Twilight Thunder

Hi everyone! I'm afraid I haven't been able to be as active here as I had planned, but hope to be able to change that in the near future.

I took my family down to Waterton Lakes National Park (in SW Alberta, Canada) a couple of days ago for one of our regular "bear drives," and the weather turned a little wild to say the least. We called a stop to our search for bruins and headed to one of the local restaurants for shelter and a late snack, then turned for home. As we drove out of the village we looked up at one of the most famous landmarks here, the Prince of Wales Hotel, and were treated to quite a sight as the thunderstorm that had roared through the park was now immediately behind the hotel! We pulled over, I grabbed my gear and ran to the lakeside hoping for some dramatic shots.

This is one of my favourites from the evening, but I must confess it's really challenged my processing abilities. The RAW file as shot shows a lot of intense blue, which is stunning, but it seems to flare out or almost appear solarized (that term likely reveals my background in the film era). I had to change the white balance from the camera setting to a little warmer temperature and dramatically reduce the vibrancy and saturation to get rid of this. Of course, I lost all the incredible drama from the deep blue hues, but did end up with something that looked more natural than processed (ironic, because the over-processed look came straight from the untouched RAW file!). In the end I took two versions of the NEF file and blended them as smart objects to retain just a little of the contrast and colour while also toning the intensity down. I was tempted to dodge the lightning glow a little and burn in the shadows in the clouds but decided to leave it alone for now.

On my monitor, what I've posted here looks decent, but I'd sure appreciate your input! I also tried a few different attempts at reducing the noise a touch with Topaz but this image seems to be getting the better of me at every turn and in the end am presenting this without NR.

I really believe there's a lot of potential here even on the marketing front as it's a unique capture of a very famous National Park lodge, so I'd love to get this as perfect as possible.

Larger image provided and much superior for analysis.

With appreciation for your time and suggestions...

Nikon D7000
Tamron SP 70-210 f/2.8 LD at 72mm
ISO 500
6sec @ f/8
tripod mounted
horizontal crop from vertical