OK, thanks …
Nice challenge!
the.fog.and.the.arw.xmp (15.2 KB)
I did chose not to lighten the total image too much. Both from a lightness point of view as well as keeping the noise down. I really like @asn’s edit, but I do think it is too light (my taste/2c…). Going to have a look at his xmp now.
This is one I’m going to be playing with for a while. I think that the horse can be somewhat improved (both mask and white/lightness).
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Interesting challenge. No mention was made of white balance or demosaic, so I took the white balance hint from the origin posting and used amaze with full & local average. BTW, I couldn’t figure out a way to make it monochrome using the exposure slider and blend modes. 
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You can do a lot with blend modes:
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@Jade_NL I would never have figured that one out. Its always nice to learn yet another way to go to monochrome. However the challenge as I read it, was to only move the “exposure slider.”
@asn Am I correct that the “black level correction” slider was off limits?
I interpreted it as using the exposure module,not limited to just the exposure slider.
the exposure module + the exposure slider
Is phrased a bit weird though.
Anyway: If only the exposure slider slider can be used I did not play by the rules (both times).
BTW: Changing black level to 0 and cranking up exposure really high (10 or so) also works to get a B&W rendition.
Me neither 
. Here my version with only using the exposure slider and parametric masks.
2019-08-25__7M36616_01.ARW.xmp (9.1 KB)
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I edited it on my notebook which doesn’t have a calibrated screen and the brightness was low. I recognized it after you mentioned it. It could be a little bit darker but not much. The idea of the challage is that you learn how to use masks and blend modes 
Hi,
interesting, but how does this work with the new recommended scene-referred workflow? AFAIK many of the blending modes are display referred. Or perhaps you avoided those in your edit? Thanks!
Well, it depends. For dodging and burning you would use the exposure module in mulitply mode 
Multiply assumes that 1.0 is white though… But I may be wrong.
(I have no problem with this btw, I was just curious to know how this plays with the scene-referred/no hardcoded assumptions way of doing things)
Thanks for the reply!
It depends on the blend modes in question and their implementation. I feel that it isn’t a one size fits all; i.e. it depends on the input image (HDR or not? etc.) and what you are trying to do with it. Trouble is with the GUI (display-referred) interface.
Here’s what I have written down from @anon41087856’s guidance elsewhere:
In linear RGB, you should only use blend modes based:
- on arithmetic operations (addition, multiplication, division, subtraction, average),
- on maximum/minimum comparisons (screen blend mode)
- or on channel separations (hue, color, chroma, etc. blend modes).
Mask blend modes not recommended:
- lighten, darken, overlay, soft light, hard light, pin light and linear light.
My comment: Of course, these are recommendations for staying linear. As can be seen, when used with talent, one can obtain very interesting results.
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I came late to this, but I really like the challenge!
I’ll learn first (and see already, where it’ll change my astro shots) and then see, whether or not I’ll come back with something not seen here yet 
