to all who participated in this challenge - THANX!! i think it is good to see the different approaches & the results for each of us to determine which we feel produces the most realistic image (or artistic, i suppose, if you didn't prefer realistic)

for me, as it was my picture, i learned at least 1 thing - to be more sensitive to the noise level. i don't know if i should be ashamed to admit it or not, but when i looked at this picture, & even when i submitted it, i wasn't consciously aware of the noise. although, the particular area that i wasn't happy with in my own edit was the rock on the right hand side - & that is where the noise showed up the most (at least to me)

buddy interjected some thoughts via his wife about the lighting of the scene. not surprisingly, roman depicted the correct source of light, but he was also spot on when he described it as "soft & diffused". the sky that is seen in this shot is very deceiving to the rest of the sky. by that, i mean, this was about the only portion of the sky that looked like this. the rest of it was extremely milky. i could show you a few shots & you'd see what i mean. even a few that are essentially in the same direction. so roman's assessment was right.

buddy (or anyone else that would be interested in the future) i didn't do it, cuz i know where the light was coming from, but i would think if you had a question about it, with the sky in the scene, use the threshholds & slide the bar to the right, & i'm willing to bet that the right hand side of the sky will be the last to turn black.

compositionally - i have to admit that i didn't take as much time as i might have. so yes, there are some points to the shot that aren't ideal. but this challenge was mostly about the post processing, so i wasn't as concerned with those aspects here. in the future, if i were more in tune with the sky as it was, i would probably have attempted to lower the horizon a bit more to the lower 3rd. the plant i might have tried to move to a different location in the frame. but frankly, it doesn't bother me as much as it did for some - so maybe not.

for the most part, i like this shot a lot. & i knew that there was more to get out of it than my edit. i appreciate seeing some alternatives here, & it motivates me to see where i can grow & learn.

if no one objects, i'm ready for the next file. when it becomes available, include me to send it to. if i need to provide an email, let me know. otherwise, i'll look for whatever instructions for getting it.

jp