XiLight

A photo collection becomes useful when the best frames are easy to find and their treatment feels deliberate. XiLight brings that work into the XiKey™ family: choose a sequence, shape its light and colour, and prepare a consistent set for its next destination.

XiLight is Alpha and free today. This page describes the documented LightCraft foundation at the inspected commit. XiKey interface integration and release validation remain unfinished; it does not promise a ready installer for every target platform. Project status, checked 2026-10-14.

For photographers working through a whole set

XiLight’s direction suits photographers, collection editors and small creative teams who need both a library and a development workflow. In the upstream foundation, ratings, flags, colour labels and albums help narrow the collection. Search can combine fields such as date, camera, keyword and rating, so the next decision begins with a manageable selection. Library evidence.

Development is non-destructive: adjustments stay separate from the original. Exposure controls, curves, white balance, the colour mixer and three-way grading give you choices from a neutral correction to a deliberate series treatment. Brushes, gradients and range masks let you refine part of a frame. Compare before and after before deciding the image is ready. Development tools and masking tools, inspected 2026-10-14.

Three collections, three reasons to develop carefully

A marine ecology photo survey

A field team returns with shoreline images captured across several dates. Try grouping them by survey session, rating the useful observations and using camera/date searches to find a location’s coverage. A conservative exposure and white-balance pass can improve viewing copies. Keep the original captures as the evidence record: a developed image is not a scientific calibration or an automatic species identification. Library and development foundation.

Photography for a ceramics catalogue

A studio has a set of bowls, tiles and vessels photographed against a simple backdrop. Start with a representative frame, set white balance and crop to the catalogue’s ratio, then copy only the relevant setting groups across the selection. Inspect glaze colours and highlights individually before export; matching an object’s appearance for print still requires a validated colour workflow. Copy settings and presets and export formats.

An amateur cycling race collection

An event photographer has bursts from the start, climbs and finish. Use flags and ratings to narrow the story, compare similar frames and apply a shared tonal treatment to the selected sequence. Export viewing files and a contact-sheet PDF for the club’s editors to discuss. The contact sheet uses current edits, an A4 or Letter grid and optional filename captions; it is not a full custom print-layout module. Selection tools and contact-sheet workflow.

From import to a considered delivery

1. Import a sample first. Check the exact camera model and shooting compression, not just the RAW extension.
2. Organize the session in albums, flag candidates and use ratings to make a smaller selection.
3. Establish light and colour, refine masks and crops, then compare before and after. Sync selected settings rather than assuming every frame needs the same correction.
4. Export with an appropriate size, quality, colour space and metadata policy. Review the exported files and retain the source images and library.

JPEG, PNG, TIFF and supported RAW families are documented. RAW coverage is uneven: some CR3, compressed ORF and Nikon High Efficiency NEF files may be preview-only. Supported XMP settings can move across, but Lightroom rendering, unsupported profiles and AI edits do not reproduce identically. Camera support details, format matrix and XMP interchange.

What XiKey is adding

In progress: an Arabic interface with a one-click EN ⇄ ع switch; a style-grouped Arabic font dialog; and XiKey splash, About and message dialogs. The live language switch is demonstrated in XiPhoto and is still being brought to XiLight. Shared kashida, tashkeel, Arabic digit and Hijri-date tools are also in progress for image apps; their integration and useful placement here remain unfinished. This is not a promise of working Arabic watermarks today.

Planned: Classic and Modern layouts, Retina scaling and sandboxed add-ons through XiLauncher. In progress: signed update delivery through XiLauncher. XiKey progress and XiKey roadmap, checked 2026-10-14.

Choose Alpha with its limits in view

Evaluate a representative shoot before moving a collection. Camera colour and lens corrections have documented gaps; automatic masks do not offer the same mature behaviour as Lightroom’s AI tools, and optional model deployment is not guaranteed in XiKey. Classic catalogue import is one-way and approximate; Lightroom plug-ins are not compatible. Cloud synchronization, mobile continuity and a full printing module are not verified XiKey services. Upstream gaps and project state.

Targets are Windows x64/ARM64, macOS and Linux, based on upstream platform support. XiKey installers and hardware minima still need release validation. Alpha is free; paid subscriptions start at Beta under the store policy, checked 2026-10-14.

Source review: LightCraft 0.7.1, commit b3d392b4994ee99dc389890f006600769d0c4ff5, checked 2026-10-14. README, feature and format documentation, gaps, what’s new and v0.7.1 release notes were reviewed.

XiLight is based on LightCraft by the ArtCraft team (MIT OR Apache-2.0).

XiKey is a trademark of Pioneer Local Development Co. Ltd.