sure, I could export every layer and mask separately and rebuild in Krita, but that's a hassle and why I was asking about future xcf support.

Hmmmm ... I think I've been doing something wrong. Normally, I purchase my laptops used on Ebay without an OS. I don't like to spend more than $300. Maybe spending more would help?

A more expensive laptop won't make Gimp different There's tiff, which may work as an interchange format, but I'm hopelessly out of date with gimp development myself. I am the Krita maintainer and chief developer, but I haven't managed to build gimp from sources for ages.

mikeholder wrote:The problem is with Gimp, not Krita. Xcf files created by Gimp 2.9 can't be opened by Kita, or even Gimp 2.8. Psd files can be opened by Krita, but Gimp can only export psd as 8 bit. I don't use 64 bit depth for anything. Gimp 2.9 does 32 bit internally for adjustments, if I understand correctly. My desire for higher bit depth is not to lose info when making adjustments like level/curves etc. Sure, I could export every layer and mask separately and rebuild in Krita, but that's a hassle and why I was asking about future xcf support.

Hmmmm ... I think I've been doing something wrong. Normally, I purchase my laptops used on Ebay without an OS. I don't like to spend more than $300. Maybe spending more would help?

There are plugins to support exporting layers and group layers out of GIMP. I use Krita over GIMP as a main program for everything, and because of 3 words: Nondestructive editing. I also use it because it is much faster than GIMP as it is now. You always lose information on GIMP if you do really deep editing no matter the color depth. There is GIMP-Painter, but it is not the main GIMP and it is a unproven solution.