All Dried Up

[jar_e]

An interesting dead, dried up plant I found on my recent trip. Does this work for anyone? Are the warm colors good? When I did auto levels, I totally lost the feeling of this picture.
I'll attach both for reference. The top one is mine, right out of the camera, the second is auto levels.

Thanks, and I appreciate the comments,

Jared

[Roy Latham]

The dried plant subject is a good one, and I like your original version much better than the auto levelled one. The large area of out-of-focus background is almost painful to me, as the eyes try to bring it into focus. Of course at my age that happens more than it used to anyway. I think the subject would work well as a cropped close up.

[Mr Yuck]

I like the original too

Very dry image, I like it

[Chunk]

Somewhere between the two lies a stronger pic with the separation from the background of the second with the better color and detail in the subject of the first. Do a manual levels adjustment to get about half the lightening of the auto on an ajustment layer and then erase over the subject with a soft brush or lay the autolevels pic over the original, erase over the subject and reduce the opacity of the layer.
I think I'd crop off the top and right 1/4th of the pic to lessen the strength of the twig behind the subject which leads the eye out of the frame and make the subject be a larger part of the frame.

Very nice pic. I like the dried remains of flowers and have a few of those sort of things myself.

[almo]

I prefer not to comment on this one. I am just going to post my take on it. ifn' ya'll wanna know what I did just ask.

[jar_e]

Everybody, thanks for the respones. Chunk, I'll definately try that with the manual settings. I did try it a little, but really didn't know what I was going for, so I'll try your idea. Almo, I like the crop, definately brings in the subject. Do you think the sharpness is good for my originals?

Jared