Smokey Dawn 2

Wow, this is great Bill! Tremendous depth throughout, with the fg leading nicely into the scene. Love this!!

Another natural looking hdr, Bill. Probably a ton more detail to be seen with a dark background. I've enjoyed your different looking series from here!

I'd prefer this over the previous post. There's a little more details in the foreground.

Bill,

I really like the scene here, but this one feels a bit more HDR than the previous post. I say that mostly because of the way the rock in the LLC looks. Also, the far canyon seems much more hazy in this one and the color seems a bit too cyan.

I do really like the comp and the dynamic created between the lower left and the tower (forgot the name.) And in this image, the horizon/sky is excellent; great color and no issue with exposure or no pure white like the previous version. In fact, you could take this sky and replace......

Lon

Hi, Bill,

I agree with Lon's observations. An HDR suggestion: Instead of using PS or Photomatix tonality adjustments, simply save and import the 32-bit tif into Lightroom (if you have version 4) and use Lightroom's adjustments.

Bill, you caught some very pretty scenes, and this is no exception. Well done.
John

Nice shot .You catch great moment

i have to agree with Lon--it looks like HDR in that the contrast is gone. I dont think you should be using 'hdr' techniques at all here (not in the sense of using software or even multiple blends) You need to mimic (or actually use) a graduated filter here. 2 exposures--one for the sky, one for the canyon. the only difficulty would be the horizon, and you could cure that with a little PS (or LR) work. BTW, the first one wasn't as dark once the bright sun went away...