Files and Formats
Delacroix's own format is GIMP's XCF. Your work is never locked into a format only Delacroix can read: GIMP opens it, and Delacroix keeps what GIMP doesn't understand next to what it does.
1. XCF
File ▸ Save (⌘S) and Save As… (⇧⌘S) write an XCF file that GIMP 3.2 opens. It holds:
- Pixels, exactly as the engine stores them, in every precision GIMP supports.
- Layers and groups, with their visibility, opacity, mode and locks.
- Layer masks and channels.
- Paths and vector layers. GIMP opens a vector layer as its own editable vector layer, with its first fill and stroke.
- Text layers, which GIMP opens as editable text.
- Guides, the colour profile, and the image's metadata (EXIF, IPTC and XMP), kept as GIMP keeps them.
Save a Copy… saves without changing which file the window is attached to. Revert goes back to the saved file.
2. GIMP Compatibility
Delacroix does things GIMP doesn't, and keeps the data for them in the XCF as parasites, named blocks of data that GIMP carries along without using. Every feature falls into one of three levels:
| Level | What GIMP does | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Full | Opens it, shows it and edits it as Delacroix does | Pixel layers, groups, masks, layer modes, paths, text, vector layers, clip groups |
| Renders | Shows the same pixels; the editable settings are Delacroix's | Live shapes, compounds, artboards, placed images, symbols, global colours, adjustment layers, slices, guides at an angle |
| Delacroix-only | Can't draw it, and shows the layer without it | The effects and gradients below |
These are Delacroix-only:
- The Selective Colour, Develop Colour and Blend Ranges effects.
- The Clarity, Smart Sharpen and Film Grain filters when they are kept as effects.
- Freeform gradients on shapes.
- The Dither Brush's setup on a layer (the painted pixels themselves are ordinary pixels).
When GIMP 3.2 opens a file with a Delacroix-only effect, it warns that a filter was discarded and shows the layer without it. The layer and its pixels are intact, and when the file comes back to Delacroix every setting is still there.
Seeing and choosing the level
- The badge in the status bar shows the document's level. Click it to see which features set it.
- File ▸ GIMP Compatibility… lists them, with a remedy for each where there is one, such as baking an effect into the pixels.
- Before an action that would lower the level, Delacroix warns you. You can turn the warnings off for a document or for good.
- When a document has Delacroix-only features, saving suggests the
.dlx.xcfextension, so you can tell such files apart. It is still an XCF file. Once the remedies bring the document back to Full, plain.xcfis offered again.
If a file was edited in GIMP and its pixels or paths no longer match the Delacroix data kept with them, Delacroix notices when it opens the file and offers to reconcile them.
3. SVG Documents
SVG is a document format in Delacroix, not only an export:
- Open an SVG file and its shapes, groups, gradients, text and masks become editable vector layers.
- Save it as SVG and other applications draw it as Delacroix does. Pixel layers and placed images are embedded as PNG, text is written as SVG text, and a blur or drop shadow is written as an SVG filter. Live shapes, compounds, vector brush strokes, symbols, artboards, global colours and slices are kept as Delacroix data alongside, so the document reopens live.
- File ▸ Export Clean SVG… writes plain SVG without the Delacroix data.
An SVG document stays in the Vector persona. Switching to another persona offers to convert it to XCF.
SF Symbols templates are SVG documents; see Vector and SF Symbols.
4. Opening and Exporting Other Formats
File ▸ Open… opens these as documents; Open as Layers… adds them to the current one, and Open as Link Layers… adds them as layers linked to their files.
| Format | Extension | Open | Export | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| GIMP XCF | .xcf, .dlx.xcf |
Yes | Save | The native format |
| PNG | .png |
Yes | Yes | 8 or 16 bit, alpha, interlacing, compression level |
| JPEG | .jpg, .jpeg |
Yes | Yes | Quality setting |
| TIFF | .tif, .tiff |
Yes | Yes | No compression, LZW, PackBits, Deflate or JPEG |
| WebP | .webp |
Yes | Yes | Lossy or lossless, with alpha |
| HEIF | .heic, .heif |
Yes | Yes | |
| AVIF | .avif |
Yes | Yes | |
| GIF | .gif |
First frame | Yes | Exports the layers as an animation when As Animation is on |
| BMP | .bmp |
Yes | No | |
| Photoshop | .psd, .psb |
Yes, with layers | Yes, with layers | |
.pdf |
Yes | Pages open as layers or as separate images | ||
| SVG | .svg |
Yes | Save, Export Clean SVG | See above |
File ▸ Export As… writes a copy in another format; Overwrite writes it again to the same file. Other exports:
- File ▸ Export Slices… writes the slices made in the Export persona.
- File ▸ Export Artboards… writes each artboard as its own file.
- File ▸ Export Icon Set… writes icons from 16 to 512 px at @1x and @2x, as PNG files,
.icnsand.ico. - File ▸ Print… prints the image, or saves it as PDF from the print dialog.
Metadata
- Opening a photo brings in its colour profile, and its EXIF, IPTC and XMP metadata, which are kept in the XCF as GIMP keeps them.
- Exporting writes back the author, copyright, description, software, camera make and model, the dates, and the IPTC byline, caption and copyright. Other details, such as exposure settings and GPS position, are not written to exported files.
5. New Documents
File ▸ New… (⌘N) opens the New Image sheet, and the Welcome window shows the same presets when Delacroix starts. Presets are grouped as Recent, Print, Devices, Assets, Photo, Social, Video and My Templates. Search finds a preset by name or by size, such as "1080". Assets ▸ Pixel art has the pixel-art sizes, which open in the Pixel persona with a transparent background.
The Templates pane manages your own templates.
The File menu also has New SF Symbol, and commands for working with several images at once: New Batch Job…, New Focus Merge…, New HDR Merge…, New Panorama… and New Stack….