Words you will meet in CullTone
Most of these are ordinary photography terms. A few mean something specific inside CullTone, and those definitions say so.
Culling
- Cull
- Going through every frame of a shoot and deciding which ones the client sees. The least glamorous evening of the job. CullTone makes a first pass and explains each decision; you have the last word.
- Keep
- A photo CullTone thinks belongs in the delivery. Keepers are the ones that get edited.
- Review (cull decision)
- A photo CullTone couldn't decide on by itself, for example two nearly identical frames from the same moment. These are the ones to look at yourself.
- Archive
- A photo set aside, with the reason shown: eyes closed, motion blur, a sharper frame in the same burst. Archive is reversible and deletes nothing.
- Burst
- A run of frames taken within moments of each other. CullTone groups bursts and near-duplicates, also across several cameras, and compares the frames inside each group.
- Camera clock offset
- How far a camera's clock is from the others on the same shoot. With two shooters, a camera set five minutes fast would put the ring exchange in the wrong place; correcting the offset puts every photo back in shooting order.
- Tie-break
- An optional paid second opinion on the bursts CullTone couldn't separate by itself, such as six frames of the first kiss that all look sharp. It shows its price and runs only after you approve.
- Genre preset
- A set of culling rules for one kind of shoot. A closed eye matters more in a group portrait than in a dance-floor shot. There are 18; at launch we offer weddings and events.
Files
- RAW file
- The camera's unprocessed sensor data, such as Sony ARW, Canon CR3 or Nikon NEF. CullTone never changes it.
- DNG
- Digital Negative, Adobe's openly documented RAW format. Some cameras write it directly; others are converted to it. CullTone opens DNG, but we haven't tested it yet.
- XMP sidecar
- A small text file saved next to a photo with the same name and the extension .xmp. Lightroom reads it for ratings, colour labels and develop settings. CullTone writes one per photo, including the reason for its decision.
- Preview
- A smaller copy of a photo, big enough to judge focus and expression. Previews and thumbnails are what you cull from on the web and the phone; the RAW file stays on your computer.
- IPTC DigitalSourceType
- A standard metadata field that records how an image was made. When a photo has been retouched from a prompt, CullTone fills it in to say the image includes generated content, so other software can tell.
Editing and checking
- Look
- A set of edit settings applied to a whole project or a single photo: tone, colour, contrast, grain. CullTone has 54, and you choose one; it never picks a look from the people in the photos.
- Learned style
- A look CullTone builds from your past edits in Lightroom catalogs or XMP sidecars. So far it has been tested only on a simulated photographer.
- Mask
- The part of a photo an adjustment applies to. CullTone can make masks for people, sky, faces, skin, and face and neck together.
- White balance
- The colour correction that makes white things look white under warm tungsten, cool shade or mixed light. CullTone reads it from the parts of the photo that should be neutral, like a white shirt or a grey wall.
- Clipping
- Pixels pushed to pure white or pure black, where the detail is gone. The quality check flags clipped highlights before a photo reaches the client.
- Review step
- The step after editing, between Edit and Deliver, where you check each edit, approve it or send it back. Its automatic quality check flags skin colour shifts, clipped highlights and size or metadata problems. Not the same as a Review decision in the cull.
- AI-modified label
- The honest mark on any photo retouched from a prompt or template. It shows in the app and the client gallery and is written into the file's metadata. Photos that only had an everyday edit don't carry it.
Studio and delivery
- Workspace
- Your studio's account in CullTone: its projects, looks, members and plan.
- Seat
- One person who can cull, edit or review: an owner, editor or reviewer. Clients who only view a gallery don't take a seat. A pending invite holds one until it is accepted or revoked.
- Gallery expiry
- The date a client gallery goes offline. By default it is six months away; you can pick another date or extend it later. Thirty days after expiry the gallery copies are deleted; your edited photos stay in the project.
- People
- CullTone's face grouping. It compares faces within one project only, so you can check that every important person was photographed, and it can be switched off per project.