I thought my shot was shot!

[PhotogChic]

This is the before photo:


EXIF:
I shot in Av mode (I normally shoot in manual but I've been playing with the setting on the new camera and didn't change them back...DOH!)
Exposure 1/8000
Aperature 5.0 (couldn't believe I did that!)
focal length 95mm; 152mm full frame length
ISO 200

I thought for sure I couldn't salvage it! I wanted to cry! The scene was so peaceful and beautiful and I ruined it!

Here's the after photo:


Most of the work I did was in Lightroom:
1. I decreased the temperature from 4680 to 3058
2.I increased the tint from +17 to +26
3.I bumped up the exposure, increased the recovery to 100 to get rid of the blown out areas as much as I could, increased the fill light to 32, bumped up the brightness (from 50 to 63), bumped up the contrast from 25 to 73, bumped up the clarity to 31, decreased the vibrance to -15, and bumped the saturation to +8.
4.I played with the tone curve: highlights 31, lights -2, darks -2, shadows -17; point curve was set to medium contrast
5. I disabled the detail tab because I kept getting an ugly orange tint around the sun reflection on the water that I couldn't get rid of.
6. I thought the sky was pretty blown out so I used 2 graduated filters, each diagonal to and on each side of the sun, to bring that back too. I added a 30% blue tint and decreased the exposure and brightness. I think I increased the clarity to bring back the cloud on the right side of the sun too.

I opened the photo in Photoshop as a smart object and ran some noise reduction. I don't remember the exact settings but I remember the strength was 9, detail preservation was around 65%.

I then ran the unsharpen mask filter with setting around 100, diameter was around 1.2, and threshold was 2 or 3.

[Quo Fan]

Nice save. I like the after.

[windrider86]

Both are nice but to be honest, I REALLY like the before shot!

[Edsport]

First one for me too...

[canon*girl]

funny, because I think the first one is beautiful too! I do like the second one better though

[PhotogChic]

Wow! Thanks for the kind comments! I was going for closer to what I actually saw but after your comments I went back to LR and did a lot less tweaking and this is what I came up with:



What do you think of this?

[jujitsu1]

I also love the first one..It reminds me of an early morning shot.

[Vikkki]

I liked the processed one better.. I think I'd like it more if you could bump the saturation of the pink color a little more..

[PhotogChic]

Okay. Here's the update with the red, orange and yellows adjusted...

[Jennilyn76]

I love the "fixed" one in the OP