Bode Museum – Berlin, Germany (HDR)

The story of this photo

View the Before-and-After Comparison to see where this photo comes from!

This shot was taken earlier this year. It depicts the “Bode Museum”, one of five internationally renowned museums on the Museum Island in Berlin. If you ever visit Berlin, this is one of the place to go, right at the heart of the city, not far from the cathedral. Even if you are not interested in the collections of art and historic items, the buildings alone are worth the visit.

How it was shot

• Handheld [details]
• Three exposures (0, -2, +2 ev) autobracketed and merged to get and HDR
• Camera: Nikon D90
• Lens: Sigma 10-20mm F3,5 EX DC HSM
• Details can be found here

How it was tonemapped

• Preparation: developed the RAW files with ACR mainly in order to reduce the CA [details]
• Resulting TIF images were then used as input to Photomatix
• Tone-mapping: Photomatix Pro 4.0 (Detail Enhancer)

How it was post-processed

• Post-processing was done in Photoshop
• Topaz Adjust on the entire image to get back the colors and the details [details]
• Topaz Denoise on the entire image (more aggressively on the sky) [details]
• Topaz Infocus on the entire image for sharpening
• Selective color layer on the sky to get a more intense blue tones
• Saturation layer on the sky (master, blues)
• Levels layer on the sky (brightening)
• Levels layer on the clouds (more contrast)
• Saturation layer on the buildings (yellows and toned down the reds)
• Levels layer on the buildings (more contrast)
• Curves layer in selected areas of the museum (more contrast)
• Levels layer on the dome (more contrast)
• Saturation layer on the dome (master, reds)
• Saturation layer on the water (master)
• Photo filter layer on selected areas of the water (cyan)
• Photo filter layer on selected areas of the water (orange)
• Curves layer on the water to enhance the reflective look
• Sharpening using the high-pass filter [details]
• Vignette effect using a masked fill layer [details]
• Watermarking (in the true sense of the word! ;-))

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