Releases & Updates.

Welcome to Project Kestrel v(Swamp Sparrow)! Kestrel gets significant improvements to the analysis options and user interface!

Key Changes

• New Group Detection Algorithm: Utilizes timestamps to more accurately group burst shots, particularly of birds in flight! New setting to change the auto-grouping time-based threshold.
• Improved Quality Scoring: Improved quality scoring and species classification accuracy in poorly-lit conditions by implementing exposure shifting within the pipeline.
• Reduced False Positives: Reduced false positive bird detection rate + new setting to control bird detection threshold.
• New "Timeline" Visualization Mode: Review your birding expedition hour by hour.
• Metadata Editing: You can now edit each scene's species and family tags, which will be reflected in the search capabilities!
• RAW Preview Support: RAW preview mode is supported in the scene view as well!
• Updated Rating System: Kestrel's auto-generated quality ratings are now standardized to your photo library, making the ratings more useful for your unique setup and style. Change this anytime in settings.

Minor Changes

• UI Tweaks and Bug Fixes
• New database structure (maintains backward-compatibility)

Coming Soon

• Video Tutorial is coming soon on projectkestrel.org
• Projectkestrel.org will be updated to reflect the full capabilities of Project Kestrel
• No major features are planned at this time; user feedback is requested as soon as possible.
• GPU support is on the roadmap; as are improvements to image quality classification and species classification.

Feedback? Please visit projectkestrel.org/contact or use the in-app feedback feature! I really need feedback! Please provide feedback. Thank you!

Thank you for trying Project Kestrel! Download Kestrel from the Microsoft Store by visiting www.projectkestrel.org for automatic updates.

Welcome to Project Kestrel v(Yellow Warbler)!

Kestrel's scene detection has been substantially improved, particularly for birds in flight. Kestrel also gets several bug fixes and UI improvements.

Key Changes

• Better Burst Grouping: Massive improvement to Kestrel's scene/burst detection methodology, especially for birds in flight. Kestrel now uses photo timestamps in addition to comparing the photos themselves to determine scenes.
• New scene editing features: Split a scene into multiple scenes, and edit the species and family tags associated with a scene for improved searchability!
• Improved Kestrel Culling Assistant: New "Reject All" and "Accept All" Buttons
• Expanded RAW Editor Support: Kestrel now lets you select out of 16 RAW editors to open photos with, and you can set your own custom executable path.

Minor Changes

• Several UI Improvements
  • Kestrel will prompt you to save changes before closing or before opening the Kestrel Culling Assistant.
  • Improved Settings, Live Analysis, and Scene GUI
  • New feature to opt-in to additional wildlife species detection (beyond just birds)
• Kestrel will prompt you to re-analyze folders that have been analyzed with an older version of the pipeline. Use this to re-analyze scenes with birds in flight!
• Ability to clear Kestrel analysis data by right-clicking on a folder in the main view.
• Removed "Use GPU When Available" checkbox since GPU is not supported.

Coming Soon

• Video Tutorial is coming soon on projectkestrel.org
• Projectkestrel.org will be updated to reflect the full capabilities of Project Kestrel
• No major features are planned at this time; user feedback is requested as soon as possible.
• GPU support is on the roadmap; as are improvements to image quality classification and species classification.

Feedback? Please visit projectkestrel.org/contact or use the in-app feedback feature! I really really really need feedback! Please provide feedback. Thank you!

Thank you for trying Project Kestrel! Download Kestrel from the Microsoft Store by visiting www.projectkestrel.org for automatic updates.

Welcome to Project Kestrel v(Tufted Titmouse)! Project Kestrel gets bug fixes, UI improvements, and a new logo.

Key Changes

• New Logo! Project Kestrel features a new logo, an American Kestrel morphing into a Camera lens aperture.
• Improved Bird Detection: Fixed a bug where the software would detect the same bird multiple times, especially with poor quality auxiliary detections.
• New Write XMP Metadata Button: You no longer need to go through the Kestrel Culling Assistant to write metadata; you can directly export Kestrel's star ratings and import them into your favorite RAW workflow editor.

Minor Changes

• Updated Tutorial: The in-app tutorial has been updated to reflect the latest workflow.
• Analytics Fixes: Resolved issues with analytics data collection.
• Expanded RAW Support: Fixed a bug where TIFF and TIF files would not be supported.
• Adobe Lightroom Enhancements: Expanded metadata handling to include more fields.

