Horse portrait

[Hazel Grant]

Found this beauty in Valdosta, Ga while watching my granddaughter take riding lessons.
Topaz oil filter.

[Dennis Bishop]

I'm a great fan of horses, so this image really speaks to me, perhaps in a way that people who haven't been around horses wouldn't understand. The colors are wonderful, too. Although I like the lighting very much, I played around with the extremes -- opened the shadows (with the Camera Raw filter) and backed off on the lightest highlights (Camera Raw filter and a Levels luminosity mask output slider). I also subdued the stall frame on the left and top with a reduced opacity black layer so it didn't compete with the horse.

[Hazel Grant]

I like what you did with the highligts backed off. Not sure yet about the stall wood. Have to decide if it's too much brown for the overall. Thanks for the input.

[Anita Bower]

Horse head is nicely framed by door opening and darkness on the right. Lovely portrait. Dennis knows his way around PS and improved an already lovely image.

[Cheryl Slechta]

Hi, Hazel, I love the expression and the framing of the head. I like Dennis' repost - the stall frame on the left was the first thing that caught my eye and I was going to comment on it.