Rolling Horse

Camera: Canon EOS40D

Lens: 17-85mm EF USM Kit Lens

Extras: Polarization filter.

Apps used for processing:

Squaready - to cut the picture to 1:1 format.

SimplyHDR - for a HDR picture in color.

DramaticB&W - for a b&w HDR picture.

Blender - to blend both HDR pictures with the goal to obtain a deeper blue color of the sky.

TouchRetouch - for minor touch-ups.

FilterStorm3 - to soften (denoise) the sky. I applied a mask to spare the sculpture from being blurred too. Unfortunately a negative side effect of pseudo-HDR rendering by apps is to end up with a dirty and noisy sky.

PhotoForge2 - to create a high pass layer which I then blend in Blender with the original layer in Overlay mode for sharpening the picture.

SnapSeed - to apply sort of a Lomo like filter because I wanted a Lomo effect but wasn't happy with the Lomo effect in PhotoForge2 because it's vignetting effect cannot be adjusted.
FilterStorm3 - to create a 25% white frame.
A+Signature - to add my copyright watermark.

Instagram - to apply the Rise filter. This was fading out to colors again but it was just fine to share it with the Instagram community. Tip: If you don't want Instagram to upload your finished picture all you need is switching your iPhone to "airplane mode". There is no Internet connection possible then so Instagram will tell you that the upload failed but saves the high resolution copy of your picture nevertheless.

 

Because I still wanted to try something else so I was loading the Instagram picture and the previous picture in Blender again to blend them 50/50 in Overlay mode which nicely enhanced the colors. Then I loaded the result in MonoPhix to create a b/w picture that I then blend again in Blender with the previous color picture to create my final, almost black and white version of the Rolling Horse. Setting was 27% color in Normal blend mode.

The title of my picture wasn't chosen by me. It's the official name of this huge 9.5m tall and 35ton heavy sculpture created by the German artist Jürgen Görtz for the German railroad company "DB". The Rolling Horse can be seen at the Berlin Main Station (Berliner Hauptbahnhof), "Europa Platz" right of the North Gate when leaving the station. My original photo was made on September 13, 2008.