Upcoming Features

• GPU Support: Hardware acceleration (CUDA/ROCm) is on the roadmap.
• Video walkthrough: Coming soon to projectkestrel.org
• Improved Quality Classification: Ongoing improvements to image quality scoring.

Feedback wanted: We are especially interested in feedback on the new culling assistant tool! Does it have the customization you need? Is the XMP metadata export working? How about the RAW previews? Share your thoughts through the in-app feedback feature or at projectkestrel.org/contact.

This release includes contributions from dedicated members of the open-source community. Thank you!

Welcome to Project Kestrel v(Chickadee)! Kestrel finally has the ability to create XMP sidecar files that let you import Kestrel's Ratings and Culling Assistant categorizations into Lightroom, Darktable, or any other XMP-aware photo editor! 🎉

Key Changes

• Kestrel 🔗 Lightroom/Darktable: Kestrel can now produce XMP sidecar files, allowing you to export Kestrel's automatic ratings and Accept/Reject categorizations into your favorite photo editing app!
• Improved Culling Assistant: New sliders to fine-tune control over the culling process.
• Code Signing: Kestrel is now available on the Microsoft Store and has been signed by Apple! No more malware warnings; Simply "Drag to Applications" or "Get from the Microsoft Store".

Minor Changes

• UI Improvements: Substantially improved folder tree and folder queuing dialog systems for better control and intuitiveness.
• Bug Fixes & Performance: Significantly faster when loading thousands of scenes.

Upcoming Features

• Video Tutorial is coming soon on projectkestrel.org
• Projectkestrel.org will be updated to reflect the full capabilities of Project Kestrel

Feedback wanted: I am especially interested in feedback on the new culling assistant tool! Does it have the customization you need? Is the XMP metadata export working? How about the RAW previews?

Project Kestrel receives a major workflow update with the new Culling Assistant and guided in-app tutorials.

• New Culling Assistant: Automatically organizes photos into Accept and Reject piles based on Kestrel's rating and analysis.
• Faster review: Click any image to load a full-resolution preview and cull rapidly scene-by-scene.
• Quick reassignment: Use Shift+Click to move a photo between Accept and Reject.
• Autosave progress: Culling decisions are preserved automatically while you work.
• Safe-by-design: Kestrel only moves rejected images into a dedicated rejects folder and does not delete your photos.
• New In-App Tutorials: Click Tutorial for guided walkthroughs of both the main window and culling assistant.

Minor changes: New Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, updated usage data policy with optional advanced telemetry opt-in, plus bug fixes and UI improvements.

Coming soon: Video walkthrough on projectkestrel.org/tutorial and XMP sidecar export for Adobe Lightroom workflows.

Feedback wanted: We're especially interested in feedback on the culling threshold behavior (currently ratings below 4 stars default to reject). Share your ideas via projectkestrel.org/contact or the in-app feedback feature.

Welcome to Project Kestrel v(Junco-2026.02.24)! This update introduces better folder management and integrated feedback tools.

• Enhanced Folder Queuing: Scan folders and see which ones have not yet been fully analyzed.
• In-App Feedback: New "Feedback" button to report bugs or provide suggestions directly.
• Optional Analytics: Opt-in to send basic usage data (file sizes, analysis time) to help improve Kestrel. 100% anonymous.
• Automatic Version Checking: Get notified if a new version is available on startup.
• UI & Bug Fixes: Various interface tweaks and stability improvements.

Known Issue: Minor bugs with folder loading during active analysis.

Version Finch brings a massive interface overhaul and merges the Analyzer and Visualizer into a single, intuitive application.

• Unified App: No more separate "Analyzer" and "Visualizer" — everything is now in one place.
• Multi-Folder Exploration: Search through tens of thousands of images across multiple outings simultaneously.
• Queue Folders: Easily queue multiple folders for background or overnight analysis.
• Tutorial View: New quick-start tutorial to help you get running as fast as possible.
• Performance: Massive uplift in loading speeds and general responsiveness.

The initial cross-platform release, bringing Kestrel to both Windows and macOS (Silicon).

• macOS Support: Full release for Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3).
• Dependency Injection: Completely removed the requirement for ImageMagick.
• PyQt6 & Rawpy: Upgraded core libraries for significant performance gains.
• Hotfixes: Addressed critical bugs in RAW image parsing and visualizer loading (Feb 15/16).